April 3, 2025 • 39 mins
If you like our show, we know you'll love this season of Nobody Should Believe Me, produced and hosted by Andrea Dunlop. While we're hard at work bringing you more Betrayal episodes, we’re going to throw it to Andrea Dunlop, who has a story unlike anything we've ever heard.
You can listen to the rest of Nobody Should Believe Me season 5 on all podcast platforms. Andrea Dunlop’s first nonfiction book, The Mother Next Door, is available now.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Before we begin, a quick warning that in this show
we discussed child abuse and this content may be difficult
for some listeners. If you, or anyone you know is
a victim or survivor of medical child abuse, please go
to munchhausensupport dot com to connect with professionals who can help.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
There is a family in Renton that I want to
introduce you to. Mom Sophie went on an inspiring trip
to Zambia and her college year. She's since adopted two girls.
One of them has an incredibly rare disorder. Doctors say
it's a one in a million chance.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
The audio you just heard is from a news story
that aired on King five television back in May of
twenty nineteen. This story wasn't on my radar, but I
had a lot going on back then. I had just
had a baby and had a new book coming out,
and this was around the time that Munchausen Biproxy was
really entering my work life. The month that this story aired,
(01:00):
I'd done my very first interview about my own family
story for Vanity Fair, and this was followed by an
appearance on a local station about my third novel, We
Came Here to Forget. This was all taking place amid
the second investigation into my sister for Munchausen biproxy abuse
of her children. By the middle of that summer, the
courts would return my sister's children to her, and a
(01:21):
few months after that, the prosecuting attorney would make the
decision not to file charges against my sister, Megan Carter,
despite the horrifying and voluminous evidence against her. But back
to Sophie in general, seeing stories about sick kids in
the news is upsetting for a bunch of reasons.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
So family friends are banding together. They're trying to raise money,
and this is something that is no little ask. We're
talking about like sixty thousand dollars for a vehicle for them,
So we just wanted to put their positive energy out there.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
Of course, there are the particular fears and questions that
I bring to it, given my experience with my sister.
Is this mom telling the truth? What if this child
isn't a victim of a rare disease but a victim
of the person purporting to care for them, even when
there are no red flags for abuse, which is mostly
the case. These stories are pretty dystopian because they illuminate
(02:16):
a tragic feeling of our country's healthcare system, the horrible
reality that families, many of whom I'm sure would prefer
to keep their children's health private, are forced into a
situation where they have to perform their trauma publicly in
the hopes that kind strangers might step in to relieve
the skyrocketing medical bills that could otherwise bankrupt their family. So,
while I usually avoid these types of stories in my
(02:38):
day to day life, once I did see this news
report right away, I noticed that Sophie was positioning herself
as the only one who saw what was happening with
her child.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
I started noticing just kind of weird things or times
where her body would just feel really different, like it
would either be super super tight or like really limp.
Speaker 4 (02:57):
Doctor's visits filled the first few years life, and right.
Speaker 3 (03:01):
Away they found pretty significant brain damage, and so she
was diagnosed with CP at the end of twenty fifteen.
Speaker 4 (03:09):
This is a sample, but Sophie quickly realized was experiencing
something much more concerning.
Speaker 3 (03:20):
Complaining to the ne'real just saying like she's having seizures.
So they would bring her in for an EEG and
it was nothing. They're like, no, we don't see anything.
Maybe she is there's the walls.
Speaker 4 (03:29):
Sophia admits she started to question her own instincts.
Speaker 3 (03:33):
There'd be times where she was like literally totally paralyzed,
and I go to her doctors and be like, I
know she's walking right now, but like she was literally
paralyzed all day yesterday and they'd be like, no, that's
not possible. I'm like, but like, it's she couldn't move,
like I'm telling you, and they're like, okay, but she
can't now, and I'm like.
Speaker 5 (03:51):
Right, I know.
Speaker 4 (03:52):
But after seeking a second opinion and running through genetic testing,
she also.
Speaker 3 (03:56):
Has one on the ATP one a phree giene which
is associated with a disorder called alternating hemopolygia childhood, which
is a extremely rare, one in a million genetic disorder.
Speaker 4 (04:09):
And she's right, it affects one and one million children.
It is progressive and has no cure.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Wow, Lord, you took me up to the fullest extent
on what I told you.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
I was willing to do. This piece on the Evening
News ended up being the first chapter in what would
become a major national news story. This is rare for
Manchessen by proxy cases, which usually Gardner little national coverage
outside of the truly sensational eyed stories like Gypsy Rose
Blanchard and Miya Kuwalski. But there were many elements of
this story that caught people's attention. For one, there were
(04:44):
the optics. Sophie, who is young, white, blonde, and conventionally pretty,
had adopted two children, sisters from a far away nation.
Speaker 3 (04:53):
I went to Zambia after my freshman year of college
on a month long mission trip, and so when I
was there, I just encounter the plight of an orphan adoption.
Wasn't on my radar at all.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
In the televised segment, there are images from Sophie's life
with her two adorable girls, interspersed with footage from the
interview and b roll of Sophie's younger daughter, who were
referring to as c, who is smiley and cheerfully dressed,
in the family's kitchen. At one point, as the two
play a game together, Sophie sitting beside her daughter's wheelchair,
the little girl says, this my.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Radar at all.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
You want to get so scared. It would be easy
to miss this blip in the audio, but the little
girl is saying, I don't want to get a poke.
I'm so scared. This moment is odd because they're not
in a medical setting and there's no medical equipment nearby.
To most this might be a throwaway moment, but for me,
(05:52):
it's a harbinger of how this seemingly inspiring story of
a mother who'd moved heaven and earth to help two
orphans became.
Speaker 6 (06:00):
So this is detective or work with the rents and
police department. Today's date is March seventeenth to twenty twenty one.
It is approximately eight oh three hours.
Speaker 7 (06:08):
And then can you just state your name for me?
Speaker 3 (06:09):
Sophie Hartman.
Speaker 7 (06:12):
In twenty nineteen, King five first met Sophie Hartman after
she adopted two sisters from Zambia. She told us one
has a rare neurological disorder called alternating Hemiplegia of childhood
or AHC. At the time, Hartman set up a GoFundMe
page to raise money for a wheelchair vehicle. Today, she
faces second degree assault charges against a child, her own daughter.
