Woman with disabilities from atomic bombing recalls mother's dedication

Japan Times

2 days ago

The memorial portrait of her mother shows a gentle smile. She was a warm but strict person.
'She would get angry if I made mistakes, like when cooking fish or cutting vegetables,' says Hiroe Kawashimo, 79, who was born with intellectual and physical disabilities due to her mother's exposure to radiation from the U.S. atomic bombing of Hiroshima. 'Maybe she wanted me to be able to do everything on my own.'
Kawashimo now lives alone in an apartment in Hiroshima after her mother, Kaneko Kawashimo, died in 2014 at the age of 92.
On Aug. 6, 1945, Kaneko Kawashimo was exposed to radiation at a location about 1 kilometer from the bomb's hypocenter while she was pregnant. Her daughter was born with "atomic-bomb microcephaly,' a condition that came to be known for babies born with smaller-than-normal heads and with various forms of disabilities because their mothers had been exposed to strong radiation during their early pregnancies.
Hiroe Kawashimo is 135 centimeters tall and has been frail since childhood. She has also been constantly in and out of hospitals, and now that she has a brain tumor, she must undergo checkups every six months.
The voice of her mother expressing her worries over raising a child with disabilities is recorded on a cassette tape from the summer of 1996, when she first provided testimony in Hiroshima as a hibakusha (atomic bomb survivor).
'My daughter is my greatest worry,' the mother said in the recording. 'I can manage to help her while I'm alive, but when she is left alone ...'
In 1995, the mother and daughter moved to Hiroshima from Kitakyushu, where they had lived for 30 years, in hopes of receiving better understanding and support as atomic bomb survivors.
In her testimony, the mother also reflected on hardships after the war. Her husband died from the atomic bombing, and she later had to make the heartbreaking decision to entrust their 5-year-old son to her husband's parents so that she could devote herself to raising her newborn daughter, who had disabilities.
Memories of a mother working
Hiroe Kawashimo's earliest memory is of her mother working. 'I was taken everywhere she went,' she recalls.
When her mother went to the mountains to cut thatch, she would play by climbing nearby bamboo stalks. At day-labor sites, she would wait near a fire for her mother to finish work.
'Work, work ... that was all she did. If she didn't work one day, we couldn't get by the next,' she says.
According to the mother's testimony, she was originally from Yamaguchi Prefecture. She married against her parents' wishes and began a new life in Hiroshima with her husband, a crew member on a transport ship. Her husband was a loving father, taking their son on bicycle rides on his rare days off.
On the day of the atomic bombing, the husband was off helping with building demolition work in the neighborhood of their home in Hiroshima. After the bomb was dropped, Kaneko Kawashimo crawled out of the collapsed house, carrying her son to a first-aid station in the suburbs. Her husband was also brought to the same place, but he died early on the morning of Aug. 9.
Kaneko Kawashimo managed to flee to her family home in Yamaguchi Prefecture with her husband's remains, but she suffered intense pain in her mouth afterward and was bedridden for nearly a month. It was only sometime later that she realized she was pregnant.
At the end of that year, Kaneko Kawashimo returned to the ruins of her home in Hiroshima and gave birth to her daughter in a 'makeshift shack' in March. Soon after, she once again relied on her parents in Yamaguchi, but at this time she decided to entrust her son to her late husband's family.
Kaneko Kawashimo noticed her daughter was clearly different from other children. 'She's so tiny — maybe it's malnutrition, or maybe because of the atomic bomb,' she said she had wondered. Her daughter didn't start walking until age 3.
Her daughter began elementary school in 1954 but was soon hospitalized long-term due to tuberculosis.
Hiroe Kawashimo remembers being stopped by adults when she tried to follow her mother leaving the hospital. 'I was hospitalized for a long time. I couldn't keep up in school because I missed so many days,' she recalls.
For Kaneko Kawashimo, however, being apart from her daughter marked a turning point in her life.
She jumped on a bus to Shimonoseki, Yamaguchi Prefecture. 'I wanted to become independent and stop relying on my parents as soon as possible,' she said in the recording.
She began working hard in preparation for her daughter's discharge from the hospital.
