One Child - Torey Hayden

...book is not an easy one to have chosen for a first time try at book reviews. In a normal book review you can tell more of the contents of the story and characters and give more insight into what was happening what the characters were doing etc etc. But with this book, there so much happening, too much activity in the book to describe it all. It would have been nice to have given more into what happened but you really have to read the book to understand ...
...very disturbing. This is not one of your everyday type of book you can pick up, read and put down, this book haunts you for days afterwards.

I only hope I do justice to the Author.

THE AUTHOR

Torey Hayden, is by profession an American teacher,and educational psychologist, who's pupils have severe mental handicaps and emotional disorders. Children that have been "past on" as being beyond help.
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I feel a little clumsy as to how I approach this review, the book is not an easy one to have chosen for a first time try at book reviews. In a normal book review you can tell more of the contents of the story and characters and give more insight into what was happening what the characters were doing etc etc. But with this book, there so much happening, too much activity in the book to describe it all. It would have been nice to have given more into what happened but you really have to read the book to understand why I wasn't able to do it. I will however give you a warning, there is a part in this book that is horriffic, sickening and very disturbing. This is not one of your everyday type of book you can pick up, read and put down, this book haunts you for days afterwards.

I only hope I do justice to the Author.

THE AUTHOR

Torey Hayden, is by profession an American teacher,and educational psychologist, who's pupils have severe mental handicaps and emotional disorders. Children that have been "past on" as being beyond help.
Though her books she tries to illistrate the speical needs of these children and how, she administrates these needs giving the child hope for a better future. I admire this women for what she does for these children and how she brings their plight to survive in this some what cruel society to light in her wonderfully written books. Some of her acclaimed books are, The Twilight Children:Three Voices No One Heard Until Someone Listened, the story of one woman's determination,the troubles of three people, and their amazing recovery. Also Just Another Kid about three children traumatised by the horrors of conflict in Northern Ireland.

THE BOOK

One Child is Torey Haydens first book written in 1980 You could not call this a story as such, more an account of true events. The names have been changed but that does not alter the fact it happened.

Torey is reading a news paper and comes across a small artical about a six year old girl who had abducted a three year old boy, tied him to a tree then burned him.The boy was taken to the local hospital in a critical condition and the girl taken into police custody. This set Torey wondering what would happen to the girl, how can a child of six be held in a prison cell, why did she do it, what will become of her. No one would want her, she would be an outcast, one thought crossed Torey's mind, would the child one day end up in one of her programmes.

Torey takes on a job at a new school, where the headmaster is not happy, having to have a special class of "crazy kids" in his school and feels that they will disrupt his " normal" children, showing his prejudice as with many other people of these troubled children. He did not provide a proper classroom for them to be taught in, instead the room he had given them was small, narrow and dark, with only a tiny window at one end of it. It was more like a storeroom for unused classroom furniture and a long way, away from the other classrooms and children.
Torey has 8 children to teach and knowing she needs the space for these children to move around freely, she gets rid of all the furniture apart from a table, a few small chairs, bookcase and a cupboard and tries to make the room as inviting as possible.

8 children at a time is the limit she is allowed to have, and by state law she was required to have the help of one full time qualified aide,but who they sent to her was Anton. Anton is a Mexican/American whose main language was Spanish, he was unqualified, not having finished High School, he had never worked with children before and hadn't wanted the job but because of the employment system he had to take the job or lose his benefits. Fortunately he soon adjusts.

The children arrive and are soon into a routine and progressing well.
Torey then goes on to tell you the history of each child, and how she feels about the manner in which she will have to reach out to them before she can start teaching them.To her each child is an individual who needs to be taught one to one at the start until they are ready to join together as a class.The exploits of these children are mentioned throughout the whole account, how they interact with each other and how they show they are like any "normal child" in a school classroom.

One day her boss, Ed Somers the director of special education arrives and informs her that there will be another child joining the class. Torey reminds him that she has her maximum limit and as much as she would like to take on this other child. it would not be possible, as it would break State law. But her boss insists and promises to get her more help plus the fact that the child will only be on a short stay until there was room for her in the State hospital. Torey agrees reluctantly.

It turns out that the child is the one Torey had read about in the newspaper article.

When the child arrives, the Social worker is gripping the little wrist holding her firmly. Torey's boss introduces the child as Sheila and gives a little insight to her history then he and the social worker leave.
Torey tries to take Sheila by the hand but the child makes a dash for the door fortunately Anton beat her to it and quickly bolts the door. While Anton tends to the other children, Torey tries to calm Sheila, who she sees as a child much too small for her age, her small frail body caked in dirt, her hair matted and dirty and clothes that were tattered, old, dirty and smelt strongly of urine. But most of all her eyes were wild and full of fear.

