This will be the first in a series of blogs containing questions I asked Deborah Hannah about why she wrote her book about living with emotionally disturbed children, and the responses she has received. Again, I encourage you to get this book if you haven't already done so! (See my review.)


What prompted you to write the book?

There were actually several different reasons; The first and foremost was personal healing—I needed to work through everything that happened in order to make sense of it in my mind. Secondly. we felt so very alone while we were going through this and I wanted to offer others who might be struggling the idea that they were not alone. Finally, I hoped to bring understanding to professionals about what it looked like from our angle.


What reaction did you THINK you would receive?

I know this sounds odd but I never considered the reaction. The book was personal—it was our journey—I needed to tell the story. What happened after that I knew I would have little control over. I wasn’t really sure many people would read the book—that has been a nice surprise.


What reaction DID you receive? What surprised you about the reaction?

I received, and was saddened by, literally hundreds of letters from families that shared in our struggles. I don’t think they wanted answers because I never purported to have any—they just wanted to be heard. I was, however, very surprised by the number of social workers, county agencies and adoption agencies that support the book. I originally thought they might be offended by some of the content, but I was wrong—they have been extremely supportive and many have even said that it will change the way they view adoptive families from this point forward. I did receive one extremely critical review from a woman who works at a for-profit adoption agency. She believed that we should not tell people the risks because they then will not adopt. I believe that the philosophy of withholding the truth in order to ensure others behave in a certain way is seriously flawed.