Eureka ranch gives children, many abandoned in Russia, second chance
By TRISTAN SCOTT
EUREKA - Bearing the scars of an invisible disorder, a lost generation of adopted children, most of them Russian, has come here to live on Joyce Sterkel's ranch.
"You're not bad. This isn't your fault. This was done to you," Sterkel, 65, frequently reminds them in a firm and maternal tone.
Their ages range from 5 to 18, but they have endured hidden horrors before taking their first breath, and were abandoned to the system before the consequences of their disease - permanent brain damage and behavioral problems as the result of fetal alcohol exposure - became evident.
Their adoptive families send them here in hopes of one day reconciling, and while many of the children are eager for a second chance, most have the implicit understanding that they are not ready to return home. Some may never be, and the bleakness of that reality stands in stark relief against the idyllic backdrop of the Ranch for Kids Project, a nonprofit, in-house respite care facility designed for adopted children who suffer from Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD).
On a recent winter morning at the organization's rural schoolhouse, the children sat in rows of desks, stabbing at the air with raised hands as a teacher invited them to recite the subject, predicate and verb of a sentence written on the whiteboard - "The deer are running through the woods."
At that moment, they behave like model students, and any evidence of the trauma they've endured is concealed behind the day's lesson plan. At that moment they are normal children.
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In the evening they return to Sterkel's nearby ranch to finish homework assignments and complete their chores, eat dinner and go to bed. On the weekend, they might spend an afternoon on horseback, roaming the pastoral foothills of the ranch's 170 acres, or else learning basic life skills, repairing fences or shoveling snow beneath the looming ridges of the Whitefish Range. In both work and recreation, they follow a structured and repetitious routine, without which Sterkel says their lives would unravel.
"We know these kids can succeed in the right setting, but if they are just thrown out in the world they cannot function, even with the best families," she said. "This is forever. It's a permanent brain injury that you cannot fix."
Every Sunday, the children write letters home, describing the week's activities to their adoptive families who sent them here in desperation for reasons that sound implausible - molestation, death threats, assaults, explosive outbursts and otherwise incorrigible behavior.
Alec Cole, a precocious 13-year-old with striking eyes and an olive complexion, recently arrived at Sterkel's ranch for his second stint. Born in Belarus, Cole spent the first three years of his life in an orphanage, where abuse and neglect compounded the effects of FASD, which can affect impulse control, intelligence and, in Cole's case, physical characteristics like height.
When a Florida couple adopted Cole, they assumed he would assimilate into their family with liberal doses of love and affection, but the damage had been done before Cole ever had a chance, and his ability to trust adults has been undermined.
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Over time, his behavior grew increasingly aggressive and unpredictable, and the family reached a tipping point when assaults and threats of violence against his parents and adoptive sister became commonplace.
"I kicked, fought, cursed, yelled and did all kinds of wrong things to my parents," Cole said, reciting the litany of reasons his adoptive family had for sending him to live with Sterkel, and for spending what amounts to a college education in the course of his therapy.
He has made progress at the Ranch for Kids, but not without frequent setbacks. During one violent outburst, he attempted to attack a staff member with a 2-by-4. Still, after living on the ranch for two years and following a visit from his family, Cole went home to Florida for a yearlong trial period. His violent meltdowns reemerged and the family determined he was not fit to live with them; he returned to live with Sterkel last month.
"I'm not saying I don't appreciate my other set of parents, but it's hard being given away," he said.
Dozens of Cole's peers at the ranch have similar stories of early abuse and neglect, and their exposure to alcohol in utero is nearly universal. Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders cause irreversible brain damage and, in the most severe cases, physical manifestations are apparent in a slight build, small head circumference, and facial dysmorphology characterized by a thin or flattened upper lip.
Gabe, a teenager whose adoptive family did not give permission to publish his last name, exhibits all of those physical features, and also recalls being abused by his biological father. He was placed at the ranch after sexually abusing his adoptive sister and, without the moral judgment to understand why those actions are wrong, is now working to correct the behaviors.
"You learn different. You do things different than other people," he said in describing the effects of FASD. "It gives you more challenges than other people, but you can definitely overcome them."
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Although not all of the children who live on Sterkel's ranch are of Russian descent, a striking majority are. International adoptions from Russia and other Eastern European countries skyrocketed in the 1990s after the Soviet Union dissolved, and more than 47,000 Russian children were adopted in the United States between 1998 and 2009.
Because alcoholism is the most frequent cause for removal of children from their biological mothers in Russia, those adoptees are at a greater risk of having fetal alcohol syndrome. One report estimates that the rate of fetal alcohol syndrome in Russian orphanages is eight times the worldwide average.
