reallives15

Normal Life Within Victims' Grasp Despite Childhood Trauma of Abuse

By Kendall Anderson and Mark Wrolstad
Originally published in The Dallas Morning News, June 16, 2001
Paul McLaughlin is a survivor, which is not to say that he is unscathed.
But something within his soul gave him the strength and determination to survive
what he calls 18 years of physical and emotional punishment at the hands of his
mother, and then to overcome it with a self-made crusade against child abuse.
"The darn thing is, I lived," Mr. McLaughlin, 52, said Friday from his home in
Eugene, Ore. "I lived to tell about it, and I'm doing something about it."
The victims of severe child abuse and neglect, such as the 8-year-old girl who
was imprisoned in a Hutchins trailer home, often need years of therapy and
attentive care—immediately and then later in life—to overcome the damage done
to their young lives. Some of their scars can only be covered, not erased.
But many abused and neglected children possess a resilience that allows them to
recover enough of their hope and their identities to live normal, rewarding lives,
according to mental-health professionals.
Among the severely abused, "the ones who do better had found some kind of
healthy family or friendship outside the abusive relationship," said Dr. Barbara
Rila, a Dallas psychologist who specializes in child trauma cases. Children also
have a better chance of recovering if the neglect occurs when they're older, and
if they're removed from their abusive home and given the chance to develop new
family relationships, usually through adoption, Dr. Rila said.
"That's what really predicts a good outcome in cases of severe neglect," she said.
Those factors may indicate a particular reason for hopefulness in the case of
Lauren Calhoun, who was rescued this week from a filthy closet where she was
kept for months at a time, authorities say. For the first eight months of her life,
the girl lived with a couple who wanted to adopt her, but the adoption fell through.
She was removed from her home Monday and has been hospitalized. The girl's
mother and stepfather have been charged with injury to a child.
Although some people triumph over extreme neglect or abuse, most suffer
lifelong physical or emotional problems, experts said.
"If a child has been repeatedly abused or neglected and you find them alive at
the end of it, then they had to survive. They acquired a separate set of skills
which helped them get through the abuse," said Dr. Donna Persaud, pediatrician
at Children's Medical Center and associate professor of pediatrics at UT
Southwestern.
Studies show that an emotionally nurturing environment in infancy is crucial to a
child's developing communication skills and the ability to form relationships—to
receive and return affection.
Neglect, defined as the absence of appropriate experiences at a time when a
child needs them, can be more destructive than the effects of physical—and
even sexual—abuse, experts said.
"Even bad interaction may be better than no interaction," said Dr. Peter
Stavinoha, pediatric neuropsychologist at Children's Medical Center and
assistant professor of psychiatry at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical
Center at Dallas.
Neglect, such as the kind that police say Lauren endured, can compromise a
child's development, including learning, language, attention, judgment and social
skills.
The chances for full recovery drop if brain damage has occurred. Significant brain
development occurs in infancy and childhood.
"If there is malnutrition or physical abuse harming brain development, that
compounds the cards against the child," Dr. Stavinoha said. "If there aren't brain-
based limitations, that child's potential for resilience is substantially greater,
though still unpredictable."
"Neglect, especially emotionally, can be just as deadly as the other forms of
abuse," said Cindy Alexander, clinical supervisor at the Dallas Children's
Advocacy Center, which counsels survivors in cases that are extreme, but not
rare.
One child and his brother were beaten by their father three years ago. The
brother was killed. The survivor, now 10, is doing well in an adoptive home, Ms.
Alexander said.
"That's not to say he's not going to have problems later on," she said.
Helen Gemeinhardt's adopted 16-year-old suffered minor developmental damage
because of the neglect and sexual abuse she endured in foster homes from ages
2 to 6. The girl functions like a 13-year-old. But she has made dramatic progress,
thanks to education, therapy and, above all, love, her mother said.
"If you saw her now, you'd never dream she went through what she did," she
said. When the Gemeinhardts adopted the girl at age 6, she threw temper
tantrums, hoarded food and checked the refrigerator repeatedly.
Inappropriate ways of coping with anger and engaging in strange food rituals are
common in neglected and abused children, experts say.
"Initially I didn't know what to do—we were blind to these things," Mrs.
Gemeinhardt said. "Punishing her didn't work because she couldn't control the
tantrums. We were very frustrated—we even thought maybe we were not the
right parents for her."
Years of counseling and reassuring the girl that she would not be without food or
her parents has made her "extremely loving and caring," her mother said.
"I think she's overly loyal and dedicated to her family and friends because she
didn't have that." Abused and neglected children often develop coping skills that
normal children do not. Occasionally these can be strengths, but more often than
not the skills are "maladaptive" in normal situations, experts say.
Excessive aggression or compliance and manipulation or intuition are among the
skills some children develop, experts said.
Studies show that abused and neglected children are more prone to depression
and suicide, anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder, learning problems and
relationship troubles.
They even can develop a higher heart rate because of long-term abuse. They are
more prone to abusing their own children, studies show. Mrs. Gemeinhardt said
she hopes the love she and her husband have given their daughter will stop that
cycle, even if the girl's memories remain.
"She was left alone in a park for punishment once and every time we see a blue
van, she points to it and says, 'That's the kind of van they took me to the park in,'"
Mrs. Gemeinhardt said. "That just sticks with her."
The effects and healing process for abuse and neglect often last a lifetime. One
way to try to prevent horrific cases of neglect such as Lauren's, experts say, is to
increase public education about the phases of child development.
There are far fewer medical journal articles on neglect compared to abuse, said
Dr. Bruce Perry, head of the Child Trauma Academy at Baylor College of Medicine
in Houston.
"People do not understand that what is neglectful at one age is not at another,"
he said. "Neglect is not because people are evil but because they are ignorant
about what children need."
Mr. McLaughlin, who said he remembers being placed on a hot stove as a child
and beaten with sticks, as was his twin sister, has been calling attention to the
problem of child abuse for more than 25 years. One day in the mid-1970s, he
decided to stand on a street corner with a sign reading "Stop Child Abuse"—
something he did off and on for the next two decades.
"This is the way I got the community involved," said Mr. McLaughlin, who isn't
sure whether his learning disabilities and other physical problems are genetic or
resulted from abuse.
His mother has acknowledged punishing her twins and regretting it, but not
abusing them. His activism led to speaking engagements, fund-raisers, small
publications and a Web site (www.efn.org/~scan)—and also became his therapy.
"I forced myself to speak out on child abuse instead of going to counseling," said
Mr. McLaughlin, who has attended only a few sessions to deal with the abuse.
"Yeah, I'm still angry about it. This is going to be with me forever."