Little Miss Evil

How our angelic adoptive daughter turned into Little Miss Evil
By MELANIE ALLEN - More by this author »

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/femail/article.html?in_article_id=554769&in_page_id=1879

When Melanie Allen and her husband Rob, a quantity surveyor, adopted a five-yearold called Alex, they couldn't believe their good fortune. Heartbreakingly beautiful, as well as affectionate, she seemed to be a dream child.
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But as the months passed, Melanie and Rob, both now 44, began to see a very different side of their "perfect" daughter - and found themselves sucked into a nightmare in which they faced losing everything ...

Jumping out of the car, I could just make out the small, lone figure waiting at the front door. My heart began to pound. She was so beautiful - and she was smiling. Her eyes seemed to have a magnetic pull, and as each step drew me closer, they grew larger.

The photo from the adoption agency had not done those eyes justice. Nor had it captured the silken gloss of her fair hair, which hung to her waist. I was in love already. Her foster father urged her forward. "Do you know who these nice people are?" he asked.

"It's my new Mummy and Daddy," Alex answered - so quietly that I had to replay the words in my head to make sure I'd heard them right. With a thrill, I realised I had. And as I looked down at my new daughter, her eyes were brimming with a pleasure that mirrored my own.

Adorable on the outside: But Melanie Allen and her husband Rob discovered their adoptive daughter Alex was ruthless and manipulative (picture posed by model)

I'd always dreamt of rescuing "unwanted" children. A year after our wedding, Rob and I conceived our son Daniel naturally, but we seemed unable to have a second child. After 18 months of trying, we decided to pursue adoption instead.

It had taken four years of interminable form-filling and interviews to be accepted on to the adoption register, but I knew that day in August 1997 that we'd found the little girl who was to complete our family.

Snuggling Alex under her Disney duvet in our four-bedroom semi in the Midlands that night, we vowed we'd love her for ever. Certainly, if anyone deserved love and security, it was Alex. Her mother, Michelle, was an alcoholic and drug addict, sustaining her habit by prostitution.

Alex was 18 months old when, acting on a tip-off, social workers broke into the flat to find her 22-year-old mother unconscious on the floor and Alex, malnourished, lying in squalor.

Alex was fostered until Michelle got clean from drugs. But when returned to her mother's care, Michelle's new boyfriend, a paranoid schizophrenic, attacked Alex, hitting her under the guise of "punishing" her. Finally, Michelle forced him out.

Alone and depressed, Michelle returned to her old habits. One day she woke in hospital, having overdosed, to learn that she and Alex had narrowly escaped being burned to death after an attempt by Alex, aged three, to grill herself fish fingers.

Alex was made a ward of court and freed for adoption - which is how we came to meet her. We'd been warned by social workers that Alex had learning difficulties and her vocabulary was very limited. It was hard to put my finger on, but her behaviour started to make me feel uneasy.

However hard we tried, she seemed incapable of learning anything. I spent hours showing her the buttons to press on the TV remote control, button her top, brush her teeth, use a knife and fork - all to no avail. Part of me wanted to scream: we loved her dearly, but it seemed we could do nothing to help her.


Alex had been with us almost a year when I first began to doubt her. Maybe she's faking it, I thought; or deliberately needling me just to get attention? Then one day I overhead Daniel pleading with Alex to stop hurting our precious cat, Scooter.

She'd been pulling his tail. Looking into Alex's big, black eyes as I gently told her off, I found nothing there. No emotion, no anger. But, as I stepped away, I heard her whisper to Daniel: "I hate you. You made Mum hear." It chilled my blood.

Alex had been with us 19 months when I found her in the bath, very deliberately pouring water from a bath toy on to the floor. For months I'd been mopping up water "accidentally" sloshed out of the bath and washing towel after towel.

Alex couldn't - or wouldn't - explain. "Mm, err ..." she stammered, her face crumpling under the force of my fury. "I dunno. I was, um, putting water, um, on the floor."

Later that night, I poured out our despair and confusion to my friend Sophie.I knew that Alex was just a little girl with a hideous past who wanted to be loved, but I couldn't help myself. "I pace the floor sometimes thinking she's some evil person reincarnated, intent on destroying us.

