Robyn's 17, Hannah's 19 - after a family upset Hannah left home for 8 months. The two sisters are now slowly re-building their relationship after the devastation of Hannah's absence ...
Robyn begins, "I was away for the weekend and when I got back Hannah had gone - when I left there were 4 of us, when I got back there were 3"
Hannah and her younger sister Robyn had just got to an age when they were beginning to enjoy each other's company. Robyn was in her GCSE year and Hannah was facing her A levels. Then suddenly Hannah left home with a boyfriend who the family didn’t get on with at all. Robyn found Hannah’s abrupt departure and continuing absence very difficult to deal with, "She didn't take me to one side to say ‘Look, this is what’s going to happen, I’m sorry, but I’m going…"
Hannah knew that her absence would have an effect. She explains "By not really talking about it I was hoping to minimise the damage - and I can see now that there were better ways to do that… There was agro at home, and pressure from my boyfriend ... I thought it couldn’t get any worse.."
Both Robyn and Hannah laugh at the question that it was just a case of the attractions of an unsuitable boyfriends, "We’ve had that before," answers Robyn, "But this time her personality changed! It did a 360 degree turn - it just wasn’t Hannah anymore."
After many unsuccessful attempts at trying to contact Hannah at the house she was staying in Sheffield, the family were told that Hannah and her boyfriend "had left in the night..." The family became seriously concerned; Hannah's mother signed press release papers which allowed Hannah’s photo to be published in The Big Issue, and there was talk of approaching the press and TV for further coverage.
Altogether Hannah was away for eight months, but she came back once, for her sister’s birthday. The sisters finish each other’s sentences as they both tell the story of Hannah turning up with peaches, cream and strawberry wine for her sister. For Robyn, Hannah’s sudden re-appearance caused turbulent emotions. "I was outraged at first," she explains "It was the day before my GCSE exams - she knew that, and I thought it was so selfish of her… Then she gave me my present, and it showed that she did still care and she was still my sister … I have enormous respect for her doing that. It meant a lot to me, but I was very upset afterwards." Hannah returned to her boyfriend.
Hannah and her boyfriend went from Amsterdam, to Doncaster, where they found a flat, which the social services helped them to rent. Food money came from begging in the streets. "We finally got everything sorted - and then I felt it was OK for me to leave him…"
Robyn describes Hannah’s return, "She looked drained and much much skinnier - I just want to scoop her up and put her in a hot bath, give her soup, put her in bed and give her cups of tea… she cried for weeks on her own in her bedroom. It was very hard for me - and my parents did break down on more than one occasion…"
Hannah feels now that she a lot more mature, "I’m a lot more aware of the people around me, which I wasn’t before…"
