People are always attracted by the unknown, the scary and the wild. And Mowgli children combine everything that so attracts and frightens an ordinary person.
Mowgli and Tarzan, being fairy-tale heroes, skillfully found a common language both with animals and then with people, understood the laws of the animal and human world. There are many stories of human children growing up wild. But is the process of adaptation possible and are their stories so exciting and happy?
According to the documentation, there are about a hundred wild children in the world. They can be "adopted" by any animals, and they will adopt all the habits, they will eat what the "educators" do. However, most often children live with dogs or monkeys.
The story of how a bear brought up a boy in the Altai Territory was described either by a writer or a photographer. According to him, she looked after the boy, and before winter, realizing that she would fall into hibernation, she transferred him to China. And when, a few years later, the author of this story went again to those parts, on one of the rocks he saw no longer a boy, but an adult man. Only it was impossible to approach him - in front of him stood a wild beast.
This story is more like a fairy tale, which, after all, all such stories are like. Sometimes it is really difficult to distinguish where is the truth and where are the authors' inventions.
Among real stories, those when children become wild due to the negligence of their parents, and not because for some reason they ended up among animals, prevail.
"Wolves" Kamal and Amal
The most famous story of wild children is about the Indian girls Kamal and Amal. In India, in general, perhaps the largest number of stories about such children. Perhaps because of the proximity to the jungle.
In 1920, in one of the villages, local residents noticed "strange ghosts" in the jungle. People began to hunt them and found that human children live with wolves. When they began to tear apart the lair, the she-wolf who defended it was killed. Together with the cubs, two girls, about two and eight years old, were found in the hole. Both girls were running on all fours, unable to speak. They were named Kamala and Amala. The youngest died a year later. The eldest lived another nine years, barely learning to stand up straight and utter a few words. When the youngest girl died, Kamala cried for the first time in her life. It was noticeable that both girls were unhappy in captivity.
Ukrainian dog girl
One of the loudest stories of our time. In 1992, a strange child was brought to the Odessa boarding school for children with developmental defects, who had to be kept in an isolation cell for a month.
The medical card indicated that she was an eight-year-old girl. True, as soon as someone approached the newcomer, she grinned and growled menacingly. The girl really was very similar to a dog: she moved on all fours, easily jumped on the table, bench, refused to sleep on the bed, barked and could bite painfully. The girl did not know how to cry, and when she was offended, she squealed plaintively.
The dog girl did not speak, although she perfectly understood human speech. Over time, in the boarding school, Oksana Malaya (that's the name of the girl) learned to behave like a human being. Until the age of 18, she learned to read and write a little, and also to count within 20. However, Oksana did not become a full-fledged one.
Mowgli from the Kaluga region
And in 2008 in Russia, residents of a village in the Kaluga region found a boy in the forest who looked about 10 years old. The boy was with wolves and completely copied their habits. When the doctors decided to catch the boy, they found him in a wolf den.
In fact, the guy turned out to be about 20 years old. From life in a wolf pack, his toenails turned almost into claws, his teeth resembled fangs, his behavior copied the habits of wolves in everything.
The young man could not speak, did not understand Russian and responded to "kis-kis-kis". Unfortunately, the specialists failed to bring the guy back to normal life, and just a day after he was locked up in the clinic, he ran away. His further fate is unknown.
Chita pupil of dogs
In 2009, in the city of Chita, Russia, a five-year-old girl Natasha was found, who spent most of her life among dogs, because her parents did not care for her at all. The girl had never been on the street, and her parents did not let anyone into the apartment where she lived. She lived in a three-room apartment with relatives and animals, did not speak, but understood human speech a little. The mother claimed that the girl was kidnapped by her father, and the father claimed that the mother was never interested in the child.
Both of the girl's parents were alcoholics. The girl moved like a dog, drank water from a bowl, and instead of speaking, gave out only barking, could throw herself at people. When they found her, they transferred her to a rehabilitation center.
Jeanie from California
In 1970, American police found a girl in one of the houses in California, who lived in complete isolation from the world for the first 12 years of her life. For the first six months of her life, Jeanie was regularly examined by a pediatrician. According to medical records, she was a normal child.
