Wittekindshof informs about new foundation for former home children of the handicapped or. Psychiatry.
A group of girls from the Wittekindshof facility for the disabled goes to church with an educator. Source: Archive Wittekindshof, Bad Oeynhausen
Bad Oeynhausen/ North Rhine-Westphalia/ Berlin/ Hamburg (AM). "I fight on and on", Ursel Weinand explains with a raised fist. The sentence is a motto of life for the 74-year-old, who has lived in a wheelchair-accessible apartment in Hamburg for more than 30 years. She is a former home child. She entered the home at the age of four, lived for more than 20 years in the Wittekindshof in Bad Oeynhausen and later in other homes for people with disabilities. "We were beaten with coat hangers and belts and could almost never get out. We secretly washed our panties because our underwear was checked every night," she says. If our shoes were broken or expired, we didn’t get anything to eat as punishment and were locked up.", Weinand reports. In the past, she often traveled in an electric wheelchair. She can no longer manage physically. For a few years now, the center of her life has been confined to her sofa. "Never again home she says and raises her fist to reinforce the statement. This is visibly difficult for her because she has been weakened for weeks by a severe case of pneumonia.