Results

From the thematic analysis, an overarching theme was developed, one that integrated the surgery and rehabilitation experiences of polio survivors: ‘The Ongoing Process of Recovery: Body, Mind, and Self’ reflects children’s recovery as a holistic, continuous process describing the physical, psychological, and social dimensions of those who lived through it, as well as the structures of recovery within the hospital environment and its hierarchy. The participants’ experiences reflected a tension between the healing and fracturing influences of the illness and the hospital environment. This tension is visible as a cross-cutting thread through the three main themes: ‘Surgical Treatments as Healing and Traumatizing Experiences’, ‘The Multidimensional Nature of Rehabilitation’, and ‘The Child’s Emotional Coping and Agency in the Hospital Environment.’ The results are presented under these three main themes. Figure 1 illustrates the experiential world of children constructed using the thematic analysis.

Figure 1.: The overarching theme, the main themes, and the subthemes resulting from the thematic analysis

Surgical Treatments as Healing and Traumatizing Experiences

The theme thus reflects the contradictory nature of corrective surgery—its perceived necessity on the one hand, and, on the other, the experiences of pain, fear, and loss of control over one’s own body linked to it. This theme is reflected in three sub-themes: experiences of corrective surgery, suffering associated with pain and physical distress, and feelings of fear and anxiety. Each subtheme is described in the following sections.

The analysis revealed how the experiences of corrective surgery in children diagnosed with polio constituted a dual phenomenon: The same procedures could offer hope for the recovery of the children’s functional capacity and the normalization of their bodies while simultaneously causing suffering. The theme thus reflects the contradictory nature of corrective surgery—its perceived necessity on the one hand, and, on the other, the experiences of pain, fear, and loss of control over one’s own body linked to it.

The participants’ experienced surgery as simultaneously restorative and traumatizing. Corrective surgical interventions occupied a central and often prolonged role in children’s narratives. The participants described a wide range of procedures, including ankle correction surgeries, tendon transfers, epiphysiodesis (surgical growth arrest), spinal fusion, and knee and hip surgeries. The experiences of corrective surgical treatment did not appear as isolated events; rather, they constituted identity-forming experiences during childhood: on the one hand, physical healing was seen as their desired goal; on the other, the experiences were accompanied by distress and disappointment—as the analysis revealed, surgery was experienced either as restorative and function-enhancing or as unhelpful and experimental in nature. In restorative narratives, children collectively recalled, for example, improved walking ability following surgery or liberation from assistive devices. Surgery’s positive impact was associated with a sense of the body normalizing or recovering:In the mornings, I remember that at first you were not really allowed to get up from bed at all. It must have been about a week and a half since we just stayed in bed, so it was just rest, there was not much else going on. Then they started trying to get me up, or rather I did manage to get up, but there was no cast on this one, just bandages, and there were proper stitches too. They kept me there until the stitches could be taken out, and then they checked whether the boy could move with it. But it was strange. I was able to walk, and when I came home, I did not need any aid at all, no cane or anything. It healed so well. (Polio survivor 1)

By contrast, some of the narratives reflected the cumulative burden of repeated and prolonged surgical treatments. The narratives were partly constructed around a persistent sense of being perpetually in plaster, preparing for surgery, or recovering from it, with each hospital stay lasting months. Some of them underwent so many surgeries that, even in adulthood, they were unable to recall all the procedures performed—the legacy was a body marked by scars. The narratives conveyed an image of confinement to bed and profound loneliness. Some perceived their own treatment and situation as unfair, particularly when they witnessed other children playing freely. Some associated corrective treatments with intense bitterness and anger, describing that they felt like ‘guinea pigs.’ Such experiences eroded their trust in care and reinforced the sense that bodily interventions were uncontrollable and externally imposed.They did tendon transfers and all sorts of things. They took a tendon from somewhere and transferred it to the thumb for instance. They carried out these experimental procedures. And then once, one of the doctors grabbed me out into the corridor and said, well we could do something about yours too—nothing is working properly there either, so we will fix that as well. But you always had to go there, there were senior consultants and other doctors, and they would all look together and decide whether to operate on something. (Polio survivor 10)

The participants’ experiences were also marked by intense distress related to post-operative nausea and vomiting. The pain experiences varied, and some narratives reflected a sense that analgesic medication was given sparingly, even when pain was intense. Pain appeared to be undertreated and left for children to bear alone. Morphine was frequently mentioned as the pain relief provided following knee surgery and other procedures; however, its significance was ambivalent. It brought relief from pain but simultaneously produced confusing and unpleasant side effects. Some described the sensation the medication produced as strange, saying they felt ‘as if in a cloud.'

