FROM BRIGHT, HAPPY CHILD, TO LOST SOUL

A classroom swot, Girl A was  a ‘bright and happy child’ from a  loving home. Then, aged 12, she turned into a ‘lost soul’. Within a few short months, she was playing truant, self-harming and going missing for days on end. Her bewildered parents begged her to tell them what was wrong, and why she had cigarette burns on her arms and blood stains on her underwear. Their once-diligent daughter  simply shrugged off their questions. Whenever she failed to come home, her father wandered the streets of Oxford bearing her photo as he searched in vain in pubs, nightclubs and cinemas. Her mother said she felt a failure, and recalled: ‘There was no emotion left in her whatsoever. She didn’t laugh. She didn’t cry.’ READ MORE HERE