At the age of 14 months, Jeanie was diagnosed with acute pneumonia, the doctor said that she was showing signs of "probable mental retardation". This assumption became a turning point in Jeanie's life: the girl's father isolated her in one of the rooms of his house from contact with her mother and older brother. He fed the girl only infant formula with milk and communicated with her, mainly imitating dog barking and growling.
Every time she tried to speak, he beat her with a stick. At the age of 13, when Genie was admitted to the children's hospital, she couldn't run, couldn't fully straighten her arms and legs. The girl did not react to the ambient temperature, was not accustomed to the toilet, did not know how to chew, did not control salivation. Gini never learned human speech, limiting herself to a few simple phrases. At the same time, the level of non-verbal intelligence has risen over time to a more than acceptable level.
Dog sisters
In 2011, Mowgli girls were found in the Primorsky district of St. Petersburg - two sisters of six and four years old. They never ate hot food, did not know how to speak, and expressed gratitude, like dogs, trying to lick adults' hands. The girls' parents are experienced alcoholics.
Lviv "Mowgli"
Probably, many people remember the story of two brothers from Lvov, whom their parents isolated from the world and kept in complete unsanitary conditions. The brothers were 14 and 6 years old. They couldn't speak or walk. The youngest has never been outside. The children were unwashed, with long hair and in a dirty room that did not resemble an apartment. In such conditions, the elder brother lived for 12 years, the younger - all his life.
The boys' mother did not go outside either. She didn't let anyone into her house either. The woman suffered from a mental illness, but the father was completely healthy. According to the doctors, the youngest boy has changed somewhat, being among people - he smiles and learned to eat properly. It is more difficult for the older brother - because of atrophied feet, he cannot walk, he is more withdrawn and silent.
As a rule, children run wild from the lack of attention of their parents, or from the influence of adults with mental disorders on them. However, how parents manage to completely isolate their own children from the world and turn them into savages in the conditions of civilization is unknown.
Psychologists who study the Mowgli syndrome say that a wild child can be taught to imitate human behavior, but only through training. True, if a child was returned to people before the onset of the "teenage threshold" of 12-13 years, he can still be adapted to society, but mental disorders will remain with him until the end of his life.
For example, if a child enters the animal community before he has formed the skill of upright walking, then moving on all fours will become the only possible way for life - it will be impossible to retrain.
Those who lived among animals for the first 3-6 years of their lives practically cannot master human speech, walk straight, communicate meaningfully with other people, despite the years spent later in human society. If children had some social behavior skills before isolation from society, the process of their rehabilitation is much easier.
All of us are familiar with the story of Mowgli, a boy who grew up among wolves. Alas, the real stories of children raised by animals are not as romantic and fabulous as the works of the English writer and do not always end in a happy ending. To your attention - modern human cubs, who among their friends had neither the wise Kaa, nor the good-natured Baloo, nor the brave Akela, but their adventures will not leave you indifferent, because the prose of life is much more interesting and much more terrible than the work of even brilliant writers.
1 Ugandan Boy Adopted By Monkeys
In 1988, 4-year-old John Ssebunya fled into the jungle after witnessing a terrible scene - during another quarrel between his parents, the father killed the baby's mother. Time passed, but John never left the forest and the villagers began to believe that the boy was dead.
In 1991, one of the local peasant women, having gone into the jungle to get firewood, suddenly saw in a flock of vervets, pygmy green monkeys, a strange creature, in which she recognized with some difficulty a little boy. According to her, the boy's behavior was not much different from monkeys - he deftly moved on all fours and easily communicated with his "company". The woman reported what she saw to the villagers and they tried to catch the boy. As often happens with children raised by animals, John resisted in every possible way, not letting himself be taken in hand, but the peasants still managed to recapture him from the monkeys. When the pupil of the vervets was washed and put in order, one of the villagers recognized him as a fugitive who went missing in 1988. Later, having learned to speak, John said that the monkeys taught him everything necessary for life in the jungle - climbing trees, searching for food, in addition, he mastered their "language". Fortunately, after returning to the people, John easily adapted to life in their society, he showed good vocal abilities and now the grown-up Ugandan Mowgli is touring with the children's choir "Pearl of Africa".