The participants recalled that physical discomfort and pain were also caused by various assistive devices, supportive apparatuses, and stretching procedures. The Milwaukee brace caused skin breakdown, adding both pain and discomfort during the recovery phase. The post-operative stretching of operated limbs proved to be a particularly distressing experience. This procedure was performed without pain relief, and in some memories, the absence of medication was again a prominent feature. According to one participant, the stretching treatment caused a serious complication when the wound of the limb being stretched opened.I remember the doctor stretching the limb. No pain relief was given at all, and it was terrible. After the surgery, when the stitches were taken out, the doctor would stretch it and I screamed terribly. I remember it so well, even my fellow patient said afterwards that she had thought, how awful. And then suddenly there was a tear in this left one, and I said that the wound had opened. The stitches were already out. The doctor said it could not be, but it was, the stitches had come apart, and the wound was weeping and festering. (Polio survivor 34)

Corrective surgical treatments were also associated with a broad range of other fears and anxious experiences. For some, fear extended beyond individual procedures to encompass the future and the unpredictability of the treatment trajectory, while some feared, on each visit to the hospital or outpatient clinic, what new procedure would be devised for them and what surgery they would have to undergo again. Hospital equipment and the clinical environment could also appear threatening. X-ray machines were described as frightening, and anesthesia experiences were recalled as particularly traumatic. Ether anesthesia was repeatedly recalled as deeply distressing. During ether anesthesia, some participants described a sensation of being unable to breathe or of dying, as the procedures had not been explained to them in advance. One participant described how they were asked to choose the method of anesthesia themselves (injection or mask), adding a burden of responsibility to an already deeply frightening moment.The anesthetics were traumatic experiences. Back then, they would ask you whether you wanted an aesthetic injection or a mask an aesthetic, and yes, they did ask the child. Well, of course a child does not want an injection, so I remember choosing the mask—and it was just awful when they put the mask on and you felt like you could not get any air. You breathed as hard as you could, but no air came. There was this terrible panic just before you went under—you fell asleep quickly enough, but it was a horrible feeling, being held down with the mask forced on you and not being able to get any air. (Polio survivor 11)

Frightening details of various procedures were also described precisely. For example, cast removal with an electric saw was described as frightening because no one had explained what the saw would be used for. Many participants also described how treatment experiences manifested in their dreams. One participant described recurring dreams in which water pulled them under. Moreover, the analysis built a picture of how the serious conditions or deaths of other children were experienced as frightening. Fear of what might happen to oneself also manifested as a child’s fear of a priest or of being on a hospital balcony. The precise recollection of such memories in adulthood may be indicative of trauma formation during the hospitalization period.And then I always had this same recurring dream, every night, a hand would rise from the toilet bowl, a black hand, and I could not escape it, it just kept coming after me. And then I would jump into, there was an indoor pool at the hospital, I think there was only a little water in it, knee-deep or so, and I would jump into that pool, but the pool just pulled me deeper and deeper and the hand followed me down, until I reached a certain floor and there was an operating theatre, and I had to go into that operating theatre because otherwise the hand would catch me—the operating theatre was the salvation, I had to go in there. The same dream kept coming back every night. It has stayed with me. (Polio survivor 11)

For some participants, the post-operative recovery phase included distressing experiences regarding eating. After surgery, they had no appetite, yet nurses sometimes force-fed them and threatened tube feeding. Force-feeding was described as distressing and controlling, undermining the participants’ sense of autonomy and reinforcing feelings of insecurity.

Physical, Emotional, and Social Rehabilitation as the Whole of a Child’s Healing

This theme is organized by the central concept that rehabilitation was experienced not merely as a series of clinical interventions but as a prolonged, institution-bound process shaping every dimension of children’s daily lives. Five subthemes characterize this theme: rehabilitation and follow-up visits, physical rehabilitation exercises, hospital schools as continuity and normalcy, craft activities and free time that support childhood, and experiences of corrective surgery. Each is discussed in the sections that follow.