Sterkel knows firsthand the scourge of alcoholism on that nation's children. She worked as a midwife in Russia from 1992 to 1994 and delivered hundreds of babies with FASD before adopting three children of her own, two boys and a girl, all of whom have FASD and are now fully grown and independent.
The Sterkel family's success with their children led other parents to seek assistance, and between 1999 and 2002 numerous children came to live on the family ranch. In 2003 Sterkel realized the need for a full-time professional staff and separate facility and created the Ranch for Kids Project.
Sterkel uses clinical terms to describe the two primary afflictions that affect her clients - FASD and Reactive Attachment Disorder (RAD), both of which cause irreversible damage. FASD is an umbrella term to describe the range of effects that can occur in someone whose mother drank alcohol during pregnancy. The effects may include physical, mental, behavioral and learning disabilities with lifelong implications.
RAD describes an inability to form attachments to caregivers, and generally arises from neglect during a child's first critical months of life. Sterkel frequently sees it occur as a result of alcoholic or absent parents, or from institutionalization in understaffed orphanages. Without that early foundation of trust, she says, the child never fully recovers.
"Horrible things happen to these children before they are abandoned to the system," Sterkel said. "Horrible things happen to them before they are even born."
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Some of the children spend several weeks or months with Sterkel before returning to their families, and the outcomes are sometimes positive. Others, like Cole, require years of respite care just to develop basic life skills.
Others still leave the ranch only when they reach the age of 18 and their adoptive families no longer bear legal responsibility. Those young adults often enroll in the federal Job Corps training program, Sterkel said, but without a structured "next-phase" environment, their futures are grim.
"We have well-meaning families who adopt these children and believe that love and affection is all it takes," Sterkel said. "They expect challenges. They expect malnutrition and lack of love, but they do not expect a child who has permanent brain damage, who cannot bond. We can correct their behaviors, but we can't put their souls back in their body."
Having navigated the murky waters of an international adoption, Sterkel says most families she encounters are patient and committed to their adopted children; however, some simply surrender their children to the ranch's charges.
Sterkel and a task force of concerned parents, some of them former clients, are actively working to acquire nonprofit status for a "next-phase project," in which a vocational school and housing would be provided for young adults who cannot transition into mainstream life.
But until such a structured environment exists, Sterkel has taken to allowing some former clients to live and work at the ranch indefinitely. She is now the legal guardian of a 2-year-old girl whose mother left the ranch for the Job Corps, but became pregnant and could not care for the child.
"I can't just put them out on the streets, because that's where they'll end up," she said. "Either on the streets or in the criminal justice system."
Jenya Davidson, 23, is a former client who now works and lives full time at the ranch, performing maintenance tasks and providing some supervision to the organization's younger clients. Socially charming and charismatic, Davidson thrives when given responsibility in a structured environment.
But as an adult, those safety nets disappear and a new set of challenges emerge, and Davidson's attempts to live an independent life have been derailed at every turn. Kicked out of Job Corps and unable to hold a steady job, Davidson lived on the streets in Honolulu for five months. He was exploited by his peers before returning to Montana.
"I'm lucky that Joyce offered me a job," he said. "I've been here for three years."
Davidson's adoptive mother, Gigi Davidson, lives in Honolulu, and is on the task force of parents working to secure funding for a next-phase project, which she calls "FASD Communities."
"He will need a supportive setting for the rest of his life, and in a city like Honolulu I cannot replicate that," Davidson said of her son. "It scares me to bring him back here, and a lot of these kids are in the same situation. Basically, they are sentenced to a life on the streets unless we can come up with a solution."
Zhenya Wood, 16, gave up on school before coming to Montana, but a winter digging ditches and performing manual labor alongside Davidson has changed his outlook.
"I'm not much of a ditch digger or a rancher, so I'd like to give school another chance," he said.
A victim of FASD, Wood lived in a Russian orphanage from the age of 3 until 7, when a Pennsylvania couple adopted him.
"I don't have a lot of happy memories," he said, recalling the orphanage as "dark and unclean, with bad food."
Wood's mother died three years ago and his father sent him to Sterkel after the teenager's behavior became uncontrollable.
"We were just holding on after my mom died, and I realize that my dad doesn't deserve all the crap I've given him," he said. "But these teenage years are tough."
Wood says he believes his father can sense a change in him during their weekly phone conversations, and his goal is to return home.
"I sure hope so. I've forgotten what he looks like," he said.
Reporter Tristan Scott can be reached at (406) 730-1067 or at tscott@missoulian.com.