ABSTRACT
In 1956 aged six, the author is taken by her parents for a drive into the Australian countryside. They arrive at a grand old house discovering, to her surprise, that it is a convent school. After she and her parents are shown around by a nun, the six-year-old child is asked if she would like to go to the school. She agrees, with no idea of what agreement means: being physically removed from her family and all that was familiar; seeing them only occasionally for a few hours two or three times a term; growing up removed from her younger sisters; having no one to turn to when in trouble or distressed; and the strict demands of a boarding school regime. Some children are primed by their parents to look forward to going to boarding school. Christopher Milne is told by his father one afternoon, when he is nine, that he is going away to board and that this will include his beloved nanny leaving. This leads into a historical exploration of the British tradition of children being brought up by people who are not their parents, the nanny system and the establishment of boarding schools. Contemporary research into the traumatic loss of a primary attachment figure by the child is outlined, signalling what is to come for both of them.