"Then I curse myself for such hateful thoughts," I confided in Sophie. Sophie had no solution, but she made me promise to get help.

Desperate, I rang the Post Adoption Centre, a national charity offering support, and we were referred to a counsellor. He was convinced that Alex was betraying a desperate need to be in control in a world where once she'd had none.

Alex had to learn that she was now in safe hands and that we were people she could trust. It seemed like good advice and relief washed over us. But sadly, it wasn't that simple. Instead, Alex's tactics intensified.



One day, when she was still six, I told her she couldn't have a second lollipop before tea. She spent the next five minutes glued to my side, mirroring my every step purely to wind me up. Her tactics were bizarre but insidious: walking strangely, staring fixedly, tapping her feet incessantly dressing completely inappropriately, often with clothes inside out or back to front.

Everything, in short, to make herself the centre of attention.

Friends, family and teachers were blinded by Alex's manipulative behaviour, blaming everything on her "learning difficulties". At school she was the model student - bumbling but eager.

The exception was Alex's drama teacher, who herself had an adopted child. She'd seen through her manipulative behaviour. "Alex is not the self-effacing little thing she appears," she said ominously. "It's the staring that first made me suspect. My son did the same when he was angry. "I also think she's overplaying the helplessness. These kids are very good at playing innocent."

I wanted to hug the drama teacher with relief.

By now I dreaded time alone with Alex, so took a part-time job at our local university. Still Alex dominated every waking moment, demanding constant attention. I don't believe Alex disliked or resented Daniel, but she sensed how precious his well-being was to us.

She disturbed his homework, interrupted when his friends came to play, stared at him at mealtimes and - most annoying of all - started waking him at 5am.

She tried his patience terribly.

We were now convinced that Alex was a very seriously damaged child. It felt too much for us to handle alone, so in early 2000 our doctor referred us to CAMHS - Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services - a government-backed network of therapists.

"It's her ability to control her emotions that worries us the most," I explained to our therapist. "If it weren't for her anger, I'd say she was a machine. And it's destroying us."

The therapist, though, seemed blinded by Alex's charm, calling her "Little Scrumptious". With her, Alex was all simpering smiles, acting the shy, slow learner for all she was worth.

Desperate, I started doing my own research. And that's when I finally made the breakthrough - in a brochure we'd been given when we first applied to adopt. It described a child identical to Alex - steely, controlled and staring.

Her condition had a name: Reactive Attachment Disorder (RAD).

Imagine attachment as a string between infant and mother. The infant's cries for food, warmth and touch are answered. Now imagine an infant like Alex, born into an environment where its carer is unable to respond due to mental health problems or drug induced oblivion.

This infant's string is useless, so it has no sense of belonging to anyone; nor anyone to it. The consequences are immense. Fear, rage, lack of conscience (neglected children are not taught right from wrong), lack of compassion or empathy.

By the time the infant is removed from its environment, it's a broken soul. But, as we were about to discover, RAD was only part of the problem. Alex, now eight, also had a voice in her head - telling her what she could and could not do.

It came tumbling out one day after a couple of years when we battled to understand why Alex had refused a simple instruction to say "Thank you".

She admitted that her "voice" had ordered her not to. Suddenly everything clicked into place. It wasn't just her anger Alex kept hidden. She seemingly wanted nothing because the voice demanded total secrecy, forbidding her to reveal her emotions to anyone. Even us.

I was convinced that Alex desperately needed treatment in a hospital specialising in disturbed children.

I pleaded with her psychologist: "We're living with a child who's secretive beyond belief, who's got a voice in her head, who talks of death - threatening to kill me at the drop of a hat - who's filled with hate, who at eight years old can't even write her name and who can shut herself down like a computer."

But Alex was such a consummate actress that no one believed us.

She mirrored the attitude of whoever was talking to her, seeming to know precisely what each person wanted to hear. By now Rob was at the end of his tether. "I don't know how much I can take of this," he whispered. "I want my life back." Tense and on edge, we decided we had only one option - to get the adoption annulled.

Instead, we'd foster Alex.

That would free her from the expectations to attach to us, and us from the expectations of making her our daughter. And, if it got no easier, we could hand her back. Our announcement to Alex's social worker was like a bomb going off.

