Bobby Baker began her diary drawings in 1997 when she became a patient at a day centre.
Bobby Baker’s Diary Drawings, Dave Sayer. Source: Wellcome Collection. Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0).
Originally private, they gradually became a way for her to communicate complex thoughts and emotions that were difficult to articulate to her family and friends or medical professionals. The drawings described Bobby’s experiences of day hospitals, acute psychiatric wards, ‘crisis’ teams and various treatments. Charting the ups and downs of her recovery from breast cancer, her family life and work as an artist, they revealed just how funny all this harrowing stuff can be.