The Story of Little Ran, Adopted from China


From: Karen Rúnarsdóttir,

         Subject: A Thank You note from Iceland

Date: Mon, 24 Jun 2013

 

>Dear Daniel,

>I was so privileged to present two of your seminars and have you visit

>my daughter during your stay in Iceland. Our daughter, Ólöf Halla Ran,

>is two and a half years old. I don´t want to say that she is

>multidisabled because she is so much more , a happy, funny,

>determinant, strong and joyful little girl.  So I prefer to say that

>she is challenged with multidisability.

>She is diagnosed with CP, cortical visual impairment, hearing

>impairment ( deaf in one

>ear) and developmental delay. We adopted her from China at the age of

>10 months. After the initial shock of knowing that she was challenged

>with disability and not just understimulation from her stay at the

>orphanage, we were full of hope and sure that this little girl would

>rise up to all her challenges. One of here chinese name when we adopted

>her was RAN and we decided to keep that name when we named her. Ran

>means „to rise up“ and we honestly believed that she would rise up with

>our help. During the last year she has been tested over and over again

>and compared to other children her age. Little by little fear and worry

>started to replace the hope in our hearts. We started worrying about

>her future and the worst part is that we started to lower the bar and

>give her some discount, so to speak. We were unconsciously preparing

>for the worst and that affected our work with her and what we expected

>of her. I didn´t realize it then but I do it now after listening to

>you. I don´t know if you realize the big impact you have made with your

>visit to Iceland and that´s why I want to send you this Thank You note.

>I would have thanked you personally after the second seminar but I was

>afraid of getting too emotional.

>Daniel, thank you for giving us our hope back and believing the

>anything is possible!

>Have I nice journey back ,

>Karen Rúnarsdóttir