Dani’s Story: A Journey from Neglect to Love (Diane & Bernie Lierow and Kay West)

After reading an interview with Kay West, the ghost writer of Dani’s Story, in the City Paper (a Nashville news magazine), I vaguely remembered hearing about the abuse case on the national news, but I couldn’t recall the details.  The interview was compelling enough to send me to Amazon for the book.  

Dani’s Story tells about a little girl in Florida who was profoundly neglected by her biological family and was eventually rescued and adopted by Diane and Bernie Lierow after they chanced upon a photo of her and felt an immediate connection.  Although Danielle would have been a healthy, normal little girl, the abuse she endured for the first part of her life rendered severe consequences:  She couldn’t feed herself.  She couldn’t talk, but only howled and grunted.  She was in diapers full time.  She walked on tip toe, a result of a neurological underdevelopment.  She had no sense of social or physical boundaries, running and climbing anywhere - into ocean waters and swimming pools, onto furniture, and into the kitchen freezer.  The biological mother had never taken Danielle to a doctor, but when she was examined after her rescue, at almost eight years old, she tested no higher than twenty months of age for various developmental functions.

Although Dani was initially “feral” and therefore extremely demanding, she was also surprisingly sweet natured, considering the abysmal conditions in which she’d been kept until Diane and Bernie found her.  Through tremendous sacrifice, patience, and love, the Lierows helped bring Dani to a normally functioning level on many counts.

The Lierow family, 2009

What struck me most about this story is that there is nothing extraordinary about the adoptive family.  Neither parent is too highly educated.  Neither has a glamorous career.  They had both been divorced twice before.  They’re not wealthy or otherwise privileged.  The mother’s first-person narrative isn’t poetic or intellectual.  She sounds like someone you’d run into at the grocery store - someone who looks and sounds completely typical until she tells her very atypical story about the gorgeous little girl beside her.  

When you read Dani’s Story, you’ll be confounded by the ignorance and incompetence of some people, but you’ll also be inspired by the wholehearted service and commitment of others, especially adoptive parents, and even more especially those like Diane and Bernie Lierow who adopt children with profound needs.

Check it out on Amazon!