Speaker 5 (06:34):
This is not based off of one investigator.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
It's not based off of a quick investigation.
Speaker 8 (06:38):
This was months of investigation by police and several experts
who wait in King.
Speaker 7 (06:44):
County prosecutors are accusing Hartman of subjecting her daughter to
medically unnecessary surgical procedures and restraints. Records say the girl
underwent more than four hundred and seventy four medical appointments
since twenty sixteen.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
When the Sophie Hartman case broke, it was the typical
litany of eye popping numbers of doctor's visits and procedures
that her daughter had to endure. But this season, we're
diving into the complicated, many layered story of Sophie Hartman,
a white evangelical woman from a small town in Michigan
who traveled thousands of miles to Zambia and returned with
two vulnerable little girls. People believe their eyes. That's something
(07:24):
that is so central to this topic, because we do
believe the people that we love when they're telling us something.
If we didn't, you could never make it through your day.
I'm Andrea Dunlop, and this is nobody should believe me.
(07:45):
If you'd like to support the show, the best way
to do that is to subscribe on Apple Podcasts or
on Patreon. You get all episodes early in ad free,
along with extended cuts and deleted scenes. From the season.
You also get two exclusive bonus episodes every month, and
for the first time ever, we have the entire season
ready for you to binge right now on the subscriber feed.
(08:09):
That's right. You can listen to every episode of season
five right this minute if you subscribe to the show,
and as always, if monetary support is not an option
for you right now, rating and reviewing the show wherever
you listen also helps us a great deal. And if
there's someone you feel needs to hear this show, please
do share it with them. Word of mouth is so
(08:29):
important for independent podcasts. For even more, you can also
find us on YouTube, where we have every episode as
well as bonus video content. Figuring out where to start
with these cases can be a challenge, and going in
I always know that hearing from the person at the
center of it is probably unlikely. However, in this instance
(08:53):
we had a pretty compelling source document because Sophie wrote
a memoir.
Speaker 8 (08:58):
The Strong Ache in my Stomach, that, like homesickness, was
for another country, a land where children ran freely and
dust filled every crevice, a place so different and foreign,
yet one where Heaven met Earth more clearly than I
had ever seen before.
Speaker 1 (09:15):
That was an excerpt from Sophie Hartman's twenty sixteen self
published memoir entitled Crowns of Beauty. The book offers her
first person account of her time in Zambia and her
journey to adopt her two daughters, Sophie's younger daughter, who
were referring to as C, and Sophie's older daughter, who
were referring to as M. The cover is a moody
professional photo of Sophie carrying her youngest on her hip
(09:37):
and holding her older daughter by the hand. Born in
nineteen eighty nine, Sophie Hartman grew up in a small
town outside of Kalamazoo, Michigan. From what I've been able
to glean about her childhood, she appears to have had
a fairly normal, upper middle class life. I've spoken to
some folks on background who know the family, and they
told me that they were well off and well respected
in town. The whole family was also very active in
(09:59):
the church, and according to Sophie's memoir, she began her
devout relationship with God at the age of fourteen during
a Christian summer camp. Sophie was a talented athlete and
played basketball and soccer growing up and after graduation, went
on to college, and then, according to her book, a
summer mission trip prompted her to leave school about two
and a half years early, changing the course of her life.
Speaker 8 (10:22):
Scene at Kafui screams of a divine artist's touch, one
that faithfully brings forth beauty each day. Within moments of
setting foot on the soil. That day in two thousand
and eight, draped behind the fierce beauty of Kafui's landscape,
I witnessed the torments of everyday life by the people
who called this compound home. I saw malner'sh children ply
(10:44):
their way through sewage drains, chewing on plastic bags, and
my heart burned in my chest. Filthy, unclothed babies crawling
alone in the middle of the street caught me completely
off guard, their desperate, empty eyes gazing lifelessly back at mine.
The dramatic and contrasting reality that was present every day
(11:05):
in Kafui devastated me, and I've never been the same.
But maybe I had been missing something. Maybe beauty could
always be found in places long thought to be dark,
and maybe beauty could still surface in places of utter darkness,
that is, if someone was willing to fight for it.
Speaker 1 (11:25):
Sophie appears to have been in and out of Zambia
from roughly two thousand and eight to twenty fifteen, but
the details of where she was and with whom are
obscured in her memoir. In fact, everything about her time
there is obscured, as she notes to the reader that
she's changed the names of not only the people who
appear in the book, but even many of the towns
that she lived in and traveled to. I can certainly
(11:47):
understand changing the names of people to protect their privacy,
but the links she goes to to hide the details
of her life there are somewhat extraordinary given that this
is a memoir. Notably, in her acknowledgments, which here in
the opening pages of the book, she thinks a large
number of Americans by name, But given that the memoirs
focused on her time in another country, her words of
(12:08):
thanks to the folks in Zambia are strikingly different.
Speaker 8 (12:11):
My big Zambian family, you have changed my life forever.
Thank you for not just being eager but ecstatic about
this book, and thank you for letting me tell those stories.
I'm so grateful we'll get to be together in the
age to come. I look forward to amazing chocolates and
the biggest pillow fights forever. You are beautiful to.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
Me, and that is it. I've written acknowledgments of my
own for five books now, and especially on the first one.
You name just literally every person ever, like the barista
who got your coffee while you were writing in the morning,
your third grade teacher, your dog walker. If these Zambian
friends were so ecstatic about the book, why aren't we
(12:55):
thinking any of them by name. The book is largely
focused on time abroad, and we're given scant details of
Sophie's life before in Michigan. In fact, we mostly hear
about how much resistance she encountered for a decision to
go to Zambia.
Speaker 8 (13:11):
A believer very near to me aggressively questioned my decision,
What did you know about helping people in Africa? And
how do you think you can handle all the poverty
and the horrible situations when you have never experienced that.
You will not be safe And all I'll be able
to say when you come home is I told you so.
