Helen Grady ~ They told me to kill my son....

[Hazardsfury]

Helen Grady is the mother of Travis and the wife of Richard. When Travis was a young boy she attempted to kill him as the "people in the mirrors" convinced her that he was a "Devil" and told her to carry out this task, after the failed attempt on her sons life she was institutionalized at Cedar Grove Sanitarium, where doctors noted that she harbored strong fantasies and a violent persecution complex. Often when her husband would come to visit she would become violent against him and demand to see her son almost like she had a "goal" that she needed to accomplish.

The main question is why? The root cause seems to be the "people in the mirrors" However this seems very delusional much like her statement that she could leave the sanitarium any time by using those same mirrors. If so then why didn't she? Why didn't she use the mirrors, escape and complete her goal of killing her son? It seems she just went completely mad. The question is why did she all of a sudden lose it and start talking about people in the mirrors? Richard Grady seems to point to the idea that at one point Helen Grady seemed to be completely normal and lead a happy life, one which he so longed for after what he saw his wife had become. Did something happen almost at that specific point in her life which made her go mad then? Perhaps she had some repressed memories of her own childhood, that were only triggered when Travis reached a certain age? Perhaps all this nonsense about mirrors is based on the theory that Travis had become a mirror image of her past, meaning perhaps he was already going through some issues before the abuse? Something definitely sparked this madness the question is what?

Was just wondering what people think about Helen Grady and the reasoning behind her motives?

[emma]

maybe she was a little feared about getting there and see what happens if she is in the mirror world ...!?..
or maybe they just told her not to get into their world!?....they might get her scared ...they might warn her about not to go inside ...
she seen "people in the mirror" as she said yeah!but maybe those "people" she was watching were like most as devils faces or somehow.. something like that in the other world !?...but this is my opinion ^^

[TheRedNurse]

This is sort of hard to answer because I don't think a person can suddenly just 'go' mad. Some people are born with mental disorders or were deeply traumatized by a certain event which caused them to become delusional and/or hallucinative.

I'm quite positive than Helen was imagining the "people in the mirrors", which also may be why mirrors were such a big part of Travis' stay in Silent Hill. I guess 'manifestation' is the right word for it in the SH dictionary.
About her killing the devil child...maybe she encountered Dahlia at some point who might have filled her already weak brain with those sorts of things. I don't know that's my take on it.

[emma]

you got a point there! maybe she did seen Dahlia in there and did washed her brain out!o.o..and make her very weak about her own son that she have to kill him...its like.. there is some devil inside those childrens who must be cleansed up with fire ...hmmm...i guess so

[TheRedNurse]

Yeah but wasn't she trying to kill her son with gas? Not fire.

[emma]

yeah i know that XD! but i was just saying ...this is the way that Dahlia was thinking of how to kill the devils inside those children as she said it! like what she did with her own daughter Alissa... i was just guessing ^^

[TheRedNurse]

I always thought Helen and Dahlia were somehow connected. That would explain a lot.

[Hazardsfury]

Hmmmm I'm not sure where Dahlia would profit from killing a boy who didn't even live in Silent Hill though? Also there's nothing In Origins to suggest that Dahlia had any influence...... Also lets look at the time frame.

>> Events of Silent Hill 1 in 1983.. Dahlia was 46. Meaning Origins was in 1976, So she was 39

>> Travis' dad killed himself at Riverside Motel On the 12th of June 1961

>> Dahlia would have been around 24.

>> However his mum was in the sanitarium for around two years before his dad killed himself [Absent Wife Memo] That would have been 1959

>> So that would make Dahlia around 22 in 1959

>> This would suggest she would have been probably around 20, 21, 22, when she met Helen if that was theoretically the case?

I'm guessing she was old enough to have met Helen Grady...... Also if she was that young perhaps she was a rookie of The Order.. and didn't know much about the various rituals and what not, but that's just speculation and some rambling from me.

Then again it is possible that she may have had some mental illness.. which led Helen to do what she did, but the way Richard longs for the wife he once knew, pretty much said to me that it was something that happened in an extremely short time frame. Perhaps it was that big a jump from how she was originally...

I agree she was imagining about the mirrors because of the nonsense that she could use the mirrors to escape the sanitarium... if she did then Travis would most likely be dead.. or something along those lines.

[emma]

I always thought Helen and Dahlia were somehow connected. That would explain a lot.

don't forge to mention Claudia there with them too ! the 3 of them all crazy and look alike somehow XD!
Hazardsfury@: i also agree with your theory there
the only thing we don't know is her face and how the way she looks!?...o.o.i mean we never seen her before !...there is no a single pic for her either! O_Ohow weird ..!
while her husband ...we all did seen his face and knows how he was look like!...O.O

[NarooN]

I doubt she was "imagining" the "people in the mirrors". I also don't think she just "suddenly" went mad. Seeing as how Travis had no idea about the mirror mechanic in the game until Alessa herself showed him how to do it, it seems clear that it was indeed a "real" thing that could be done, i.e. traveling to the Otherworld via the mirrors. What I think happened is that somehow, Helen found out about the mirror on accident and someone or something on the other side pretty much brainwashed her. Her mind was probably blown from seeing all of that stuff, so she just didn't know what to do with herself and that's why people thought she was crazy or something.

[Hazardsfury]

Just came across... This memo is from Silent Hill: Downpour, was adding it to the wiki today... and I was like... Hmmmm Hold On..

http://silenthill.wikia.com/wiki/Psychiatrist%27s_Note

[emma]

oh yeah that women who believes about the mirror mirror world thingy xD! as she was a magician or something like that ...they hanged her! as a witch...
hmm...you think that women was...omg do you think what am thinking ?!O_O no way!! o.o..