Over the following week, the help that had been promised arrived in the form of a junior student called Whitney, who could only help out during recess and for a while before and after her own schooling which seem pointless at the time considering Torey needed full time assistants. However Whitney seemed to have a way with the children and was willing to help in any way she possibly could, like changing diapers of the children who had no control over their bodily functions or reading stories to the children, taking them down to lunch and to the bus at the end of the day leaving Anton free to help with lessons and giving Torey the chance to spend more time with Sheila, who was proving to be quiet a problem.

Sheila refused to join in with the other childrens attivities, she would not partake in lessons, she didn't talk and never cried, she would only sit on a chair in the corner of the room with her knees drawn up under her chin, her deep dark eyes taking in every movement that Torey made. If any of the other children upset her, in even the smallest way, she would react violently towards them and had to be forcefully lead back to her chair.

Over the following weeks Torey slowly wins Sheila's trust, and learns a little more about her short tragic life, a life that had been full of abuse and lack of love. When Sheila was four her mother piled her and her two year old brother into the car and drove off leaving Sheila's father. When her mother reached a busy Highway she shoved Sheila out of the car abandoning her. This is something that Sheila could never understand, why her mother had left her behind and took her little brother.

Sheila was then put into the care of her drunken father, who beat her and felt she was to blame for his wife leaving him. Sheila's life went from bad to worse all she knew was violence, abuse, being unloved and being made to believe that everything that went wrong was her fault and constantly told she was a bad girl and needed to be punished, all people who did bad things had to be punished. Later Sheila would say "If I had been a gooder girl Mama might not have left me and I miss my little brother Jimmy." Sheila never knew what happened to her mother and brother only that they went to live in California.

After she had been taken into cutody by the police,for kidnapping and burning the little boy she was put back into the care of her father until a place became available in the state Hospital, no one wanted to foster her, no school wanted her in their classes. If care is the word you could use considering his brand of care was nothing but abuse and drunken indifference and thoughts that she wasn't his natural daughter.

The struggle to educate Sheila becames a battle, not just with Sheila but also the school head and other teachers. However Torey determination would not give up and she and Sheila formed a special bond. For once in her little life Sheila felt loved and slowly began to interact with the other children in the class tending to mother them, but she was so afraid that Torey would go away like her mother had and clung to Torey's jeans belt following her around where ever she went.

Eventually even the headmaster and the other teachers became fond of this child and did their all they could to help Torey obtain the benefits and care Sheila deserved.

The threat of Sheila being put in the State hospital and what later becomes of her, is for you to find out by reading this thought provoking and heart wrenching account of One Child.

CONCLUSION

How do I feel after reading this book.

Anger, heartbreak, rage and strong motherly emotion because those are the feelings of any mother who would read this book. I could not believe that a child of six could do the things Sheila did but reading the story I could understand why.

I felt sad, that a child this age had gone through so much hurt and sorrow my stomach turned at the horrors in her young life. I felt anger with the Authorties who knew what she was going through and had not stepped in earlier.
This small child, not much more than a baby, was so unloved, so unwanted, left to her own means, too afraid to cry in case it showed her weaknesses, who thought that the only way through life was to do to others as they had done to her, this had been the only way of life that she knew, so she knew no better until Torey.

I wanted to pick this child up and hug her, take her into my arms and tell her she was safe now and no one else would ever hurt her again, to give her all the things she had missed out on, to tell her I wanted her,and I would never leave her.

One last thing, Torey wrote in the epilogue of her book a poem she received from the real "Sheila" which I would like to leave you with.

To Torey with much "Love"

All the rest came
They tried to make me laugh
They played their games with me
Some games for fun and some for keeps
And then they went away
Leaving me in the ruins of games
Not knowing which were for keeps and
Which were for fun and
Leaving me alone with the echos of
Laughter that was not mine

Then you came
With your funny way of being
Not quite human
And you made me cry
And you didn't seem to care that I did
You just said the games are over
And waited
Until all my tears were turned into
Joy.

Torey's other books are:

ONE CHILD, 1980 (nonfiction);
SOMEBODY ELSE'S KIDS, 1981 (nonfiction);
MURPHY'S BOY, 1983 (nonfiction);
THE SUNFLOWER FOREST, 1984 (novel);
JUST ANOTHER KID, 1988 (nonfiction);
GHOST GIRL, 1991 (nonfiction);
TIGER'S CHILD, 1995 (nonfiction);
THE MECHANICAL CAT, 1999 (novel);
BEAUTIFUL CHILD, 2002 (nonfiction)
THE VERY WORST THING,2003 (children's novel)
TWILIGHT CHILDREN , 2005 (non-fiction)  

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