Suddenly, the authorities went into action, doing anything to prevent us annulling the adoption. Our social worker agreed to refer Alex to a hospital specialising in children with RAD. We were thrilled.

And then everything changed. I'd refused Alex a treat - an outing with my sister - because I knew she'd be so disruptive. An hour later, I was at the kitchen sink when I heard a single clicking noise behind me.

I spun round to find Alex pointing Daniel's red metallic spud gun at me, her eyes locked to mine. I looked down. A 2in nail lay on the floor, inches from my feet. I was too stunned to speak. I bent down, picked up the nail and held out my hand.

"It works better with potatoes," I said.

i found Rob and recounted the incident.

"That's it! I want her out of the house!" he said. "We've got Daniel to think about. "I'd never forgive myself if ... " He couldn't finish the sentence. The following day I rang the hospital, begging for news about our appointment - only to discover our social worker had never even referred us.

We gave Social Services one last chance: a week to confirm a date for a hospital assessment. The deadline came and went. We'd been abandoned. Alex could sense something different in the air. I wasn't ignoring her mind games; I simply wasn't reacting. When she did her usual routine of stumbling into the car in a deliberately clumsy heap, I ignored her.

I was waiting for the treacherous moment we'd be breaking the news to her that she was moving on. About a week after the gun incident, Rob returned from work to tell her. Alex, then nine, was sitting propped against her bedroom wall with her knees up, eyes straight ahead. I think she knew.

"Alex, love, we've got something to tell you," I said gently.

The eyes she turned on me were dead. "You're going to be staying somewhere else for a while, just until we've found someone to help you. I'm sorry."

My tears weren't for me. They were for the girl who'd never been loved: not by me, not by anyone.

Alex simply nodded, barely displaying a hint of emotion.

Later, Rob sought her out in her bedroom. "Alex, do you want to go?"

Alex looked up, flat, as though defeated. "I want to stay," she said. "But the Voice wants me to go."

It was so honest, it was heartbreaking.

Two days later, we gathered Alex's belongings, put her suitcase in the car and drove our daughter to her new home. The peace that descended on our house that evening was the saddest I'd ever known. I agonised about what we'd done and how Alex was coping with rejection for a second time. Gradually, though, life got back from normal and we began to enjoy life again.

But this was far from the end. Alex had been with her foster mother almost a year when our lives imploded again.

We'd been visiting her every 12 weeks and had taken her to a restaurant where we'd played a silly game where the children had fallen on the floor.

"She was in tears after you left," her social worker said icily.

According to Social Services, we'd also "harmed" Alex by insisting she suffered from RAD and heard voices in her head. Social Services were seeking a care order which meant Alex could never return to us. Over the next few months, they marshalled a case against us. We were dangerous parents who had systematically abused and harmed an innocent child. I was crushed under the weight of pain and grief.

What had we done to deserve this? Could we lose Daniel, too?

In our different worlds of pain, Rob and I found ourselves torn apart, rowing constantly. Finally, we decided it was best if Rob moved out to a flat nearby.

Devastated, I was prescribed anti-depressants. Meanwhile Daniel, then 13, was suffering nightmares. We soon discovered we were in a Catch 22 situation.

Our solicitor warned that we stood little chance of successfully contesting the care order - which was the only way to clear our name - because, at that time, Alex wasn't displaying enough disturbed behaviour to convince the judge just how damaged she truly was.


Our only option was to consent. Soon, our daughter for six years was no longer our responsibility. Meanwhile, Alex's behaviour had become increasingly bizarre.

She was muttering to herself and threatening to run away - but social workers were still blaming her "learning difficulties".

Three weeks after the order was granted, Alex grabbed painkillers and matches and locked herself in the bathroom at her foster home.

Police broke down the door to find her cowering under the sink, surrounded by burned out rolls of toilet paper.

Refusing to talk, she was rushed to hospital to check she had not taken an overdose. She hadn't. A few days later, her foster mother, Janet, left her youngest charge, Maisie, five, in the bath while she answered the phone.

Fired by a jealous rage, Alex burst into the bathroom, pushed one hand over her face and the other on her stomach, and deliberately pushed her under the water.

Only Janet's return saved the child's life.