[Hazardsfury]

Dahlia? No. Helen Grady? No. Whoever it was, was born in 1975.... The person is Malone D. A but that could easily be a pseudonym... She lost her older sister and that is it..

[emma]

i think that will makes her older sister... maybe!?...O_o hmm i don't think so XD!
kinda little confused here XD!silly me XD

[Devoured]

I doubt she was "imagining" the "people in the mirrors". I also don't think she just "suddenly" went mad. Seeing as how Travis had no idea about the mirror mechanic in the game until Alessa herself showed him how to do it, it seems clear that it was indeed a "real" thing that could be done, i.e. traveling to the Otherworld via the mirrors. What I think happened is that somehow, Helen found out about the mirror on accident and someone or something on the other side pretty much brainwashed her. Her mind was probably blown from seeing all of that stuff, so she just didn't know what to do with herself and that's why people thought she was crazy or something.

Don't think there's a way of ever truly confirming if she was insane through in-game evidence but I don't think that's necessarily true NarooN - since Helen quite obviously had these delusions [or not] before she was shipped away, I mean they were the indirect cause, Travis easily could have known about them. Just because he doesn't remember exactly what happened in his youth doesn't mean those memories are actually gone, his gradually remembering everything shows us just that, things he already knew but locked away. IMO the game just needs to show us in some way that we need to use the mirrors and 0rigins being kinda tacky in execution does it that way.

Anyway, my two cents on Helen Grady though are that she was crazy and was born crazy. Most people don't turn crazy after seeing a ghost or being abducted by aliens or whatevs, they either have a predisposition, a chemical imbalance that's not caused by anything other than genetics [or drug abuse for instance] or become unsociable through abuse or trauma. So IMO Helen was simply clynically psychotic, her husband scared of his own shadow and this behaviour had its effect on Travis, warping him from youth [as evidenced by the fact that he stayed in his father's room all day after he'd killed himself, which only added to the ball of yarn]. So in turn Travis became a murderous sociopath through trauma.

For those that don't know this - people that are really wondering about Helen and actually all parts of 0rigins' plot not concerning the cult should try to read House Of Leaves by Mark Z Danielewski if they can, SH 0rigins is basically a simplified version of [a layer of] that novel. Helen's motives are much more questionable than her House Of Leaves counterpart's though, in the sense that to me Helen kinda came off as a cackling witch in the game and the character in House Of Leaves is a bit more believable. Having read it won't answer every question about Helen Grady you might have but I think it would probably take away the doubt that there's much sanity in her statements and give insight in most major aspects of the whole Grady Bunch story.

[WhiteClaudia]

I won't go as far to say that Dahlia had contact with her (simple because of her age) or that they're related or she's related to Malone because that's just A LOT of speculation and far fetched at this point right now. If there were any relation, I think it might have been important enough to reveal in-game.

But, I do believe there is a possibility that Helen might have had contact with an Order member in general. It wouldn't have surprised me in the least if they had talked to her. Only thing is, I even doubt that because I'm not sure what their motives would have been for doing so...

REVEAL SPOILER

Like giving her reason in wanting to kill Travis. She wanted to kill because he was a "devil" and that she was told by the "people in the mirrors". That doesn't sound like anything Order related to me. But it's hard to tell, again.

Until any confirmation comes out, I'm going to think that it might have just been Helen alone somehow. Something in her could have "snapped" (like those women from "Snapped" ) and lead her to believe all these things. Maybe Travis had done something that triggered this.....

OR... she just had a very severe form of Spectrophobia Fear of mirrors.

But, who's to say she wasn't always like this? We don't know anything about her before that one incident that led her to the Sanitarium. Maybe she always was? It's hard to tell.

[NarooN]

I dunno about everything else, I'm kinda still going with my theory for now, but I do agree with Travis being mentally scarred since a young age. Hence the sub-plot which most people don't pick up on about Travis being a serial killer (peep the pics you can find scattered around the motel which show the various deaths and descriptions on their deaths, and how Travis' truck driver friend mentions something about how screwed up Travis was or something.)

[WhiteClaudia]

Hence the sub-plot which most people don't pick up on about Travis being a serial killer (peep the pics you can find scattered around the motel which show the various deaths and descriptions on their deaths, and how Travis' truck driver friend mentions something about how screwed up Travis was or something.)

So, it wasn't just me! I remember seeing that, but I played a loooong time ago, and I haven't read it anywhere else. So, I thought it was just me. I personally saw the Butcher as a hint at this as well...

But yeah. I mean, I see what you're saying, and I agree with him being scarred too! XD Of course he'd be mentally scarred. I think anyone who's life is threatened, and almost dies by their mother would be scarred. Especially with all the crap he was put through afterwards? Seeing his father kill himself. I know I would be scarred in some way too. Who knows what that would do to a person!

[NarooN]

The Butcher ending seems to be a direct reference to his possible past as a serial killer as well. It all makes sense once you put it all together; the screams of various people being murdered and begging for their lives as Travis is strapped to the table... He's trying to break free but can't -- a possible allusion to how he can't escape the truth of what happened in his past.

Even though we don't know his fate in that ending, and we know that the Good ending is basically canon since he appears in HC, this could all still very well be true, that he was a serial killer.

[Devoured]

Uh huh most people seem to think The Butcher is only what Travis becomes after obtaining the bad ending, when it's just him embracing that aspect of himself, whereas the counterpart is his caring side [towards children specifically] prevailing. I'm forever amazed how few people seem to have picked up on the fact that in the game's canon there was a serial killer active, dubbed The Butcher, who is in truth Travis getting away with it being a truckdriver and very mobile and all, and the PH-knockoff Butcher we see is a manifestation of that. It's only one of the most important aspects of the whole story ...