Speaker 1 (13:31):
And look, I can imagine that Sophie's parents were probably
a bit dismayed at the idea of their daughter dropping
out of college to move to Zambia. However, an idealistic
college kid heading out to save the world is so
common it's a cliche. We all know the guy who
goes on to be an accountant but never shuts up
about his time in the Peace Corps. But Sophie's description
(13:51):
of the town's reaction to her decision elevates her to
the status of martyr.
Speaker 8 (13:57):
Images of leaving my upper class at youation and culture
and stepping into the dusty lives of children deemed filth
triggered thoughts of a scripture passage I had read time
and time again. Speak up for those who cannot speak
for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute,
Speak up and judge fairly, defend the rights of the
(14:19):
poor and needy, Proverbs thirty one to eight nine.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
In the beginning sections of the book, we also hear
from Sophie's little sister, Sam, who contributes journal entries describing
the change she sees in her sister.
Speaker 9 (14:32):
I saw Sophie walking through a towering doorway, given away
by her bright blonde hair and beaming smile. She rolled
two large suitcases behind her, and she was wrapped in
colorful Zambian fabric. I clung to Sophie's right side the
entire ride, wide eyed and in awe of my big sister,
who looked like an African princess.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
After her initial trip, Sophie returned less than a year later,
and at nineteen, started interning for an orphan sponsorship ministry.
That was where Sophie would find her true calling.
Speaker 8 (15:11):
He has called me to Zambia. I was there, and
then he told me he wants me to move there.
I'm still in college, but I'm leaving soon. He's called
me to be a mother in this nation. He has
called me to serve these children and to be a
voice for those who have no voice. It's crazy. Most
of my friends and family are trying to stop me
from going, but I can't say no. I love Jesus.
(15:35):
I love him. I love him. Oh, I love him.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
Reading this book was a disorienting experience, given the context
a young white evangelical setting out to quote save the
people of Zambia. I was expecting the writing to be
a bit problematic, but it was also settling in for
what might at very least be an interesting fish out
of water story of someone leaving everything they've ever known,
(16:03):
and I didn't know anything about Zambia, so I was
looking forward to hearing the little details about day to
day life. You notice so much when you're in a
new place. It's what makes traveling abroad so thrilling. Suddenly,
everything from the food to the fashion, to the local
shopping habits and modes of transportation are new and fascinating.
I was also quite curious to know what a twenty
year old college kid even does when they land in Zambia,
(16:26):
and after reading the nearly two hundred pages of this memoir,
I learned none of that. Reading this book was the
beginning of an experience that I continue to have as
I try to get a handle on Sophie's story. It's
like the closer I get to it, the more it pixelates.
It's like trying to see through layers of smoke, only
to discover more smoke. Sophie's primary descriptive of Zambia is
(16:49):
that it's quote dusty and basically just kind of hellish.
Speaker 8 (16:54):
Walking through the streets of shanty Zambian compounds does something
to me. These compounds are lums, squalid, densely populated areas
where poverty and disease are rampant. Whether I return home
with mud between my toes because of the rains, with
dust in every crevis during the dry season, or with
(17:14):
soiled clothes because of a mixture of urine and diarrhea
from all my little friends, something unexplainable happens. My heart
is moved every time, and something in the depths of
me yurins for Jesus.
Speaker 1 (17:28):
Because at the obfuscation of many of the exact locations,
I can't say for sure whether Sophie really encountered this
much dust, but certainly the whole country is not dusty.
Zambia is a developing country, but to reduce the nation
to scenes of crushing poverty and desperately maltreated children, as
Sophie does in this book is unfair and inaccurate. Zambia
(17:50):
is one of the most urbanized countries in Sub Saharan Africa.
In two thousand and eight, when Sophie first arrived there,
Zambia would have still been reeling from the global economic crisis,
but they'd also undergone about a decade of economic growth
and export diversification. Progress is being made in education, lowering
maternal and child mortality rates and tackling the HIV AIDS epidemic.
(18:12):
But there isn't much nuance to Sophie's descriptions of Zambia.
The picture she paints is evocative of those Sally Struthers
commercials from the nineties.
Speaker 10 (18:20):
For about seventy cents, you can buy a can of
soda regular or diet. In Ethiopia, For just seventy cents
a day, you can feed a child like Jamal nourishing meal.
Since nineteen thirty eight, Christian Children's Fund has helped children
of many faiths and their communities with food, medical care, clothing,
a chance to go to school, or whatever is needed
(18:42):
most Today, so many children around the world still need
your help, and through Christian Children's Fund, you can reach
out to one of them by sharing, well, just a
little of your pocket change.
Speaker 4 (18:55):
It takes so little for you to.
Speaker 8 (18:56):
Become a special friend to a child in a developer country,
but boy, the good it can do is worth more
than you can imagine.
Speaker 1 (19:07):
So while there certainly is poverty in Zambia, much like
in most places, Sophie's descriptions feel troubling. Now, it's hard
to say on its face whether the problem here is
that Sophie just needs to take a few more creative
writing workshops, or if this is evidence of something deeper,
but I just couldn't get over how the people she
was with and the place she was in just never
(19:27):
came into focus. Much more vivid than her descriptions of
life in Zambia were Sophie's internal experiences, mostly talking to God.
These were numerous and florid, occasionally veering into downright romantic
passages like this one.
Speaker 8 (19:43):
You will find that I have loved you, Lord. I
have loved you hard and with abandon. My eyes are
on you, locked in I'm gazing. You will find me
fully and holy in love with you. I will drink
this cup, this double agony, this double grief, this searing pain,
this deep anger, and this hatred of injustice because of them,
(20:07):
and I will love you wholly as I drink this cup,
sowing in tears, sowing in tears, sowing in tears.
Speaker 1 (20:20):
In her memoir and when she speaks to the media
about her daughters, Sophie refers to the two young girls
she brought home from Zambia as orphans. And there's an
important cultural nuance here in the United States. When we
say orphan, we usually take this to mean a child
whose parents are dead. However, because of the differences in
family structure, the word orphan has a pretty different context
(20:42):
in Zambia. According to Zambian journalist Lori Machinhi, children become
orphaned when they lose their parents, but parents are not
seen as the only primary caregivers in a Zambian family.
