Infiltrating a psychiatric hospital, the journalist made a gruesome discovery: “How are they going to get me out?”

Many claim to have witnessed paranormal events. However, some stories sound like fiction, almost straight out of a horror movie and only possible in a cinematic context. And the most popular programs are O Videos of an unsuspecting man or woman entering an abandoned house with a video camera and a flashlight that looks for ghosts or other things appealing to the human eye. Nellie Bly, an American journalist, is included in this group.

After spending ten days in a psychiatric hospital, the woman immortalized her experiences, a period in which he witnessed horrifying and extremely sinister events. The drama began when he asked the famous and renowned journalist Joseph Pulitzer: “How are they going to get me out once I get there?” To which the author replied clearly, succinctly and succinctly: “I don’t know, but we’ll get you out.” That answer was Bly’s introduction to the world in 1887, when he was 23 years old.

Posing as an immigrant with economic and psychological problems, the young woman infiltrated Blackwell’s Island Psychiatric Hospital for Women in New York, United States. Already within that space, he began writing what would become his future book, Ten days in a psychiatric hospital. In this he explained in detail the treatment given to the patients in that mysterious place.

In the preface, he recalls, “The feeling of satisfaction at having reached my destination as I was driven through beautiful countryside to the refuge. She blushed slightly with an expression of frustration In the faces of my comrades.

At that time, she was unable to cope with the plight of being admitted to a mental hospital, and she did not know the plight of other women. Then he realized the platform he had entered. The first thing he saw on his entrance was the deteriorating physical and mental condition of the patients. Victims of all kinds of abuse.

“What a mysterious thing madness is. I have seen patients whose lips are permanently sealed in silence. They live, breathe, eat; “There is human life, but there is something that the human body does not need, but cannot exist without, it has disappeared,” he said. Beyond a brief description of the place, Bly also brought his notes, Because he witnessed horrific incidents related to the treatment the patients received.

Later, she told a story in which her roommate was shivering from the cold, the nurses were sleeping with sheets, and she had a seizure so she left. Considering the situation and the journalist’s claims, one of the participants limited himself to saying: “Let her fall to the ground, and she will learn her lesson.”

This remained forever in Bly’s mind, who, in the midst of his work, could not believe the mistreatment to which patients were subjected. Many boarding schools lacked economic stability, so without a roof over their heads, they begged on the cold streets of nineteenth-century New York. After 10 days of confinement in the shelter, He used to carry a notebook full of notes of his experiences which he expressed in his literary work. However, the court summoned her to explain how she managed to trick the police into entering the hideous place.

The publisher wrote several books and articles on the working conditions of American women at the time. An example is a newspaper article New York WorldIt was titled, openly and knowingly about the racial situation in his country “Nellie Bly Tells What It Means to Be a White Slave”.

In that article, A Lower East Side factory in the Big Apple condemned the working conditions of the women who worked thereHe did fieldwork there as well as in the asylum.

Her level of relevance in the New York media earned her much criticism from her male colleagues in various media outlets across the country. A clear example is Erasmus Wilson, a journalist who did not approve of women entering the same profession. In her words, she saw “women working outside the home as a monstrosity”.

However, Bly’s remonstrances paid off. Thanks to her reports, books and articles in the media, great improvements were made in terms of living, working and health conditions for women in the country. In addition, their demands were strengthened by the growing desire to legalize the vote for American women.