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After Years of Pain, Joanne Has Broken the Cycle |
| By Carol Priour, written about a girl who spent years healing, then found reward in a family of her own |
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One Child's Story - What I Need - That was all Joanne wanted . . . love & care. It seemed to her that the longing and hurting would never stop . . . What does an eleven year old girl go through when she is all alone in a chaos that ends in tragedy? "When I was calling your name, all I wanted was for you to hold me, Mommy! It hurt so bad, the tears stinging my cheeks -- no one to hear. The bottle had taken you away years ago. I wanted you to look away from that bottle and notice how much I still loved you. All that came back was the yelling and scolding. "I shivered, afraid, in a corner, when daddy would leave you beaten and bruised . . . Afterwards we always acted like nothing had even happened. I remember the last night. The sound I heard from you was not exactly a cry (you had stopped crying so long ago . . . stopped thinking it would do any good) . . . the last sound from you . . . those little mutterings, then the explosion of the gunshot burned like fire in my heart. It always will. "I always knew mommy, that there was something that hurt you more than the hitting . . . more than the poverty . . . more than the whispers and stares. What hurt you most was the knowing that you were not loved. I know, because I felt it too. "I wondered if anyone would care for me now that you were gone forever." It was after Joanne had been placed in five foster homes that her caseworker contacted the Ranch about placing her with us. The caseworker warned us that Joanne was a deeply troubled child and that she had attached to no one in the year since the tragedy. She told us that Joanne's first recollections of abuse started when she was about 4--the verbal abuse, bruises, burns, continuous incest and constant hearing that she was "stupid", had left her with a complete lack of self worth. The teenager had taught herself "not to feel", so self-mutilation was not a fearful dilemma for her, but rather second nature. Sometimes Joanne's inner turmoil surfaced as violent anger, sometimes total withdrawal. She had often been found hiding in closets for hours. Joanne's caseworker told us that, should we choose to accept Joanne, we would have our hands full, and we did. A letter from Joanne arrived at the youth ranch shortly before she did, and she ended the letter with "P.S. Now I finally got somebody to care for me." Our work with Joanne began simply. She spent the first month on "shadow restriction", constantly with her new houseparent. This time was important for both of them because it set the stage for a meaningful relationship with an adult to develop. Joanne met her therapist, and they found a time to meet together weekly. One day when they were walking and talking, Joanne's therapist found out how much Joanne loved horses. Joanne had read books and books about horses, but had never ridden one. The therapist arranged for Joanne to have special one on one lessons with one of HCYR's horseback riding instructors. Within weeks Joanne was going on trail rides, and then she joined the Riding Club. As Joanne's first three months with us came to a close, she began a pattern of behavior which was escalating towards violence. She directed verbal abuse, and a very defiant attitude toward her houseparent. Joanne was rarely withdrawn. She was angry, aggressive, and loud. An interdisciplinary treatment team met and decided that she was ready to start group therapy with other sexually abused girls. After much love, patience, counseling and prayers, Joanne began to speak of the roots of her self-hatred. She harbored strong feelings that somehow she should have stopped all of the hurting in her home . . . she should have stopped the murder . . . she should have been a better child . . . more loveable . . . not so "STUPID". In time, Joanne began to see things differently. In group therapy, Joanne and several other girls had made porcelain baby dolls. The girls were to stuff the doll bodies, then place a jewel inside, symbolizing the priceless beauty within their own hearts. Joanne asked the group leader "Could I have another jewel please, I'd like to put one in my doll's head, because I AM NOT STUPID! They were wrong!" As Joanne began to leave the nightmare of her childhood behind, Ranch staff, who had come to care very deeply for Joanne, took every opportunity to offer her more helpings of childhood. Never before comfortable in the classroom, she began to catch up on her grades. Her love for horses extended to a love of farm animals in general, and her 4-H projects were a thorough success. She won her first ribbon in a horse show. She has also re-established contact with her aunt, her mother's sister. Joanne progressed enough to know that she was not the cause of the bad things that had happened to her. Today, sixteen years later, Joanne has a loving marriage and three beautiful children. There is no abuse in Joanne's home. We are grateful to have had a part in her journey, to have been with her and watched her grow, and we've told her so many times. As a family we shared tears with her when we read one of her poems, written about a year after she joined us in 1983. BACK TO COLOR Joanne stayed with us until shortly after graduation, then it was years until we heard from her again. Her call came right before Christmas 1995. Joanne excitedly told us of a husband and children - children that had never known abuse - children she and her husband were not only proud of, but respected. She thanked us for showing her how to love - for encouraging her that she could have the family that she had seldom dared to let herself even dream about. |
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