The analysis revealed how rehabilitation was reflected in the participants’ experiences as a multidimensional phenomenon, in which rehabilitation was not a singular or uniform process but one in which the physical, educational, and social dimensions of childhood were interwoven. The analysis further constructed an understanding that for the participants, rehabilitation represented both a medical necessity and a lived reality that shaped their sense of self, their relationships, and their understanding of their own bodies, as well as their capacity to preserve the conditions of an ordinary childhood within a prolonged hospital environment. By contrast, rehabilitation also brought children security during their hospital stay, a sense of normality, and enabled play and participation, which, in turn, strengthened the experience of being a child.

Follow-up checks and assessments were often conducted in the capital region and in specialist units for people with physical disabilities. Follow-up appointments could continue for years, at six monthly intervals or over a period of up to ten years after procedures. These visits also held social significance, giving rise to friendships. There were also experiences of children travelling alone by train to the follow-up appointments, although a relative would be waiting upon arrival. In addition to monitoring physical recovery, one participant also recalled psychological testing as part of the follow-up visits.The follow-up appointments were the only visits, and even there they just checked things—as you can see from the records, they took an EEG and a chest X-ray and skull and thorax X-rays, and measured blood pressure, checked the eyes, tested the IQ, did the Rorschach and all of that. I remember the inkblot tests too, those were done. Apparently, they were checking that there was nothing wrong up here. (Polio survivor 12)

At the same time, the follow-up visits were psychologically burdensome for many. During each visit, they feared that they would be made to stay back in the hospital. The visits also produced strongly embodied experiences of shame and vulnerability, as some children were asked to walk before doctors and nurses, sometimes partially undressed, and to be photographed. Particularly traumatic was the experience of seeing oneself in a mirror while multiple professionals assessed one’s walking performance. Witnessing another unclothed child walking could also evoke shame and embarrassment. Moreover, in the waiting areas for appointments, children compared themselves with others who had even greater mobility impairments, provoking confusion and distress. Anxiety was heightened when adults discussed the child’s illness and prognosis within earshot without explaining anything to the child, thereby reinforcing children’s uncertainty and insecurity, as well as their imaginings about the course of the illness.They would always walk you around and move you from place to place. And about this walking when I went there for surgery, they would walk you around in this room so they could see how you stepped and how you walked. Without clothes, and there were a great many people there, many doctors and many nurses. And then we were photographed. (Polio survivor 29)

Physical rehabilitation constituted a broad and multifaceted domain in participants’ experiences, encompassing both active therapeutic practice and children’s own assumption of responsibility for their recovery. The nature and extent of rehabilitation varied considerably. Some described the absence of active rehabilitation, experiencing recovery as occurring through their own natural liveliness and spontaneous movements. Based on the interpretation of the analysis, in such cases, children’s innate curiosity and activity appeared as compensatory factors for the lack of formal rehabilitation. By contrast, for some participants rehabilitation was characterized almost entirely by prolonged bedrest, with physical rehabilitation reduced to months of confinement to bed; being confined to a room was described as profoundly boring, with children’s natural need for movement going unsupported, as they were not even taken anywhere in their beds. The analysis produced an understanding that rehabilitation and assistive devices could simultaneously evoke both positive and negative feelings in children, with exercise sessions being enjoyable on the one hand and demanding on the other, bringing joy or provoking fear.Yes, back then as I said, we really did rehabilitate. To me it felt like almost a full-time job—there were all sorts of things going on throughout the day. There was physiotherapy on the bench, on the couch, and then there were walking exercises and water exercises, and there was a lot of activity going on. You just always worked on fitness and strength, which was what you trained, and you always had to do as much as you could manage. It really was like proper work. (Polio survivor 10)

The rehabilitation exercises were diverse, addressing the strengthening of overall bodily function through gymnastics, wall bars, walking practice, and relearning to walk through crawling. The physiotherapy experiences ranged from positive to burdensome: some described the physiotherapist as encouraging and motivating, while others experienced rehabilitation as hard work that at times felt commanding and unpleasant. Hydrotherapy and pool-based treatment were frequently part of rehabilitation and were experienced by some as enjoyable and by others as frightening.I have this image in my mind of a huge steel swimming pool, and in that pool we were given some kind of treatment or did exercises. To me it was great fun, because I had never been anywhere other than a lake before, but now there was warm water and you could splash around in it, and you felt that there was still some strength in that leg after all. (Polio survivor 12)