Zambians embrace the extended family system, so the adults that
we would refer to as hans and uncles are also
considered parental figures and often referred to as mom and
(21:04):
dad as well, especially in traditional village settings. Similarly, cousins
are referred to as sisters and brothers, etc. So when
someone loses their parents and can't live on their own,
the other adults in the family automatically take over custody
of that quote orphan. In a few circumstances, where families
are too poor or too abusive, the orphans will be
(21:24):
taken to an orphanage where they will remain until they
are able to be reunited with family, or, in cases
where that's not possible, come of age and go out
on their own. So while in the US we may
think of an orphanage as a place where abandoned children
await adoption. Orphanages in Zambia can serve as more of
what we think of as a foster home for children.
Because of the vagueness and frankly, the strangeness of Sophie's writing,
(21:48):
it's hard to get a grasp on what she was
doing day to day in Zambia prior to meeting and
adopting her older daughter m Largely, it seems that she
was in the business of saving souls. There's a lot
of talk about saving women and children and being a
quote mother to them, but the particulars aren't clear other
than various mentions of proselytizing and Bible study, and occasional
(22:11):
mentions of meetings with various healthcare providers. And Sophie doesn't
appear to have any specialized training. However, as well demonstrated
by the book, she sure does seem to know a
lot of scripture. There's a lot about Jesus in this book.
I would say at least the third of the text
is Sophie in rapturous conversation with Him. Now, as for
(22:32):
any of the earthly men she encounters in her time
in Zambia, Sophie has nothing good to report.
Speaker 8 (22:38):
One afternoon in late twenty ten, I was walking home
through the compound where I lived, dialoguing with Jesus about
my day. Drunken men directed profanities at me as I
passed a tavern, but simultaneously, my eyes fixed on three
little girls playing in the dirt just a few feet
in front of them. Their soil dresses barely covered their bottoms,
(23:00):
making it obvious that they wore no undergarments. My heart
burned and adrenaline shot through my veins as I recalled
that three days earlier, a young child was severely raped
in an alley nearby. A fire rose within me as
I recalled another very complex sexual assault case in which
three precious young girls confessed that they had agreed to
(23:22):
give themselves to a man for a gift, which turned
out to be a single lollipop for the three of
them to share.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
Now, sadly, sexual assault is both pervasive and universal, and
unfortunately it has not been possible to corroborate or disprove
any of the anecdotes Sophie shares in her book. The
story she tells here could be true, but her descriptions
of the people in Zambia particularly, but not exclusively, the men,
often paints them as cruel and violent.
Speaker 8 (23:55):
The transition from my Southwest Michigan normal to my new
Zambian compound was tough. It was now normal to cry
myself to sleep every night, to be fondled and grabbed
by men throughout the day, and to encounter severely abused
women and children. It was also normal to hear heinous
sexual comments by drunken men. It was normal to have
(24:19):
bruises and sore limbs from being dragged into an alleyway,
to be threatened with stoning and being thrown in fire
while fighting to rescue children, and to be harassed and
followed by individuals with legions of unrestrained demons possessing them.
It was normal to hold babies who had been dumped
in sewers, to feed children whose bellies and bottoms were
(24:42):
being eaten away by worms, and to listen to little
girls replay the abusive events of the night prior.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
And while we don't get any sense of the daily
details like meals or dress, the passages about the suffering
of the children she encounters are vivid and grows. The
book positioned Sophie as both a martyr and a savior
helping various women and children at great risk to herself.
And while Sophie talks a lot about Jesus, she also
(25:12):
paints herself very much as a christ like figure. Her
story culminates with the adoption of her two daughters, C
and M, following a lengthy battle with the Zambian government, who,
according to her, fought her every step of the way.
Sophie was under twenty five at the time, which made
it against Zambian law for her to adopt children. She
(25:33):
was also less than twenty one years older than M,
her eldest daughter, which went against a separate legal requirement. However,
the adoptions did eventually go through, with M in twenty
fourteen when she was five, and with C the baby,
when she was less than a year old.
Speaker 8 (25:47):
In twenty fifteen, one day after I had completed my
primary responsibilities, I was prompted by the Holy Spirit to
visit a crisis orphanage. I had been there only one before,
and since then I had repeatedly asked Jesus for another
opportunity to go. I declared under my breath that because
(26:08):
Jesus made it clear in the Bible that visiting the
orphan was true religion. I knew that more would happen
during my time at the Orphanage than would meet my eye.
I walked in, and there she was. As she wiggled
beneath three blankets. I could start to make out her
tiny frame. It was obvious just by her face though
that malnourishment had left her entire body skeletal. Her body
(26:32):
came to a rest as I drew her near. I
looked down, gazing into her eyes. I couldn't help but
stare at such beauty. She pulls her little fists close
to her face and she rubs her tired eyes. I've
never seen something so precious. My hand supports her damp bottom.
The smell of urine meets my nose as the most
(26:53):
fragrant glory.
Speaker 1 (27:06):
Every other case I've covered on this show has concerned
parents and their biological children, so I wanted to better
understand the nuances of the adoptions in this case and
get some insight into the girl's experience. To help us
understand the process and complexities of transracial adoption. We sat
down with Chad Golder Sojourner, a Seattle based writer, educator,
(27:27):
and performer who counsels, families and organizations on this topic.
What do you think is the biggest kind of misconception
or set of misconceptions about transracial adoption, in particular when
you're talking about like a white family adopting black children.
Speaker 5 (27:43):
So I think so I've been one of the misconceptions
is that the white parent knows more. Think about that way.
We have this weird way about adoption and especially transracial
adoptee is this narrative that they adoptees should be grateful.
Some home is better than no home.
Speaker 10 (28:04):
How dare you.
Speaker 5 (28:05):
Not be grateful?
Speaker 10 (28:07):
You know?
Speaker 5 (28:07):
In this man? You know, I remember the whole album
was that Sally's thruthers ads with the kids and the
flies and all that, even at mentality, And the fact
is that's not right, you know. And the fact is
that you have to put in more energy and time.
So one thing I did when I did We're we're consulting,
(28:28):
is that somebody's going to be uncomfortable. It's just how
life is. And if the parent is not feeling uncomfortable,
you can assume that the child is uncomfortable. For translational adoptees,
especially when dropping black kids, is you have to prepare
them to enter into the world they're going to live in.