2. Chita girl who grew up among dogs
Five years ago, this story appeared on the front pages of Russian and foreign newspapers - a 5-year-old girl Natasha was found in Chita, who moved like a dog, lapped water from a bowl and instead of articulate speech made only barks, which is not surprising, because, as it turned out later, the girl spent almost her whole life in a locked room, in the company of cats and dogs. The child's parents did not live together and presented different versions of what happened - the mother (I really want to put this word in quotation marks), 25-year-old Yana Mikhailova claimed that her father had stolen the girl from her a long time ago, after which she did not take care of her upbringing. The father, 27-year-old Viktor Lozhkin, in turn, stated that the mother did not pay Natasha due attention even before he took the baby to him at the request of her mother-in-law. Later it was established that the family could not be called prosperous in any way, in the apartment where, in addition to the girl, her father, grandparents lived, there was terrifying unsanitary conditions, there was no water, heat and gas.
When they found her, the girl behaved like a real dog - she rushed at people and barked. Having taken Natasha away from her parents, the employees of the guardianship and guardianship authorities placed her in a rehabilitation center so that the girl could adapt to life in human society, her "loving" father and mother were arrested.
3. Volgograd Prisoner of a Birdcage
The story of the Volgograd boy in 2008 shocked the entire Russian public. His own mother kept him locked up in a 2-room apartment inhabited by many birds. For unknown reasons, the mother was not engaged in raising the child, giving him food, but not communicating with him at all. As a result, the boy, up to seven years old, spent all his time with birds, when law enforcement officers found him, in response to their questions, he only “chirped” and flapped his “wings”. The room where he lived was full of bird cages and just overflowing with droppings. According to eyewitnesses, the boy's mother clearly suffered from a mental disorder - she fed street birds, took birds home and lay on the bed all day long, listening to their chirping. She did not pay attention to her son at all, apparently considering him one of her pets. When the "bird boy" became known to the relevant authorities, he was sent to a psychological rehabilitation center, and his 31-year-old mother was deprived of parental rights.
Source 4The little Argentinean rescued by stray cats
In 2008, the police in the Argentine province of Misiones found a homeless baby of one year old, who was in the company of wild cats. Apparently, the boy was in the company of cats for at least a few days - the animals took care of him as best they could: they licked the dried mud from his skin, brought him food and warmed him on frosty winter nights. A little later, they managed to get to the father of the boy, who led a vagrant lifestyle - he told the police that he had lost his son a few days ago when he was collecting waste paper. Dad told the officers that wild cats had always protected his son.
5. Kaluga boy raised by wolves
2007, Kaluga region, Russia. Residents of one of the villages noticed a boy who appeared to be about 10 years old in a nearby forest. The child was in a pack of wolves, who, apparently, considered him "their" - together with them he got food, running on half-bent legs. Later, law enforcement officers raided the "Kaluga Mowgli" and found him in a wolf's lair, after which he was sent to one of the Moscow clinics. The surprise of the doctors knew no bounds - after examining the boy, they concluded that although he looked like a 10-year-old, in fact he should have been about 20 years old. From life in a wolf pack, the guy's toenails turned almost into claws, his teeth resembled fangs, his behavior copied the habits of wolves in everything.
The young man did not know how to speak, did not understand Russian and did not respond to the name Lyosha given to him during the capture, reacting only when he was called “kis-kis-kis”. Unfortunately, the specialists failed to return the boy to normal life - just a day after he was placed in the clinic, "Lyosha" escaped. His further fate is unknown.
6. Pupil of Rostov goats
In 2012, the employees of the guardianship authorities of the Rostov region, having come with a check to one of the families, saw a terrible picture - 40-year-old Marina T. kept her 2-year-old son Sasha in a goat pen, practically not caring about him, while, when the child was found, the mother was not at home. The boy spent all his time with animals, played and slept with them, as a result, by the age of two he could not learn to speak and eat normally. Needless to say, the sanitary conditions in the two-by-three-meter room he shared with his horned "friends" not only left a lot to be desired, they were appalling. Sasha was emaciated from malnutrition when he was examined by doctors, it turned out that he weighed about a third less than healthy children his age.
The boy was sent to rehabilitation, and then to an orphanage. At first, when they tried to return him to human society, Sasha was very afraid of adults and refused to sleep in bed, trying to get under it. A criminal case was opened against Marina T. under the article “Improper performance of parental duties”, a lawsuit was filed with the court to deprive her of parental rights.