Rehabilitation stays generally lasted around a month, and in some cases, the episodes were scheduled during the summer to minimize disruption to schooling. When mobility began to return, children experienced this as a cause for celebration. Assistive devices, including metal leg supports, crutches, wheelchairs, splints, and corsets, featured prominently in the data. For some, these gave their weakened bodies a sense of security; for others, they were a source of fear.And then when it was taken off me, it was such a wretched feeling. It felt like my body was upright, am I just going to collapse completely. You had got so used to it holding your posture properly like this. And then when it was no longer there around you, it felt like I was just falling apart without it, because I did not have it anymore. (Polio survivor 2)

Some experienced rehabilitation as a lifelong institutional commitment. While some spent extended periods in a hospital—for example, 18 continuous months—others were in rehabilitation facilities for three years and returned home only for holidays. Physical rehabilitation thus encompassed, alongside experiences of recovery, also experiences of separation, loneliness, and a childhood structured around the rhythms of the treatment institution.And then I had a great many operations. Probably something like ten or more before I turned 15. All kinds of tendon transfers, sympathectomies to try to improve the circulation in the worse leg, and—I do not even know. All kinds of bone operations, the ankle was fused at some point because my ankle bent into hyperextension. But there was always a cast on my leg, or I was just recovering from an operation or about to go into one. It felt like that was my childhood. (Polio survivor 24)

Library access and hospital schooling formed an integral part of the participants' everyday life. The hospital school was a central element of their routine during rehabilitation and hospital stays, supporting educational continuity throughout prolonged treatment periods. Attendance at the hospital school was maintained, and learning was facilitated even when functional capacity was limited. The analysis indicates that the hospital school thus represented an effort to maintain children's learning and development in a context where all other aspects of life were dictated by treatment procedures. In this way, the hospital school provided children with a sense of security and normality. The children's hospital, for instance, was described by the participants in particularly positive terms. One participant remembered it as a paradise, filled with wonderful staff, and as a natural part of their daily life.Well, for a country girl that was really just like being in heaven, it would have been paradise, and of course the food was different than at home, it was regular, there was breakfast and lunch and a snack and dinner and an evening snack, and then there was fruit too. (Polio survivor 12)

The analysis considered craft activities and free time as a central dimension of children’s psychological and social wellbeing. The participants highlighted daily activities, with craftwork, drawing, reading, and playing games as common pastimes. Some described craftwork as more enjoyable than physiotherapy exercises. The role of the play worker (‘play aunt’) was particularly significant: the play worker engaged and activated children, brought joy to their daily life, helped them with homework, and provided them with treats, especially for those who had no visitors.There was this trolley that came around with all sorts of craft things on it—some modelling clay, very simple things, some books. A trolley like that went around the rooms. She was called the play aunt. (Polio survivor 25)

Craft activities and free time were thus not merely ways of passing time but pathways to participation, meaning, and emotional support within the treatment environment. Excursions to an amusement park, a theatre, and a confectionery factory were recalled fondly, and small everyday pleasures, such as watching television, building a model railway set, or receiving a banana for the first time in their life, underscored the exceptional nature of the hospital environment and the intensity of specific sensory memories.And then for pleasant memories, we went with the nurses to the chocolate factory once. You got to take sweets home, these little sweet houses to take with you. And you could eat as many sweets as you liked there at the factory. And then there was a trip to an amusement park with the nurses. And the theatre has stayed in my memory too; we went to the theatre as well. I remember some performance where there were witches, and I wondered at how they were depicted or shown, how they flew across the stage, those witches. Those were nice memories. (Polio survivor 11)

The Child’s Emotional Coping and Agency in the Hospital Environment

This theme was created around the understanding that hospitalized children were active agents who developed ways of navigating, enduring, and, at times, resisting the institutional environment. The analysis generated a picture of how children’s emotional coping and agency were also shaped by the degree to which they were acknowledged and included in their own care. Further, the analysis constructed the understanding that the hospital environment was simultaneously a place of vulnerability and resilience for the participants, where the conditions for coping were found not only in professional care but in the everyday structure of their ward life, peer relationships, and the nurturing of ties to home. Four subthemes characterize this theme: child involvement in care and ward routines, child-centred care and treatment, relationships with other children and play, and ties to home as a source of emotional anchoring during hospitalization. Each is discussed in the sections that follow.