She moved from job to job, including work at inns, infant homes and hospitals, under the condition that housing was provided.
Moving to Kitakyushu
In 1965, Kaneko Kawashimo moved to Kitakyushu with her daughter and settled into a job as a dormitory manager at a company. Hiroe Kawashimo has few memories from that period, but she graduated from junior high school in Kitakyushu in 1966. By then, she was 19, or four years older than the other graduating students.
Later that year, Hiroe Kawashimo obtained her hibakusha health record book, but her mother testified that the health book — which serves as a certificate to receive subsidies for medical checkups and treatment as hibakusha — could hardly be used in Kitakyushu.
'When I showed it at a hospital, they'd say, 'What's this?'' the mother said.
Kaneko Kawashimo |
Courtesy of Hiroe Kawashimo / via Chugoku Shimbun
Meanwhile in Hiroshima, a mutual support group called 'Kinoko-kai' was formed in 1965 by people who were born with atomic-bomb microcephaly and their parents.
In 1967, the group won the Japanese government's official recognition of the causal relationship between the atomic bombing, and intellectual and physical disabilities in children born from affected mothers. With the recognition, people born with atomic-bomb microcephaly became able to receive a 'certified hibakusha' status that entitled them to various health care benefits.
However, Kaneko Kawashimo said she didn't know about this back then. Living away from the bombed city, information about survivor support was scarce. 'I didn't have time to even think about it,' she said.
While working as a dormitory manager, Kaneko Kawashimo sent her daughter to a kimono-making school in hopes of having her obtain skills to live on her own when she entered her 20s. However, Hiroe Kawashimo said she couldn't do the math needed for making patterns. She eventually gave up and spent her days helping clean the dormitory.
In 1989, Hiroe Kawashimo finally became a 'certified hibakusha' at the age of 43. Her mother was 67 at the time and was starting to think about retiring and moving to Hiroshima. According to Hiroe Kawashimo, her mother probably thought that after her death, her daughter would be able to live with a greater peace of mind in the bombed city by getting better support and understanding from people around her.
To realize the move, the mother sought help from medical social worker Sugako Murakami, who is now 79 and lives in Hatsukaichi, Hiroshima Prefecture.
When they met in 1995, Murakami was working at a hospital and researching the health and living conditions of hibakusha with microcephaly.
Upon receiving a call from Murakami for her research, Kaneko Kawashimo brought up the idea of relocating to Hiroshima.
Kaneko Kawashimo's son, whom she had parted with when he was young, was in the Kyushu region. Upon Murakami's suggestion that it might be better if Kawashimo were near him, she revealed her uneasy relationship with her son.
According to Murakami, Kaneko Kawashimo said she had left her son with her late husband's parents, but after some twists and turns, the son was sent to a foster home. When he tried to go back, his grandparents placed him in an institution. After the son found a job, Kaneko Kawashimo briefly lived with him, but they were never able to bridge their emotional divide.
'The atomic bomb also damaged family ties,' Murakami says bitterly. Murakami has supported Kaneko Kawashimo and her daughter since they settled in Hiroshima in 1995.
'I'm glad we came to Hiroshima,' Hiroe Kawashimo says. Members of the Kinoko-kai check on her regularly. They also helped with her mother's funeral and her move to an apartment afterward. Her brother has died, but the city hall has dedicated counselors with whom she can seek help.
Hiroe Kawashimo shows her poetry and paintings. |
Chugoku Shimbun
'I don't have time to get bored,' she says. She goes out shopping, cooks three meals a day and has a favorite cafe she frequents. Her hobbies are writing poetry and painting.
One of her poems reads:
Light finally reaches the Atomic Bomb Dome
Even cudweed flowers are blooming
Please don't extinguish the lives
of these little flowers
By Hiroe
During her regular walks, she enjoys looking for flowers to use as the subjects of her works. Even so, she sometimes wonders, 'If there hadn't been an atomic bomb, maybe there would have been a different kind of happiness for me.'
This section features topics and issues covered by the Chugoku Shimbun, the largest newspaper in the Chugoku region. The original articles were published April 28 and April 29.