Speaker 1 (28:48):
I have a two year old and a six year old,
and I really see my job as a parent to
prepare my kids for the world that they live in.
And this is hard enough as it is, so I
can only imagine when an uphill battle be if you
had such a difference in your lived experience to what
you know that your children's will be. So it's really
important to me to note that neither Chad nor myself
(29:09):
is against adoption, transracial or otherwise. Families come to be
in all kinds of different and often beautiful ways, and
families are always complicated. It's also true that there are
some additional layers of complexity when adoption comes into the picture,
and as I know from talking to friends who've adopted,
including our Season two family The Wayburns, it's just a
(29:31):
lot to navigate. As Chad explained, there is always the
risk that children in these situations will come to be
seen as commodities, and consideration for them and their birth
parents isn't always top of mind Sadly, in the worst
case scenario, adoption can be seen as a marketplace. For example,
prospective parents can flock to states that allow shorter windows
(29:52):
of time for birthing parents to change their mind. And
when you add international borders into the discussion, children are
also at an en increased risk of being fundamentally and
profoundly disconnected from their homeland.
Speaker 5 (30:05):
I think one of the reasons that people benefit from
it it's their national adoption, it's yeah adopters, is because
it's harder for you kept the kid away, so there's
no three days you can't take him back. You know,
it's less likely this kid's going to be taken from right.
Speaker 1 (30:25):
So this family, you know, it is a transracial adoption.
It's a white mother of two black daughters. And it's
also an international adoption that is a faith based adoption
that took place in the context of this woman when
she was quite young, going to Zambia to do missionary
work and then eventually returning to the States with these
two girls. So can you help us kind of understand
(30:47):
these these different sort of complications that come around with
these things.
Speaker 5 (30:51):
Well, so, first of all, somebody who's been running with
Jesus is the Carter administration. I will tell you that
God will never tell an eighteen year old to go
six thousand miles to get a child. Okay, he might say,
and go down to the soup kitchen, go mow the
guy's lawn. So I think the problem with the international
(31:11):
adoption for a couple reasons is you have no idea.
First of all, you don't know what you're gonna get.
And I don't mean that you know you're going to
play sweet on a local currency. You can't spell, you
can't find it on a map, I can't play. I'm
not saying, but I'm not going to Zamber to get
a kid. There's all these different things. You know nothing
with history, and you want to take a kid and
(31:32):
remove them. Just erase that part, which is very bold
and brash. It just seems like who, like where? Like
where is that biblical? You know? If you know Golb'm
talking about guard helps some widows in Orpher and she
doesn't like talk about just removing them.
Speaker 1 (31:51):
Missionary work itself is very fraught territory. It's mostly young
white kids going to countries that have often been destabilized
due to long histories of colonialism and foreign conflict, and
as Chad pointed out, Sophie's traveling to Zambia to take
two girls Home was probably not the most efficient or
economical way to help out.
Speaker 5 (32:13):
I mean, being the playing there's all the money that
they were, all of the stuff that goes into these.
Speaker 8 (32:20):
Couse.
Speaker 5 (32:20):
It's like why. It goes back to why my other
concern about transracial international adoptions. I just think this thing
that kids should be able to put their feet on
the soil. Somebody, you know, like, are you taking the
kid back? Like when are they going back? You know,
becau it's all interesting, Oh we can't afford it. Well,
you afforded it the first time, you know, you went
(32:42):
to et open and get the kid, but now you
can ever afford to go back. So I think, I mean,
I want to see just totally disparaging about but I
think there's you know a lot of stuff there that
is still doesn't make sense. I think when you looking
at you know, this whole concept an I don't want
to use the white nationalism the way and we all think,
(33:03):
but there is this white savior complex.
Speaker 1 (33:07):
This is the troubling vein running through Sophie's book. It's
the grandiosity of thinking that Zambia is a problem and
it's one that she's equipped to solve.
Speaker 8 (33:17):
A fierce fire started to burn in me with the
knowledge that I had been born to fight for justice.
The core of my god given personality, combined with the
circumstances of my life, had given me a unique skill
set that seemed particularly valuable in Zambia's darkest compounds.
Speaker 1 (33:35):
And the two kids that Sophie ends up adopting are
not the only kids that she tries to quote save
from Zambia. She attempted to adopt twins before she successfully
adopted her older daughter m She also describes many other
instances in her book where she's saving kids in a
different way.
Speaker 8 (33:53):
I took a few steps in Espina's direction. She immediately
retreated backward and began shouting, almost barking. In that moment,
I became certain that she was under a demonic influence,
and I immediately felt a generous boldness to share the
gospel completely unhindered. I began to share the gospel from
Genesis to Revelation. Espina was now seated with intense anger
(34:16):
across her face. I calmly approached her and gently placed
my right hand on her head. She pulled away, falling
down in the dirt, and immediately I could tell that
the little girl inside her was held captive by darkness.
I got down in the dirt beside her and proclaimed
freedom over her. I could hear her calling out Jesus, Jesus,
(34:36):
and then suddenly she would stop. I made no retreat
and simply continued to declare freedom in Jesus's name. Aspina
thrashed around on the ground for quite a while, sometimes
extending her hands up to the sky, but kicking up
a dust storm. She screamed as if her entire body
was chained, and I stood in agreement with Jesus as
(34:57):
he ordered the demons to let go.
Speaker 1 (35:00):
I don't want to be dismissive of anyone's beliefs, but
also what will The religious piece of Sophie's perspective feels
pretty foreign to me as an agnostic, and we're going
to bring in an expert to help us unpack those
parts of the story. The positioning of Sophie as both
a martyr and a savior feels extremely familiar to me,
(35:23):
as does the book's fixation on crisis and suffering. So
much is glossed over in the book, but the scenes
like this one where Sophie is heroically saving children feel
downright cinematic, so as we move away from Sophie's account
of her origin story and the adoptions go through for
both C and M in twenty fifteen, this brings us
(35:44):
back into the real world, a world where Sophie is
now a single mother of two, and after leaving Zambia,
she doesn't choose to head home to Michigan, where her
family and friends live, where her childhood church congregation is,
or where her entire supports AYSM appears to reside. She
moves to Seattle, where I live. This season on, nobody
(36:12):
should believe me if.