7. Adopted son of a Siberian watchdog
In one of the provincial regions of the Altai Territory in 2004, a 7-year-old boy was discovered who was raised by a dog. The mother left little Andrei three months after his birth, entrusting the care of her son to an alcoholic father. Soon after, the parent also left the house where they lived, apparently without even remembering the child. The guard dog, who fed Andrei and raised him in his own way, became the father and mother for the boy. When he was found by social workers, the boy could not speak, moved only like a dog and was wary of people. He bit and carefully sniffed the food that was offered to him.
For a long time, the child could not be weaned from dog habits - in the orphanage, he continued to behave aggressively, rushing at his peers. However, gradually, the specialists managed to instill in him the skills of communicating with gestures, Andrey learned to walk like a human and use cutlery while eating. The pupil of the guard dog was also accustomed to sleeping in bed and playing with the ball, attacks of aggression happened to him less and less and gradually faded away.
The idea that children can be raised by wild animals sounds like the plot for fictional stories like The Jungle Book or Tarzan. But did you know that such cases were in real life? Here are some stories of children who were abandoned or lost in the wild and adopted into animal families.10. Oksana Malaya
In 1991, a girl named Oksana Malaya was found living in a dog kennel. She was eight years old when the rescuers found her, and only three years old when she was lost on the street by her drinking parents. To keep warm, she climbed into a kennel with a litter of mutts and lived with them for the next five years. After several years of living in isolation from human society, she adopted all the features of dogs: the girl walked on all fours, ate raw meat, growled, whined, barked and even bared her teeth when approached. The mutts considered her one of their family members, this was clearly seen in the way they resisted and attacked when the rescuers tried to take the girl.
Due to the fact that Oksana began to master the skills of speech and social communication very late, it took a lot of effort and time to return her to her human form. She had to re-learn how to speak and walk upright on two legs. According to recent reports, she lives in an institution for the mentally handicapped and spends most of her time caring for the animals on the clinic's farm.
9. Marina Chapman
Colombian Marina Chapman was five years old when she was kidnapped and left for dead in the jungle. Fearing loneliness, she clung to a flock of capuchin monkeys, very smart animals with black and white coloration. For five years, she followed them, mimicking their eating, socializing, and socializing behaviors. As a result, the capuchins adopted her as their own and taught her to look for food in the forest and run away from predators. In the end, she was found by hunters, but they handed the girl over to a brothel, from where she, fortunately, escaped. Now she lives in the family of a British housewife, along with her two own daughters - a happy ending! She wrote a book describing her five-year wandering called The Girl With No Name; The Incredible Story Of A Girl Raised By Monkeys.
8. A boy raised by goats
In 1990, a boy was found in the Peruvian Andes. Nobody knows how he got there. But he lived in a herd of wild Peruvian goats from the age of eight. He survived thanks to their milk and wild fruits. The boy had no linguistic skills, but could communicate with his goat family through bleating. He used his hands like hooves, as a result they became too calloused to hold anything. The skin on the arms and legs was traumatized and hardened. Many bones have grown abnormally due to walking on all fours for almost a decade. He was sent to Kansas for research and was later named Daniel.
7. Rochom Pnjieng
Rochom was found in a dense jungle in a remote area of northeastern Cambodia when a villager noticed he was missing food. The girl was taken to the nearest village, where her father recognized her by the scar left from childhood. The girl disappeared twenty years ago when she was eight years old. She said that she survived in the jungle thanks to the help of various animals, especially monkeys, because her walk and figure were similar to monkeys. The girl could hardly speak or communicate and tore off any clothes. Her new family struggled to follow the girl over the years, at various times she tried to escape into the jungle several times. In May 2010, her escape into the jungle was a success and she was never seen again.
6. Vanya Yudin
Eight-year-old Vanya Yudin was found in a tiny Russian apartment with lots of caged birds. His own mother treated him like one of her pets, he lived near the birds and learned to imitate their chirps and shrill cries. When the authorities found him, the dehumanized boy was unable to utter a single word. Although his mother never abused him or kept him hungry, social services took the boy from his mother and sent him to rehabilitation. In 2008, the mother was deprived of parental rights, and the boy was placed in a psychological care unit for recovery.