The participants’ narratives revealed child-centered care as a contradictory experience: on the one hand, children experienced moments of safety, attachment, and genuine care; on the other, they encountered institutional routines, hierarchical structures, and the dismissal of their emotional experiences. The hierarchy of the hospital environment was present in every narrative. Ward rounds, for example, were experienced as authoritative events, and nurses were described as fearful of doctors. The analysis thus constructed a picture where children’s daily lives were tied to hospital routines and rules, which created predictability and a sense of safety for some and a sense of their autonomy being constrained for others.They were these authority figures who came round, perhaps once a week or so. Everything had to be spotlessly clean, the beds had to be perfectly made without a single crease in the covers, and not a speck of dust anywhere in the rooms. They came in like kings and queens, and went around from bed to bed, talking over you. (Polio survivor 30)

The participants memories of nursing staff were both positive and negative. In many narratives, nurses were described as kind and reassuring, doing their best to help and attend to children’s needs. As the analysis progressed, the experiences of ‘motherly’ nurses became particularly significant; these nurses were described as ‘named nurses.’ These named nurses, as per the analysis, were acting in a sense as surrogate mothers, offering children something extra in the way of care, such as bringing honey water to a child with a cough, cleaning under a child’s fingernails, or letting a child sit in their lap. In the participants’ minds, these extra gestures registered as concrete signs of safety and being cared for. Doctors, too, appeared as father figures as well as authority figures, with the participants using words such as ‘fatherly figure’ in their narratives. Moreover, the adult patients who showed children affection through treats and small gestures also extended the care children received and gave them a sense of being seen.I remember those old doctors who were so kind and fatherly somehow. They were all men, those orthopedic surgeons, and I remember them because the prosthetics workshop was in the same building at the time. It was down in the basement of the same building, and those men, well they seemed like uncles to me back then. They wore brown coats, and they were wonderfully warm, like father figures and all that. As a child you probably seek that kind of security from anyone who has that sort of fatherly quality. And then there was a nurse there too, it seems I must have had some nurse when I was very small who was a kind of mother substitute for me. (Polio survivor 31)

At the same time, some participants also described instances concerning lack of empathy, physical punishment, and shaming children. Moreover, the children's complaints were not always acknowledged, with the nursing staff advising children that a 'good child' was one who did not complain. Some participants highlighted that some nurses slapped children on their face or buttocks; some were even scolded harshly when they were unable to move and soiled themselves. While children felt lonely without nurses caring for them, some nurses interpreted a child's crying as a sign of being 'spoiled' or 'difficult.' Children's emotional expressions were thus evaluated through the lens of discipline and obedience rather than from the perspective of their emotional needs.But then I remember crawling around on the floors of the hospital too, and being… yes, quite resistant as well, I remember that. I had of course been defiant and difficult, and I remember the nurses saying that you will be taken to another hospital, they used to threaten me with something about another hospital… perhaps I somehow understood that they were talking about a psychiatric hospital or something like that… for this reason, a test was carried out which established that there was nothing wrong with the patient's intelligence. I must have been just under five years old. (Polio survivor 17)

Children's ward life was organized around daily routines: They were expected to make their beds and keep their belongings tidy, which served to support their functional capacity and as a disciplinary practice. Some participants described involvement in ward tasks, such as meal distribution, as a source of pride and meaning, while the same routines reinforced a sense of institutional control for others.And then when I was a little older, I was always allowed to help the ward assistants with the meal rounds. I could take the trays, I was not allowed to carry them to the patients myself, but I could always hand them over. That was an important task. I loved it. (Polio survivor 12)

Children’s participation in understanding and decision-making about their own care was frequently insufficient: procedures were not explained, medical information was withheld, and conversations were held in children’s presence as though they were invisible. Their agency manifested as resistance, including demanding discharge, refusing assistive devices, and concealing food, all of which can be understood as responses to pain, fear, homesickness, and the loss of autonomy in a hierarchical and routine-bound environment.I was very small and a poor eater, and I always threw all the food I did not want out of the window, and there was probably quite a lot of it. Then someone came and asked whether someone had been sick out here. Or perhaps they realized it was me who had been throwing it. Then because I was such a poor eater, I was given cod liver oil, and I fed it to the other girl in the room who had not been given any, and I told her it was for her. And then somewhere in a nearby room there was an adult patient, and she had chocolate bars on her bedside table. She was asleep, and I stole a chocolate bar from her and got caught. But I was not punished at all. (Polio survivor 16)