Speaker 8 (36:13):
She wasn't guilty of these allegations, if she was not
doing what this search warrant was alleging.
Speaker 1 (36:20):
You know how horrific.
Speaker 3 (36:22):
I mean, she seems like a saint.
Speaker 10 (36:23):
She would start to talk about money and how you
know she doesn't have any money and she needs fundraisers
and all those stuff.
Speaker 8 (36:30):
But her daughter is in one of the most expensive sports.
Speaker 6 (36:33):
And I believe the church raised about around thirty thousand dollars.
Speaker 3 (36:39):
Something like that.
Speaker 11 (36:40):
I'd gone through a very traumatic experience having your children
taken away, and we as han church, got the opportunity
to support her and hold her up with our prayers.
Speaker 2 (36:53):
But from my observations, she's like the healthiest kidder.
Speaker 7 (36:55):
Of seeing her life.
Speaker 11 (36:57):
Would eat as much as we'd feed her. But given
the fact that her digestive system is so messed up,
my daughter has to regulate that.
Speaker 6 (37:06):
I had a hard time imagining being a parent and
making videos of those kinds of things for my kid.
Did you ever witness having what Sophie calls one of
her episodes. I did not.
Speaker 2 (37:23):
She allegedly had this journal entry that talked about how
she had an issue with lying, so.
Speaker 3 (37:29):
Every time I go in, like to the doctor, she
wouldn't be exhibiting those symptoms. I'm like, I know this
sounds crazy, but.
Speaker 8 (37:34):
I'm not making this is not this is not. Yeah,
well you're the mom.
Speaker 6 (37:38):
Yeah, would it surprise you if I told you that
AC is not a terminal disease?
Speaker 8 (37:44):
Yes, it was, so.
Speaker 5 (37:45):
I think that all of the signs and symptoms are
here for that. It's obviously a concern that she's pushing
this child towards death.
Speaker 1 (37:56):
Nobody should believe me. Is written hosted an executive produce
by me Andrea Zumma. Our senior producer is Maria Gossett.
Story editing by Nicole Hill. Research and fact checking by
Aaron Ajaii and our associate producer is Greta Strongquist. Mixing
and engineering by Robin Edgar. Book passages were performed by
(38:17):
Ilana Michelle Rubin. Special thanks this week to Chad Goler, sojourner,
Glori Machinhi Francisco Alvarado, who originally covered this story for
The Daily Beast, and the many people who spoke to
us on background. If you, or anyone you know is
a victim or survivor of medical child abuse, please go
to munchausensupport dot com to connect with professionals who can
(38:38):
help
Before we begin, a quick warning that in this show
we discussed child abuse and this content may be difficult
for some listeners. If you, or anyone you know is
a victim or survivor of medical child abuse, please go
to munchhausensupport dot com to connect with professionals who can help.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
There is a family in Renton that I want to
introduce you to. Mom Sophie went on an inspiring trip
to Zambia and her college year. She's since adopted two girls.
One of them has an incredibly rare disorder. Doctors say
it's a one in a million chance.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
The audio you just heard is from a news story
that aired on King five television back in May of
twenty nineteen. This story wasn't on my radar, but I
had a lot going on back then. I had just
had a baby and had a new book coming out,
and this was around the time that Munchausen Biproxy was
really entering my work life. The month that this story aired,
(01:00):
I'd done my very first interview about my own family
story for Vanity Fair, and this was followed by an
appearance on a local station about my third novel, We
Came Here to Forget. This was all taking place amid
the second investigation into my sister for Munchausen biproxy abuse
of her children. By the middle of that summer, the
courts would return my sister's children to her, and a
(01:21):
few months after that, the prosecuting attorney would make the
decision not to file charges against my sister, Megan Carter,
despite the horrifying and voluminous evidence against her. But back
to Sophie in general, seeing stories about sick kids in
the news is upsetting for a bunch of reasons.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
So family friends are banding together. They're trying to raise money,
and this is something that is no little ask. We're
talking about like sixty thousand dollars for a vehicle for them,
So we just wanted to put their positive energy out there.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
Of course, there are the particular fears and questions that
I bring to it, given my experience with my sister.
Is this mom telling the truth? What if this child
isn't a victim of a rare disease but a victim
of the person purporting to care for them, even when
there are no red flags for abuse, which is mostly
the case. These stories are pretty dystopian because they illuminate
(02:16):
a tragic feeling of our country's healthcare system, the horrible
reality that families, many of whom I'm sure would prefer
to keep their children's health private, are forced into a
situation where they have to perform their trauma publicly in
the hopes that kind strangers might step in to relieve
the skyrocketing medical bills that could otherwise bankrupt their family. So,
while I usually avoid these types of stories in my
(02:38):
day to day life, once I did see this news
report right away, I noticed that Sophie was positioning herself
as the only one who saw what was happening with
her child.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
I started noticing just kind of weird things or times
where her body would just feel really different, like it
would either be super super tight or like really limp.
Speaker 4 (02:57):
Doctor's visits filled the first few years life, and right.
Speaker 3 (03:01):
Away they found pretty significant brain damage, and so she
was diagnosed with CP at the end of twenty fifteen.
Speaker 4 (03:09):
This is a sample, but Sophie quickly realized was experiencing
something much more concerning.
Speaker 3 (03:20):
Complaining to the ne'real just saying like she's having seizures.
So they would bring her in for an EEG and
it was nothing. They're like, no, we don't see anything.
Maybe she is there's the walls.
Speaker 4 (03:29):
Sophia admits she started to question her own instincts.
Speaker 3 (03:33):
There'd be times where she was like literally totally paralyzed,
and I go to her doctors and be like, I
know she's walking right now, but like she was literally
paralyzed all day yesterday and they'd be like, no, that's
not possible. I'm like, but like, it's she couldn't move,
like I'm telling you, and they're like, okay, but she
can't now, and I'm like.
Speaker 5 (03:51):
Right, I know.