5. Lyokha, who grew up as a Russian wolf cub
In 2007, residents of the Kaluga region in central Russia reported that they found a nearly frozen boy in a den of leaves and twigs. The police saved him. He could not speak, but only growled and tried to bite the policeman who was holding him. The boy was placed in a Moscow suburban hospital. In appearance, he was about ten years old, but he could be older, as he grew up in natural conditions. The nails on his hands and feet were long and sharp, like nails, in general, his behavior resembled that of a wolf. The hospital staff bathed the boy, cut off his nails and took blood samples, they named him Lyokha. The wolf boy clearly did not like the attention given to him, and he fled within 24 hours.
4. Hadara raised by ostriches
At the beginning of the 20th century, two-year-old Hadara was separated from his parents in the Sahara desert. He found himself alone in the middle of the desert, and it seemed that he had no chance of salvation, but the incredible happened - he was picked up by ostriches! Usually ostriches do not make contact with humans, this is the only known case. The young Hadara lived in a family of long-legged birds for ten years. When he was rescued, the boy was already twelve. Now he is married. He lives with his children and tells them the incredible story of his survival.
3. John Sembuya
When two-year-old John saw his father kill his mother, he fled into the jungles of Uganda. There he was picked up by a flock of green monkeys. The boy lived with his new family for three years, until he was found and returned to human society. He prefers raw foods and cannot stand upright.
2. Ivan Mishukov
Ivan was four years old when he fled Moscow and stood no chance in this grim situation until he was taken in by a pack of stray dogs. In the end, he became the leader of the pack, as he was the only one who could successfully beg food from humans! The dogs responded to him in return, they protected him during the day and did not let him freeze at night. Like any typical wild story, it ended up being picked up by the police two years later and the boy had to relearn how to be human.
1. Kitten boy
- a set of symptoms observed in children who grew up in conditions of complete social isolation. Lack of communication experience, human relations forms a pronounced lag and distortion of mental, emotional, personal development. The movements and behavior of children are similar to the activity of animals: they move on four limbs, deftly jump. Instead of speech - onomatopoeia. Emotional reactions are primitive, reflecting anger, fear, pleasure. Diagnosis of psychopathological abnormalities is carried out by observation. Treatment is based on developing and corrective exercises, rehabilitation.
General information
The name of the syndrome was due to the collection of stories by D. R. Kipling "The Jungle Book". The main character named Mowgli was brought up by wolves in the jungle from an early age. The author attributes to him a relatively developed intellect, physical skills of people (upright walking, use of tools), differentiated social emotions and feelings. Unlike the hero of the book, real children adopt the behavior of animals and are significantly behind in the development of intelligence. Synonymous names for the Mowgli syndrome are feral, wild, feral children. In Russia, children of alcoholic and mentally ill parents are more likely to be socially isolated.
Causes of Mowgli Syndrome
The question of the reasons for the absolute social isolation of children continues to be investigated. When development takes place in the wild, it is impossible to determine the conditions under which the child was among animals. With artificially created isolation, it is possible to establish contact with the mother and / or father. Presumably the causes of Mowgli's syndrome are:
- Death of parents. The most likely cause is in small settlements located near wild forests. Children are left alone, wandering, adjoining animal families.
- Insufficient supervision. Babies can be stolen by some animals (such as large monkey species). Older kids leave home on their own, become disoriented in natural conditions, and do not find their way back.
- Mental disorders of parents. Mowgli children were found in basements, animal cages, closed rooms of the house. The conditions of confinement were created by parents with psychopathology, including those provoked by the use of drugs and alcohol.
Pathogenesis
In the mental development of a child, there are sensitive periods - time intervals characterized by an optimal combination of internal conditions for the development of certain mental processes. The psyche becomes as sensitive as possible to external social influences, which contribute to the formation of the arbitrariness of memory, thinking, attention, the development of speech, and various forms of activity. When the developing environment is deficient, there is a delay in mental functions.