It is noteworthy that some children were delegated to supervise their peers and even permitted to restrain poorly behaved children, illustrating both the disciplinary nature of ward culture and the ambiguous dimensions of participation.And then two of the older children were given authority, if someone would not settle down to sleep, they were allowed to tie them to the bed, because we had these kinds of braces, so they had permission to tie them to the bed if someone was not behaving properly. (Polio survivor 11)

According to the analysis, the relationships between children were found to be a central coping resource, although they also encompassed bullying. Extended hospital stays gave rise to children’s own communities and peer groupings, within which children learned both how to be good and how to be unkind to each another. The participants described a sense of community expressed through playing games together, chatting during evening gatherings, and entertaining each other. Racing wheelchairs in the corridors with friends was described as joyful, and according to some accounts, lifelong friendships were formed in the hospital. Follow-up appointments could also be occasions for making friends, and seeing peers reinforced a sense of solidarity and shared identity.

Play and imagination, it can be suggested from the analysis, functioned as mechanisms for regulating the feeling of safety and alleviating the monotony of hospital life. Children told each other stories, sang together and played pranks, threw paper airplanes at roommates, and pushed others in their beds or wheelchairs and shared jokes. The shared games represented mutual survival, and shared resistance against ward routines produced a momentary sense of freedom.Me and another child were out on the balcony, and then suddenly the idea came to us, let's pull a trick. We rushed inside at full speed and told everyone that Sputnik was passing overhead. Everyone came rushing out to the balcony. Of course there was nothing to be seen, but we said it had just gone past. They never believed us, and it was never set straight. (Polio survivor 10)

Imagination occupied a significant role in the participants’ narratives, taking the form of storytelling, shared daydreaming about escaping, and pranks against ward routines that produced a momentary sense of freedom. The narratives also conveyed images of empathy and a home-like emotional atmosphere among children: The older children served as parental figures for the younger ones, and the younger children sometimes sought consolation and physical contact from their peers than from the nursing staff.And then these strange experiences that stayed with me from childhood—every evening, always at the same time, someone would tickle the soles of my feet. It went on for a long time, I always knew that when the lights went out and it had been dark for a little while, someone would sort of tickle my feet. And then one time I turned around so that my legs went the other way, with my knees towards the head of the bed, and then whatever it was tickled my knees. It was somehow such a strange sensation, I do not know what it was—whether it was psychological or what. (Polio survivor 11)At least one boy I remember, though I do not know his name or anything else about him—we would all go out into the corridor and sit side by side, and there was the evening devotion. And there was always this one little boy who wanted to come and sit in my lap. (Polio survivor 39)

The bond with home seems to have constituted a central dimension of children's emotional coping and simultaneously represented a fragile bond that the hospital institution could either strengthen or weaken. Experiences of intense homesickness were present. At the same time, prolonged absence could cause the idea of home itself to fade, manifesting, for example, in a child failing to recognize their mother immediately upon her arrival.I remember one time when my mother came. I do not know which hospital stay it was. I was not entirely sure whether it was her who this person was. But in some way, I sensed that it was my mother. And I remember that the memory of home faded, or it became unclear, there was no longer a clear picture, and it felt like it had been a dream, had I been somewhere, the memory of home grew hazy there in the hospital. (Polio survivor 11)

Visits and contact with home were often limited. The visiting hours could end up in disappointment if there were no visitors. Sometimes parents were unable to visit at all during a hospital stay or came only once every couple of months; contact with home was sometimes maintained through visits from relatives. In one narrative, parents were actively encouraged to ‘forget’ the child, an instruction that contributed to a recurring experience of abandonment, particularly as the child moved between multiple hospitals and repeatedly lost contact with their parents and friends.

Letters, telephone calls, and parcels represented a tangible connection to home. However, the hospital’s control could undermine this bond: Nurses rationed treats, and the gifts sent to individual children were sometimes distributed among all the children on the ward. Personal objects, including toys and clothing, served as anchors of children’s identity and their relationship with home, and their loss or redistribution was experienced as a significant violation.We had this big hall where everyone had cot beds, and there were quite a few of them—I would not dare say exactly how many, but it was a big hall, and all the children had different kinds of disabilities. Then when they cried at night, as I said, they (nurses) would come and fetch my teddy bears and toy cars to calm them down. And as soon as they fell asleep or the nurse left, I would go and take them back. (Polio survivor 42)