Some Blathering About Mary Todd Lincoln

The biggest shock of the week for me was reading that Mary Todd Lincoln was committed to a mental institute for four months at one point in her painful life. I read a little about this today and of course I have some thoughts that I will cram down your throat. I will preface by saying that I am only a woman with no college degree and some brain damage so feel free to ignore me - but on the other hand I've done a fair amount of reading about women's health issues in the nineteenth century.

These are Ms. Todd Lincoln's symptoms, from what I find online.

She spent too much money.

She worried about being alone.

She bought things she had no use for - this in particular is what upset her son and led to him institutionalizing her.

She heard voices.

She thought she had wires coming out of one eye.

She was in touch with the spirit world and had concerns about an Indian guide who was living in her head.

She had insomnia.

She tried to sell her old clothes - something else that mortified Robert.

Carried large amounts of cash around with her.

Had a fear of fire.

She had migraines.

So we have a woman whose husband was killed right next to her. Three of her four children died. She had very little money after Mr. Lincoln died. She was taking chloral hydrate and who knows what else to help her sleep and I seriously doubt that she had decent migraine medication.

Doesn't it make sense that she might have post traumatic stress disorder? Mixed up with a great big helping of depression? Add in the potions she was taking for her headache (tonics in the south at the time often contained mercury according to a book I read about midwifery in the American South in the mid to late nineteenth century) and you have a recipe for all kinds of symptoms.

Was she truly ill or a victim of her times? I don't know but I'm going to find out more. I've requested a book from the library based on letters from members of the Lincoln family.

Years ago, probably eleven or so, I was researching a play I was writing about midwifery. I found this account of a woman whose entire family was poisoned by mercury. It was given as a tonic to prevent yellow fever, I believe. She had six babies and they all died. In the end her husband locked her up in an institution and she died there. Reading about her broke my heart. Her tragedy was so pointless and wasteful. I wished I could go back in time and snatch her out of the hands of the doctors of her time.