Alex was removed immediately and placed in a small residential unit for disturbed children. Two years on, the unit serves 15-year-old Alex well: there are no expectations on her to bond or to love. She is still legally our daughter, but I fear for her future.

I hope one day she will get the treatment she needs.

Alex is a people-lover who, under different circumstances, would have so much to give. With luck, she might yet be given the chance to love and to feel loved.

Unhappily, Rob and I are still separated, though we remain very close.

Although shaken by the experience and still somewhat fragile, we have at last begun to move on. Aside from the strain those years put on Daniel, now 17, we don't regret our decision to adopt Alex.

She taught us - a normal middle-class family in an ordinary town - so much about the complex makings of a human being. We considered legal action against Social Services, but the idea of embroiling ourselves in an ugly legal battle was as unthinkable as leaping into a snake pit.

Instead, we settled for an apology "for the way things had turned out for us" - and, most of all, for Alex.

We were all horribly let down by Social Services.

Even now, incredible as it might appear, Alex remains untreated.She has not seen a psychiatrist since the care proceedings. She has simply been "lost in the system".

We still visit her every three months - but, sadly, with each visit we see her becoming increasingly withdrawn.

Alex deserved a chance of happiness, but because Social Services are underfunded, understaffed and weighed down by bureaucracy, our family was destroyed. It's so tragic.

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I just post the stories, for interest.. for everyone

Lord, what fools these mortals be!
- A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act III, Scene ii

Voltaire said: "Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities."

H.L.Mencken wrote:"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.”

Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former. Albert Einstein

That's always a plus: adopting someone else's damaged goods. I think I'd have beat her half to death when I saw her hurting the cat. That shit doesn't fly with me no matter WHO you are.

Luckily that one is returnable like a damaged item from Wal-Mart.

Sounds like they adopted a little Lolita witch with demonic powers.

I wouldn't be surprised if her eyes suddenly glowed in dark.

Or she ended up a drug-addicted prostitute like her poor moo had been.

So once again, thanks for making me FORGET about adoption altogether!^_^

This kid was damaged goods from the start. Not exactly her fault, but whatever damage she's suffered certainly doesn't excuse her behavior either. This child is a psychopath, pure and simple. She has no conscience, and therefore there is no hope for her. Best thing to do is lock her up now and never let her out.

Their description of the child reminds me of the cooly murderous, psychopathic demon spawn character, "Rhoda," in the movie, "The Bad Seed." "She was sooooooooooo beautiful and charming! How could she be anything but perfect?" Famous last words!

After learning what that child had gone through at the hands of her cracked-out mother and moomie's boyfriend, those assholes STILL decided to adopt her anyway, thinking they could somehow "save" her and mold her into a "normal", productive citizen. WRONG!! I don't feel sorry for them in the least bit!

They should have just left well enough alone!

Jesus, that poor poor girl. Can y'all imagine never being loved by your mom?, especially so young when you need them so much. I couldn't imagine my life without my mom, she's my best friend and I still go to her for advice and other things.

Anyone considering adoption should pay for their own private investigator and run a full blown background on the alleged 'parents' as well as the kid and any medical background information, treatments etc. And for Gods' sake, don't ever believe something a freakin' social worker tells you! They just want to move the kid along so they can get them out of their hair and get on with their next case.

This is a very easy question to answer from the medical point of view. The brat is the product of a psychotic/schizophrenic father and a drug-abusing moo. Bratlina would have been damaged goods even under the best of circumstances. It is now more than a 50% chance that the brat will exhibit either some psychotic or schizophrenic tendencies and/or various mood disorders including bipolarity, major depression, etc.

The numbers were not in the brat's favor, and quite frankly I wonder if the adoption agency fully revealed the brat's history to the adoptive breeders. Chances are they did not, and now they are stuck for life with a future little felon whose evil will grow like Sauron on steroids.

WTF was up with one of the therapists calling the girl "Little Scrumptious" ??? HORK.

Wow, this was a heavy story! I'm all for adoption because I feel that people should at least try to help the unwanted children that are already on this planet rather than creating more. I can't blame these people for getting her out of their home. Some humans are genetic garbage. With her family background she didn't have a prayer and should have been aborted.