Mowgli's syndrome is the result of total socio-psychological deprivation during sensitive periods of development. The lack of communication, education, love and other forms of human interaction leads to a pronounced intellectual, emotional and behavioral defect. Pedagogical, educational, corrective influences carried out after the end of sensitive periods turn out to be ineffective. Basic mental functions develop up to 5 years, so the younger the age at which the baby was in the "wild" conditions, the more pronounced and persistent the defect will be.
Classification
The typology of the syndrome has not yet been finally developed. Insufficient amount of empirical data, outdated methods of studying most cases (XIX, beginning and middle of the XX century) do not allow classification according to clinical manifestations, nature of the course, pathogenetic mechanisms. Since the middle of the last century, Kaspar Hauser syndrome, named after the name of a boy who was imprisoned from an early age, began to be considered as a kind of Mowgli syndrome. Currently, patients are divided into two groups:
- Feral children. Development and education takes place in the wild without the presence of people. The consequences are almost impossible to correct.
- Children with Hauser syndrome. This group includes babies left without help and imprisoned. Presumably, forced isolation in the early years is manifested by less stable mental disorders.
Symptoms of Mowgli Syndrome
Long-term isolation affects all areas of the psyche - intellectual development, emotional response, behavior. The level of cognitive deficit is comparable to severe mental retardation. "Children of the jungle" do not speak, abstract figurative and logical thinking. All functions of the psyche are realized at a visual, concrete level: the mastering of simple tools, manipulative (rarely objective) actions, and figurative memorization are available. Speech is replaced by onomatopoeia, children imitate howling, barking, whining, grunting, hissing.
There is no ability to walk upright, movement is carried out on four limbs - crawling, jumping. Children cannot establish and maintain contacts with people; when they approach, they demonstrate fear or rage - they hide in a corner, whine, growl, bare their teeth, bite, grab their hair, scratch. Emotions are pronounced, primitive, due to the survival instinct - fear, anger. Often, "Mowglis" do not know how to smile, pleasure is manifested by a grimace with a curvature of the mouth. Children identify themselves with animals, sometimes show love for representatives of the "native" species.
Changed features of physical development, sensory sensitivity. The bones of the skeleton (especially the limbs) are deformed, sensitivity to temperature and pain is reduced, hearing, vision, and sense of smell are well developed. Diurnal rhythms have not been established, sleep predominates during the day or is randomly distributed throughout the day. The usual diet is berries, fruits, nuts, raw meat. There is no skill in using cutlery and household items. Children eat with their hands, refuse spoons and forks, resist hygiene procedures, use clothes.
Complications
Complications are more likely in cases of prolonged isolation, lack of pedagogical and educational influence. The main problem of wild children is the impossibility of full socialization. Cases of late mastery of speech, development of higher forms of behavior are rare. More often, thoughtless repetition of words and phrases is formed, the simplest forms of everyday interaction are mastered, but schooling, mastering the profession remains inaccessible. An unexplored complication is the sudden death of some Mowgli children in captivity. Before death, they show a pronounced desire to escape, to return to the wild.
Diagnostics
Diagnosis of Mowgli's syndrome is performed by a psychiatrist, a neurologist. A significant condition for the diagnosis is the fact of complete long-term isolation from society. Information from parents, people who have found the child and are caring for him at the moment is added to the survey data. Physical and clinical methods are used:
- Interview. The conversation is held with the parents, but full-fledged contact in most cases is impossible, only information about the duration of the detention is established. The people who found the child are interrogated - the conditions of his life, especially behavior are determined.
- Inspection. A neurologist examines the sensitivity, formation and adequacy of reflexes, features of motor activity. Characterized by a high pain threshold, good performance dexterity.
- observation. It is carried out by doctors of various specialties. Various indicators of physical and mental development are assessed: the formation of upright posture, speech, intelligence, social modes of interaction, everyday skills.
Treatment of Mowgli's syndrome
Therapies remain the subject of research. The main direction is psychological and pedagogical correction. Techniques used to work with children with severe mental retardation are used. The effectiveness of behavioral teaching methods based on a simple chain of "stimulus-response-reinforcement or punishment" has been proven. Learned behavioral patterns - everyday, communication skills - allow the child to minimally adapt to society. The general scheme of therapeutic and pedagogical activities includes:
- Development methods. Classes are conducted by psychologists, oligophrenopedagogues, speech therapists. The primary goal is to teach how to establish contact, express needs and needs, and reduce the likelihood of aggressive reactions. At the second stage, an individual development program is developed, focused on the formation of speech, arbitrariness, and the development of self-service skills.
