What was the turning point with Michelle?

A. Michelle had been assigned to a new school and by a stroke of good fortune the local authorities had lost all the papers relating to her past so she was admitted to this school with a clean slate.

There she underwent a new assessment by an independent educational psychologist, who concluded that my treasured baby had cerebral palsy, very likely caused by the birth process. Dyspraxia and dyslexic along with an emotional and intellectual IQ of around 45.

I was exonerated, but it had cost me many years of heartache and agony and untold financial impact as I’d spent a huge amount of energy and heartbreak seeking answers to her problems.

When I met the late Jim Goulding, my second husband, and we embarked on a journey of exploration together to try and work out how we could reach and help heal Michelle’s little battered heart and soul.

I realised that no matter how much I loved her and how much Jim adopted her, she was still left with this feeling of not quite belonging, of being inadequate, sad, lost, and annoyed at the world because of her disability.