My aunt and uncle had a similar, shorter lived, situation. After their only child was killed in an accident, they decided to take in two young brothers (ages 6 and 8) as foster children in hopes of adopting them. WIthin the first month of living with them they burned down their garage, and broke the family dog's leg. After the dog situation they packed the little monsters' bags and sent them right back to the children's home they had been previously living in. They never even toyed with the idea of adoption again. Why don't more people abort?

It's a sad situation when any child has to get sent back, because you just know that if the adoption actually reaches that point, something is most likely wrong with the child that can never, ever be fixed. Then everyone hears about it and the adopting person/people catch all kinds of shit for sending the kid back, and anyone who ever considered adopting a child is probably having second thoughts because they worry they might end up with a child they absolutely can't deal with and will need to send it back...which is exceptionally demonized already.

I greatly respect anyone who chooses to adopt or foster because it's not an easy task in any way. But some of these kids are just too fucked-up for anyone to handle on any level below professional, and I seriously advocate locking these kids up for the rest of their lives to keep them out of a society in which they would never be able to live in normally; if euthanasia was legal for humans, I'd advocate that too so others who need that space in a mental hospital would not have to go without care because of some coke-slut's stupid mistake.

Social Services is basically ineffectual in the U.S. as well. You hear horror stories almost every other day. I have a couple friends who were social workers. Their hands are basically tied, caseloads are ginormous, and almost everyone burns out in a few years.

Why can't we have a one-strike rule: you fuck up, you get sterilized. your brats get locked away somewhere where they can never hurt others.

Psyco kid, nature and nurture both conspired against her....

Run away...run away very very fast and don't ever contact her again.

Very Scary.

Banshee Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Sounds like they adopted a little Lolita witch
> with demonic powers.
>
> I wouldn't be surprised if her eyes suddenly
> glowed in dark.
>
> Or she ended up a drug-addicted prostitute like
> her poor moo had been.
>
> So once again, thanks for making me FORGET about
> adoption altogether!^_^

Sadly, I am adopted (that's not the sad part) so I think I would understand but children are so damaged these days, I don't want to undo the mess even if I WERE to consider it.

I saw the link and the girls is a little Jezebel. I can tell she will become a Teen-mum with her evil boyfriend = Evil Trophy, not F###trophy. Or make it an evil-F-Trophy-semon-demon from Hell.

Hry Gig, I did heard of a friend that have twins, she call them twins from hell!. Never adopt damaged goods. At least the little miss-evils mum adopt the kid and decide to be Childfree or else put up with the evil kid.

Ok, I have to ask:

Gigabyte, Sherrif X, ASRock,

What is up with you guys? You keep resurrecting old posts, you always seem to post in a group (as in, if one of you guys posts something, one or both of the others immediately posts on the same thread too), and you're clearly not native English speakers. Not trying to be mean, but what's your deal?

Arctic_Fox Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Ok, I have to ask:
>
> Gigabyte, Sherrif X, ASRock,
>
> What is up with you guys? You keep resurrecting
> old posts, you always seem to post in a group (as
> in, if one of you guys posts something, one or
> both of the others immediately posts on the same
> thread too), and you're clearly not native English
> speakers. Not trying to be mean, but what's your
> deal?

Sorry Artic Fox
I am one of the guest and so as my friend Sherrif and ASRock. We are from UK just like Mercurior. We start joining since rant since found out the childfree stuff. Now I learned more about CF is a choice. The old posts and thread, some issues like to write on because just like you have put up with the breeders. Is it OK to apologise here?

I don't give a fuck what any of these mamby pamby social services liberls say, part of the parent child bonding process is DISCIPLINE and unfortunately, especially in Europe, it's getting harder and harder to discipline kids! You can't do shit without these little monsters blackmailing you with threats of calling in the goddamned social service wankers to haul the moos and duhs off for "abuse."

The kid is a psychopath, plain and simple. And RAD, is just a fancy name for child psychopath.

There is only one way to deal with psychopaths, and maybe, just maybe, a kid that hasn't had full brain development yet, might not grow up to be an adult psychopath if the crap is nipped in the bud with some swift and harsh discipline. Psychopaths do not respond to mamby pamby liberal bullshit, they only respond to PAIN. Period. That's the only hope you have for modifying the behavior of a psychopath.