- . Preparations are selected by a neurologist, a psychiatrist, taking into account the clinical picture and data from instrumental examinations. With disinhibition of behavior, tranquilizers, neuroleptics are prescribed. With concomitant organic lesions of the central nervous system, medicines are used to improve cerebral circulation, nootropics.
- Rehabilitation. The efforts of teachers are aimed at the adaptation of children in teams. In boarding schools, neuropsychiatric dispensaries, they attend occupational therapy, creative classes. Simple communication and work skills are formed.
Forecast and prevention
The prognosis of Mowgli's syndrome is determined by the duration of the period of development outside the society and the age until which the child was in normal conditions. The general trend is that the later the isolation began and the shorter it was, the better the adaptation takes place, the easier it is to develop speech and social skills. There are no specific preventive measures. It seems possible to reduce the prevalence of cases of forced detention through increased control of social services over dysfunctional families in which parents suffer from mental disorders,
Who among us is not familiar with Rudyard Kipling's touching story about Mowgli the Frog, a boy who grew up in the jungle? Even if you haven't read The Jungle Book, you've probably watched cartoons based on it. Alas, the real stories of children raised by animals are not as romantic and fabulous as the works of the English writer and do not always end in a happy ending. To your attention - modern human cubs, who had neither the wise Kaa, nor the good-natured Baloo, nor the brave Akela among their friends, but their adventures will not leave you indifferent, because the prose of life is much more interesting and much more terrible than the work of even brilliant writers.
1 Ugandan Boy Adopted By Monkeys
In 1988, 4-year-old John Ssebunya fled into the jungle after witnessing a terrible scene - during another quarrel between his parents, the father killed the baby's mother. Time passed, but John never left the forest and the villagers began to believe that the boy was dead.
In 1991, one of the local peasant women, having gone into the jungle to get firewood, suddenly saw in a flock of vervets, pygmy green monkeys, a strange creature, in which she recognized with some difficulty a little boy. According to her, the boy's behavior was not much different from monkeys - he deftly moved on all fours and easily communicated with his "company". The woman reported what she saw to the villagers and they tried to catch the boy. As often happens with children raised by animals, John resisted in every possible way, not letting himself be taken in hand, but the peasants still managed to recapture him from the monkeys. When the pupil of the vervets was washed and put in order, one of the villagers recognized him as a fugitive who went missing in 1988. Later, having learned to speak, John said that the monkeys taught him everything necessary for life in the jungle - climbing trees, searching for food, in addition, he mastered their "language". Fortunately, after returning to the people, John easily adapted to life in their society, he showed good vocal abilities and now the grown-up Ugandan Mowgli is touring with the children's choir "Pearl of Africa".
2. Chita girl who grew up among dogs
Five years ago, this story appeared on the front pages of Russian and foreign newspapers - a 5-year-old girl Natasha was found in Chita, who moved like a dog, lapped water from a bowl and instead of articulate speech made only barks, which is not surprising, because, as it turned out later, the girl spent almost her whole life in a locked room, in the company of cats and dogs. The child's parents did not live together and set out different versions of what happened - the mother (I really want to put this word in quotation marks), 25-year-old Yana Mikhailova claimed that her father had stolen the girl from her long ago, after which she did not raise her. The father, 27-year-old Viktor Lozhkin, in turn, stated that the mother did not pay Natasha due attention even before he took the baby to him at the request of her mother-in-law. Later it was established that the family could not be called prosperous in any way, in the apartment where, in addition to the girl, her father, grandparents lived, there was terrifying unsanitary conditions, there was no water, heat and gas.
When they found her, the girl behaved like a real dog - she rushed at people and barked. Having taken Natasha away from her parents, the employees of the guardianship and guardianship authorities placed her in a rehabilitation center so that the girl could adapt to life in human society, her "loving" father and mother were arrested.
