Barred Eyes/Barred Voice: Stress, Repressed Anger and Women's Health. By Tina-Lee Clarke, 2011

This image of 'Chiller Doors' are from my Aunt's century old farm house. The doors are part of the chiller, where killed cattle were in hung inside to drain their blood before being butchered. And while they still give me the "chills" today, this image has come to represent a key finding in my research concerning stress, femininity and women's health:


Women, who are trapped in a care giving role, internalize their repressed anger and frustration, because it is deemed negative and not caring. This repression resembles the face on the weathered melancholy locked doors. The widows of the doors stare like sad barred eyes that hide from the world’s glare. The door’s lock bars the mouth from speaking the truth of repressed emotions. The weathered door holds in all the dark harmful emotions, which poisons and
creates illness within.