Anne Hallward Reaction

Chris Spino

Professor Amoroso

English 110, Section 1

13 September 2017

          Anne Hallward’s Ted Talk was extremely eye opening and moving. It brought into perspective that there are so many people that bottle emotions up and are ashamed of who they are. Shame is what really digs deep into someone’s soul and makes a person lack self confidence. Anne Hallward also exclaims that speaking up and telling stories can help not only you but so many other people in this world. This world is full of people that can connect to not only her, but her idea of individual healing and healing in general.

          I can personally relate to Anne Hallward because she spoke about her father having dementia and it was killing her to see him suffer the way he was. My great-grandmother died after a long battle with alzheimer’s and dementia. It was so sad to go and see her, each time I visited I had to remind her who I was and it took a while for her to remember me. At the very end I was a complete stranger to her and it brought her to tears because she recognized me but had no recollection. Hallward tells the audience, “We lost him progressively, and he didn’t recognize any of us for about five years…” (Hallward 4) This was the same thing with my great-grandmother as I mentioned before. Luckily for the family and I, it was only a few months that this went on.

          Just like me, many others were helped by Anne’s story; she received email after email saying that they have gone through the same thing. It can be as simple as sharing one story to change so many people from depression and shame. These people felt ashamed because they wished death on their loved one’s and so did I, but it was for the better of the person because we couldn’t live seeing them suffer the way they had been. One story can change the world, it only takes one person to speak up and that story can touch possibly hundreds or thousands of people.