The girl in the window

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A haunting true story that we all can not help but learn from, and hopefully gain some strength in our own lives...

The Girl in the WindowA feral child, deprived of her humanity by a lack of nurturing...
http://www.tampabay.com/specials/2008/reports/danielle/

In the audio link it mentions that she has environmental autism, guess it would be hard to at first do any real test, environmental factors may impact on who we are - our autism, but does not give it to us.... from the very short audio it seem clear to me she could possibly be on the autism spectrum, so I do wonder why the professionals could not see that - maybe she survived because of her autism! A must - Listen to audio on link below ( once in link click on Play audio:) -
http://www.tampabay.com/specials/2008/a ... ndex.shtml really interesting, about 1 hour long... The professionals suggest the child was made autistic - when will the world really understand or learn!

When I was a child my situation was far from normal, but as children we know no difference... I use to just stare, and I have like a shutter system.. which I still do, if there is some think that I do not like the shutters start coming down, and I start to withdraw, close off, shut down.. I often withdraw as a child and even never really spoke for a while. There are so many autism children who do this with amazing parents, but feel often it because they feel alienated, misunderstood. I feel its our safety mechanism to safeguard us from an often very unforgiving world, with rules that are not made for us.

This situation is so horrendous its hard for any of us to really relate to, but I also can not help but wonder how much of it is exaggerated by people who just can not comprehend situations so vastly different from there own.

Parts of childhood I do not discuss as feel others will not understand, judge wrongly. Even maybe think I have made bits up. I do not need others telling me parts of my childhood were horrendous, because to me thats just how it was... as for many others. The one thing I needed so much as a young adult was to be able to talk about my life, have normal conversations... but there are even guidelines for what we do and do not say....

I am not trying to compare with this child, as no one should suffer the way she has, but things like this happen and continue to happen, and until more people take note, talk about and ask more questions so many more children will suffer in silent.

Sometimes extreme examples are needed so that maybe the real world will really start to listen, but it should not just be there shock we get from this, as we all need to see the bigger picture!

Last edited by asplanet on 07 Aug 2008, 7:21 pm, edited 3 times in total.

We don't know whether she became autistic or was autistic to begin with because we don't know her early history. Of course, we can't know experimentally, either, because who would deliberately do that to a child?--certainly not a responsible scientist. I suppose if we find another tragic situation like this whose early history is known, we might find an answer.

The distinction here has to be made between autism and attachment disorder, of course... likely enough that this girl has both. Seems to be recovering from her neglect, though; she's so amazingly affectionate--communicating, just without words. Very resilient child.

Feral children was an interest of mine some time back. I read by more than one psychologist who has studdied them, that it is believed many of these children *are* autistic, which makes them more susceptible to the neglect and abuse they endure.

It does make sense. If a mother is the kind of *censored* who will neglect a child, she is more likely to neglect an autistic child who does not fulfill her emotional needs. (Children aren't supposed to do this--but many parents apparently expect it!) If she has autistic traits herself, she will be less likely to neglect the child in a socially appropriate manner such as putting him in an institution.

Of course it happened near Tampa, Florida. Only criminals live in Florida. Especially Tampa. D'oh!

Wow, I do not understand how a mother could do that to her child. I am guessing she did it because her daughter was "difficult." It's possible she might have had autism just by what Michelle said and she made it worse by neglect. Well it's not worse, but it seems like it is because of the neglect. Any child would go feral like Dani if they were neglected like that. It's does not mean they are autistic.

Children neglected and raised without socialization are well known though--it's diagnosed as an attachment disorder and it happens in every badly run, overcrowded orphanage ever. They do have a lot in common with autism (autism was thought to be an attachment disorder once--the refrigerator mother theory) but there are differences enough to tell that they are not autistic. Whether it's the extreme isolation or underlying autism that causes feral children to be different is anyone's guess.

Wikipedia article that covers the basics:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attachment_disorder

Autism can be made "worse" (more disabling) by a bad environment. An autistic child not encouraged to talk may never do so even if he would have done so with encouragement and education. Inappropriate therapy could be just as bad. Abuse is worst of all. Its effects can show up differently in the autistic than in the non-autistic... Environment has little to say in whether autism exists, but much to say in whether you learn to take advantage of your autistic traits or become held back by them. (Well, I guess technically it's a matter of degree; I think we all have benefits and hindrances simultaneously...) The neurology of a child's developing brain is dependent on the environment--especially the stimulation the child receives--and if a neurotypical child is forever less able to communicate if his early years are bereft of communication, doesn't it stand to reason that an autistic child might be even more affected?

I so agree with what you say...

It's impossible to tell if she was autistic to begin with or developed "autistic like traits" from lack of socialization. It could be both. The mother-- while she could have just been an evil person-- might have had some serious issues herself. There was a story in the news recently about a woman who kept her autistic son hidden all his life, and all he ate was chocolate milk. She (the mother) really thought she was protecting him.

Sadly so many parents all round the world feel the need to keep differently minded children hided away, saw a program on Indian where sadly many still feel the need to do this...

The fact that the child only "all he ate was chocolate milk." does not seem so far fetched to me, my sisters older child when through a stage of only eating about one thing at a time, fine now... in fact he is extreme in ever way and doing extremely well - he is a genius, and doing things way beyond many of us... would not wish this on anyone, as he really does live in his own parallel world!

People who keep their children locked up in their own home thinking they are protecting them are insane.

This artricle goes into more depth about her mother:
http://tampabay.com/features/humaninterest/article750838.ece

I think you might be right about Danielle having some kind of autism originally, or maybe mental retardation... The article in the link does shed some more light on the early history.

I'm picking out some interesting bits here...

A sibling with a speech delay...

You don't get attachment disorder in a newborn... but newborn autistic kids are a bit notorious for either screaming too much (probably overstimulated) or surprisingly little (not realizing it brings Mom).

More early problems... Her brothers, similarly neglected (they were left to watch Danielle when their mother was gone) apparently picked up on "something wrong".

Danielle's low IQ may not all be from neglect--if her mother's is borderline low, she could've inherited it.

Neglect paying attention to others... Hmmm. A child who isn't "lovable" plus a mother who doesn't know how to love...

I actually agree with her... I don't see why attachment disorder hasn't even been mentioned once; nobody can 'make' you autistic to begin with. I guess it's just that everybody's thinking about autism, so they say autism when they see something similar with a different cause.

I can see parallels in my own life, I grow up alienated from my own mother, unloved and not able to give love who's thought was it when no one knew back then. My mother could not cope with life itself, she never understood and no one did.

I hate it when society judges without truly understanding, media exaggerates and stereo types, if you become below the excepted line as the majority of society see it, they so often reject you. I felt growing up I may as well of been disposable, many of our neighbors would of preferred us not to be there, we did not fit...

What chance in life do differently minded people have, if others often so wrongly judge. I think we all need to look within ourselves at times, as we can only grow from really helping those in need. How many of us worry far to much what others think, projecting an imagine that we feel we should.

NOW RETHINK>>>
Quote: " A child who isn't "lovable" plus a mother who doesn't know how to love..."

Once you have read all of above, then rethink not lovable in who's eyes, for those of us on the autism spectrum we do have emotions, love and needs but do not show in the way you may expect, and often get rejected for this reason, we grow up being told our way is wrong - but is it!... If we grow up not knowing, its like walking in the dark and not knowing what to do, or where to go....

Autism and Feral Children
http://www.feralchildren.com/en/autism.php