We have an adult psychopath in our own family. I won't go into great detail here, but I will say this, he's functional, he works, and he's evil as fuck. His brothers though served up a lesson to him about not being able to get away with anything EVER, NEVER EVER EVER, he doesn't understand the pain of other people, but he does understand his own pain. And the more pain he suffered for being an evil asshole, the less he goes around being an evil asshole.

That child reminds me of The Bad Seed kid too, that someone already mentioned. Let's face it, she is most likely a born sociopath, which is what this sounds like with the blank evil stares, emotional detachment, etc...and she was placed in what sounds like a loving home and wanted for nothing. If she was abused in the past, couldn't she see this was her ticket to get out of hell? So, she is either a sociopath, which has no cure, or an idiot,for which there is no cure. I think they should not only return the merchandise, but get a full refund for all of the money they have spent on this nutcase kid.

Her birth mother probably looked her in the eye, saw the blank evil look she had seen on her crazy Aunt Sally's face, since this shit is inherited, and knew her best way out was to pass her off to someone else, preferably some unsuspecting person as no sane relative would want it either. Then she probably went to a kindly old lady cookie baking foster mom and wreaked havoc from the crib there, and eventually ended up in the foster circuit where they beat the shit out of her. Most smart sociopaths figure out early on how to manipulate and pretend to be sweet and innocent, but this kid is too dumb to do that. So, she is a sociopath AND stupid. Yeah, return her already and for your family's safety, don't look back.

I think adoption is a con game all the way around. Agencies are notorious for lying to prospective parents about the emotional health of a child.

I would not judge any parent for sending an adopted child back. I would do the same thing, especially if I felt the child was dangerous to himself and others.

I had a friend who worked as a social worker at a local hospital. She told me she would never recommend adopting a child. Most of the baybees adopted out from her hospital were from crackwhore mothers. Genetic garbage.

An adopted student I taught in my elementary music classes was similar to this. Sweet a sugar one minute, a complete psychopath the next. I knew him for two years, in 1st and 2nd grade. I felt bad for his parents (definitely PN.

The mother was friends with another of the teachers at my school. From her I found out that he had been a crack baby. He was prone to fits of violence, and the parents decided they didn't want him endangering the other students so in the end he was sent somewhere else (not sure where). The mother told the other teacher that she feared for her life when the child was in the house. This teacher was unable to have children and had been considering adoption. The mother advised her to never, ever to adopt and the teacher took her advice.

I don't doubt that some children are damaged goods and just can't be helped. It's sad that someone who could provide a home to an unwanted child would have to endure such horrible thing.

Once in a while it is interesting to resurrect zombies. It serves as a reminder again of the luck to be childfree.
I look at this and consider the flame job I got at livejournal when I suggested mentals be sterilized. Bunch of head stuck up assholes jerks.

two cents ¢¢ Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Once in a while it is interesting to resurrect
> zombies. It serves as a reminder again of the luck
> to be childfree.
> I look at this and consider the flame job I got at
> livejournal when I suggested mentals be
> sterilized. Bunch of head stuck up assholes jerks.


two cents, I completely agree with you about mentals getting sterilized and I have been called mean, uncaring, selfish,etc... for my opinion on that, AND on voluntary euthanasia and euthanasia in general in certain cirumstances, such as incurable water head babies and those who are otherwise fucked up mentally and/or physically and have no chance for a decent life. Like that Teri Shievley woman down in Florida. Had it been my decision, she never would have slobbered and shit on herself for 15 years. Her parents saw what they wanted to see as far as her "responding" to them, because with that type of brain damage there is no way medically possible that she consciously responded to anything.

We have a friend I've posted about here with a severe mental illness(bipolar) and he doesn't have kids. People who are mentally ill are not necessarily dumb, left to themselves without breeding pressure, they'll just naturally NOT BREED. Seriously. I really do believe that the pressure of a childcentric society on the mentally ill will cause them to do things, like breed, that nature did not intend for them. Some people who are mentally ill are strong enough to overcome society's pressure to breed, but certainly not all.

If we simply did not have a childcentric, breedercentric society, a whole lot less people who should not be breeding would not be breeding.
IMO