Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

Regina Cohen - April 18, 1982

Memories

Mm-hm.

He was ash...he knew--well, people would say, "Where is your mother from? She speaks with an accent." He uh, he was ashamed to say that I was in a concentration camp. I said, "Well your dad speaks with an accent too Darren, and it's a British accent. And if it bothers you, you don't have to tell 'em." Uh, my daughter never uh, she knows a lot. But she doesn't know my day to day...

Details.

...detail. She doesn't know those. She knows where I was, how many kids were in the family, she knows their names. Uh, she doesn't know anything when I was little yet, you know, from, from the time I remember.

Mm-hm.

Funny, I can remember when I was two years old, a song that my father used to sing to me. And I can't remember some things that a whole year had gone. There's certain things that...

Blocked out.

Blocked. Total disaster. And many times I thought, "If I could just--maybe I should go to a, a--get hypnotized." Would it come out? I don't know.

Would you want to?

At times I think I'd like to really know. It's, uh...

You feel you lost that time?

Yeah, it's confuse--it's confusing to me uh, it's as if something was erased. Uh, it wouldn't be pleasant to remember but, I think uh, I've lived through a lot of miserable time. Uh, the total picture would be uh, at least it would fall into place. It, it wouldn't mean anything, it would just, it just--I feel that uh, it's a confusion in my head.

You experienced a lot as a young...

Yeah.

...tender-aged child.

Well, look where I was when teenagers go out and date or when they do things. I didn't have no youth. I lost that. But I know where I was, but the things that, uh. But I don't know whether it's normal to be like a two people. You understand what I'm saying? Whether it's a normal thing for me to experience now, that the person then--she's me but she's somebody else. And this is you. Well, the two of you are being hurt by the same thing. Uh, is it crazy?


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