Speaker 4 (03:52):
But after seeking a second opinion and running through genetic testing,
she also.
Speaker 3 (03:56):
Has one on the ATP one a phree giene which
is associated with a disorder called alternating hemopolygia childhood, which
is a extremely rare, one in a million genetic disorder.
Speaker 4 (04:09):
And she's right, it affects one and one million children.
It is progressive and has no cure.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Wow, Lord, you took me up to the fullest extent
on what I told you.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
I was willing to do. This piece on the Evening
News ended up being the first chapter in what would
become a major national news story. This is rare for
Manchessen by proxy cases, which usually Gardner little national coverage
outside of the truly sensational eyed stories like Gypsy Rose
Blanchard and Miya Kuwalski. But there were many elements of
this story that caught people's attention. For one, there were
(04:44):
the optics. Sophie, who is young, white, blonde, and conventionally pretty,
had adopted two children, sisters from a far away nation.
Speaker 3 (04:53):
I went to Zambia after my freshman year of college
on a month long mission trip, and so when I
was there, I just encounter the plight of an orphan adoption.
Wasn't on my radar at all.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
In the televised segment, there are images from Sophie's life
with her two adorable girls, interspersed with footage from the
interview and b roll of Sophie's younger daughter, who were
referring to as c, who is smiley and cheerfully dressed,
in the family's kitchen. At one point, as the two
play a game together, Sophie sitting beside her daughter's wheelchair,
the little girl says, this my.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Radar at all.
Speaker 1 (05:32):
You want to get so scared. It would be easy
to miss this blip in the audio, but the little
girl is saying, I don't want to get a poke.
I'm so scared. This moment is odd because they're not
in a medical setting and there's no medical equipment nearby.
To most this might be a throwaway moment, but for me,
(05:52):
it's a harbinger of how this seemingly inspiring story of
a mother who'd moved heaven and earth to help two
orphans became.
Speaker 6 (06:00):
So this is detective or work with the rents and
police department. Today's date is March seventeenth to twenty twenty one.
It is approximately eight oh three hours.
Speaker 7 (06:08):
And then can you just state your name for me?
Speaker 3 (06:09):
Sophie Hartman.
Speaker 7 (06:12):
In twenty nineteen, King five first met Sophie Hartman after
she adopted two sisters from Zambia. She told us one
has a rare neurological disorder called alternating Hemiplegia of childhood
or AHC. At the time, Hartman set up a GoFundMe
page to raise money for a wheelchair vehicle. Today, she
faces second degree assault charges against a child, her own daughter.
Speaker 5 (06:34):
This is not based off of one investigator.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
It's not based off of a quick investigation.
Speaker 8 (06:38):
This was months of investigation by police and several experts
who wait in King.
Speaker 7 (06:44):
County prosecutors are accusing Hartman of subjecting her daughter to
medically unnecessary surgical procedures and restraints. Records say the girl
underwent more than four hundred and seventy four medical appointments
since twenty sixteen.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
When the Sophie Hartman case broke, it was the typical
litany of eye popping numbers of doctor's visits and procedures
that her daughter had to endure. But this season, we're
diving into the complicated, many layered story of Sophie Hartman,
a white evangelical woman from a small town in Michigan
who traveled thousands of miles to Zambia and returned with
two vulnerable little girls. People believe their eyes. That's something
(07:24):
that is so central to this topic, because we do
believe the people that we love when they're telling us something.
If we didn't, you could never make it through your day.
I'm Andrea Dunlop, and this is nobody should believe me.
(07:45):
If you'd like to support the show, the best way
to do that is to subscribe on Apple Podcasts or
on Patreon. You get all episodes early in ad free,
along with extended cuts and deleted scenes. From the season.
You also get two exclusive bonus episodes every month, and
for the first time ever, we have the entire season
ready for you to binge right now on the subscriber feed.
(08:09):
That's right. You can listen to every episode of season
five right this minute if you subscribe to the show,
and as always, if monetary support is not an option
for you right now, rating and reviewing the show wherever
you listen also helps us a great deal. And if
there's someone you feel needs to hear this show, please
do share it with them. Word of mouth is so
(08:29):
important for independent podcasts. For even more, you can also
find us on YouTube, where we have every episode as
well as bonus video content. Figuring out where to start
with these cases can be a challenge, and going in
I always know that hearing from the person at the
center of it is probably unlikely. However, in this instance
(08:53):
we had a pretty compelling source document because Sophie wrote
a memoir.
Speaker 8 (08:58):
The Strong Ache in my Stomach, that, like homesickness, was
for another country, a land where children ran freely and
dust filled every crevice, a place so different and foreign,
yet one where Heaven met Earth more clearly than I
had ever seen before.
Speaker 1 (09:15):
That was an excerpt from Sophie Hartman's twenty sixteen self
published memoir entitled Crowns of Beauty. The book offers her
first person account of her time in Zambia and her
journey to adopt her two daughters, Sophie's younger daughter, who
were referring to as C, and Sophie's older daughter, who
were referring to as M. The cover is a moody
professional photo of Sophie carrying her youngest on her hip
(09:37):
and holding her older daughter by the hand. Born in
nineteen eighty nine, Sophie Hartman grew up in a small
town outside of Kalamazoo, Michigan. From what I've been able
to glean about her childhood, she appears to have had
a fairly normal, upper middle class life. I've spoken to
some folks on background who know the family, and they
told me that they were well off and well respected
in town. The whole family was also very active in
(09:59):
the church, and according to Sophie's memoir, she began her
devout relationship with God at the age of fourteen during
a Christian summer camp. Sophie was a talented athlete and
played basketball and soccer growing up and after graduation, went
on to college, and then, according to her book, a
summer mission trip prompted her to leave school about two
and a half years early, changing the course of her life.
Speaker 8 (10:22):
Scene at Kafui screams of a divine artist's touch, one
that faithfully brings forth beauty each day. Within moments of
setting foot on the soil. That day in two thousand
and eight, draped behind the fierce beauty of Kafui's landscape,
I witnessed the torments of everyday life by the people
who called this compound home. I saw malner'sh children ply
(10:44):
their way through sewage drains, chewing on plastic bags, and
my heart burned in my chest. Filthy, unclothed babies crawling
alone in the middle of the street caught me completely
off guard, their desperate, empty eyes gazing lifelessly back at mine.