3. Volgograd Prisoner of a Birdcage
The story of the Volgograd boy in 2008 shocked the entire Russian public. His own mother kept him locked up in a 2-room apartment inhabited by many birds. For unknown reasons, the mother was not engaged in raising the child, giving him food, but not communicating with him at all. As a result, the boy, up to seven years old, spent all his time with birds, when law enforcement officers found him, in response to their questions, he only “chirped” and flapped his “wings”. The room where he lived was full of bird cages and just overflowing with droppings. According to eyewitnesses, the boy's mother clearly suffered from a mental disorder - she fed street birds, took birds home and lay on the bed all day long, listening to their chirping. She did not pay attention to her son at all, apparently considering him one of her pets. When the "bird boy" became known to the relevant authorities, he was sent to a psychological rehabilitation center, and his 31-year-old mother was deprived of parental rights.
Source 4The little Argentinean rescued by stray cats
In 2008, the police in the Argentine province of Misiones found a homeless baby of one year old, who was in the company of wild cats. Apparently, the boy was in the company of cats for at least a few days - the animals took care of him as best they could: they licked the dried mud from his skin, brought him food and warmed him on frosty winter nights. A little later, they managed to get to the boy's father, who led a vagrant lifestyle - he told the police that he had lost his son a few days ago when he was collecting waste paper. Dad told the officers that wild cats had always protected his son.
5. "Kaluga Mowgli"
2007, Kaluga region, Russia. Residents of one of the villages noticed a boy who appeared to be about 10 years old in a nearby forest. The child was in a pack of wolves, who, apparently, considered him "their" - together with them he got food, running on half-bent legs. Later, law enforcement officers raided the "Kaluga Mowgli" and found him in a wolf's lair, after which he was sent to one of the Moscow clinics. The surprise of the doctors knew no bounds - after examining the boy, they concluded that although he looked like a 10-year-old, in fact he should have been about 20 years old. From life in a wolf pack, the guy's toenails turned almost into claws, his teeth resembled fangs, his behavior copied the habits of wolves in everything.
The young man did not know how to speak, did not understand Russian and did not respond to the name Lyosha given to him during the capture, reacting only when he was called “kis-kis-kis”. Unfortunately, the specialists failed to return the boy to normal life - just a day after he was placed in the clinic, "Lyosha" escaped. His further fate is unknown.
6. Pupil of Rostov goats
In 2012, the employees of the guardianship authorities of the Rostov region, having come with a check to one of the families, saw a terrible picture - 40-year-old Marina T. kept her 2-year-old son Sasha in a goat pen, practically not caring about him, while, when the child was found, the mother was not at home. The boy spent all his time with animals, played and slept with them, as a result, by the age of two he could not learn to speak and eat normally. Needless to say, the sanitary conditions in the two-by-three-meter room he shared with his horned "friends" not only left a lot to be desired - they were appalling. Sasha was emaciated from malnutrition when he was examined by doctors, it turned out that he weighed about a third less than healthy children his age.
The boy was sent to rehabilitation, and then to an orphanage. At first, when they tried to return him to human society, Sasha was very afraid of adults and refused to sleep in bed, trying to get under it. A criminal case was opened against Marina T. under the article “Improper performance of parental duties”, a lawsuit was filed with the court to deprive her of parental rights.
7. Adopted son of a Siberian watchdog
In one of the provincial regions of the Altai Territory in 2004, a 7-year-old boy was discovered who was raised by a dog. The mother left little Andrei three months after his birth, entrusting the care of her son to an alcoholic father. Soon after, the parent also left the house where they lived, apparently without even remembering the child. The guard dog, who fed Andrei and raised him in his own way, became the father and mother for the boy. When he was found by social workers, the boy could not speak, moved only like a dog and was wary of people. He bit and carefully sniffed the food that was offered to him.
For a long time, the child could not be weaned from dog habits - in the orphanage, he continued to behave aggressively, rushing at his peers. However, gradually, the specialists managed to instill in him the skills of communicating with gestures, Andrey learned to walk like a human and use cutlery while eating. The pupil of the guard dog was also accustomed to sleeping in bed and playing with the ball, attacks of aggression happened to him less and less and gradually faded away.
The most influential children and teenagers of 2014
Two girls who never grew up 21 principles of parenting through the eyes of a child How These 12 Childhood Events Could Have Affected You Top 10 Parenting Principles by Nigel Latta Why do human babies take so long to grow compared to other animals?