The dramatic and contrasting reality that was present every day
(11:05):
in Kafui devastated me, and I've never been the same.
But maybe I had been missing something. Maybe beauty could
always be found in places long thought to be dark,
and maybe beauty could still surface in places of utter darkness,
that is, if someone was willing to fight for it.
Speaker 1 (11:25):
Sophie appears to have been in and out of Zambia
from roughly two thousand and eight to twenty fifteen, but
the details of where she was and with whom are
obscured in her memoir. In fact, everything about her time
there is obscured, as she notes to the reader that
she's changed the names of not only the people who
appear in the book, but even many of the towns
that she lived in and traveled to. I can certainly
(11:47):
understand changing the names of people to protect their privacy,
but the links she goes to to hide the details
of her life there are somewhat extraordinary given that this
is a memoir. Notably, in her acknowledgments, which here in
the opening pages of the book, she thinks a large
number of Americans by name, But given that the memoirs
focused on her time in another country, her words of
(12:08):
thanks to the folks in Zambia are strikingly different.
Speaker 8 (12:11):
My big Zambian family, you have changed my life forever.
Thank you for not just being eager but ecstatic about
this book, and thank you for letting me tell those stories.
I'm so grateful we'll get to be together in the
age to come. I look forward to amazing chocolates and
the biggest pillow fights forever. You are beautiful to.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
Me, and that is it. I've written acknowledgments of my
own for five books now, and especially on the first one.
You name just literally every person ever, like the barista
who got your coffee while you were writing in the morning,
your third grade teacher, your dog walker. If these Zambian
friends were so ecstatic about the book, why aren't we
(12:55):
thinking any of them by name. The book is largely
focused on time abroad, and we're given scant details of
Sophie's life before in Michigan. In fact, we mostly hear
about how much resistance she encountered for a decision to
go to Zambia.
Speaker 8 (13:11):
A believer very near to me aggressively questioned my decision,
What did you know about helping people in Africa? And
how do you think you can handle all the poverty
and the horrible situations when you have never experienced that.
You will not be safe And all I'll be able
to say when you come home is I told you so.
Speaker 1 (13:31):
And look, I can imagine that Sophie's parents were probably
a bit dismayed at the idea of their daughter dropping
out of college to move to Zambia. However, an idealistic
college kid heading out to save the world is so
common it's a cliche. We all know the guy who
goes on to be an accountant but never shuts up
about his time in the Peace Corps. But Sophie's description
(13:51):
of the town's reaction to her decision elevates her to
the status of martyr.
Speaker 8 (13:57):
Images of leaving my upper class at youation and culture
and stepping into the dusty lives of children deemed filth
triggered thoughts of a scripture passage I had read time
and time again. Speak up for those who cannot speak
for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute,
Speak up and judge fairly, defend the rights of the
(14:19):
poor and needy, Proverbs thirty one to eight nine.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
In the beginning sections of the book, we also hear
from Sophie's little sister, Sam, who contributes journal entries describing
the change she sees in her sister.
Speaker 9 (14:32):
I saw Sophie walking through a towering doorway, given away
by her bright blonde hair and beaming smile. She rolled
two large suitcases behind her, and she was wrapped in
colorful Zambian fabric. I clung to Sophie's right side the
entire ride, wide eyed and in awe of my big sister,
who looked like an African princess.
Speaker 1 (14:51):
After her initial trip, Sophie returned less than a year later,
and at nineteen, started interning for an orphan sponsorship ministry.
That was where Sophie would find her true calling.
Speaker 8 (15:11):
He has called me to Zambia. I was there, and
then he told me he wants me to move there.
I'm still in college, but I'm leaving soon. He's called
me to be a mother in this nation. He has
called me to serve these children and to be a
voice for those who have no voice. It's crazy. Most
of my friends and family are trying to stop me
from going, but I can't say no. I love Jesus.
(15:35):
I love him. I love him. Oh, I love him.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
Reading this book was a disorienting experience, given the context
a young white evangelical setting out to quote save the
people of Zambia. I was expecting the writing to be
a bit problematic, but it was also settling in for
what might at very least be an interesting fish out
of water story of someone leaving everything they've ever known,
(16:03):
and I didn't know anything about Zambia, so I was
looking forward to hearing the little details about day to
day life. You notice so much when you're in a
new place. It's what makes traveling abroad so thrilling. Suddenly,
everything from the food to the fashion, to the local
shopping habits and modes of transportation are new and fascinating.
I was also quite curious to know what a twenty
year old college kid even does when they land in Zambia,
(16:26):
and after reading the nearly two hundred pages of this memoir,
I learned none of that. Reading this book was the
beginning of an experience that I continue to have as
I try to get a handle on Sophie's story. It's
like the closer I get to it, the more it pixelates.
It's like trying to see through layers of smoke, only
to discover more smoke. Sophie's primary descriptive of Zambia is
(16:49):
that it's quote dusty and basically just kind of hellish.
Speaker 8 (16:54):
Walking through the streets of shanty Zambian compounds does something
to me. These compounds are lums, squalid, densely populated areas
where poverty and disease are rampant. Whether I return home
with mud between my toes because of the rains, with
dust in every crevis during the dry season, or with
(17:14):
soiled clothes because of a mixture of urine and diarrhea
from all my little friends, something unexplainable happens. My heart
is moved every time, and something in the depths of
me yurins for Jesus.
Speaker 1 (17:28):
Because at the obfuscation of many of the exact locations,
I can't say for sure whether Sophie really encountered this
much dust, but certainly the whole country is not dusty.
Zambia is a developing country, but to reduce the nation
to scenes of crushing poverty and desperately maltreated children, as
Sophie does in this book is unfair and inaccurate. Zambia
(17:50):
is one of the most urbanized countries in Sub Saharan Africa.
In two thousand and eight, when Sophie first arrived there,
Zambia would have still been reeling from the global economic crisis,
but they'd also undergone about a decade of economic growth
and export diversification. Progress is being made in education, lowering
maternal and child mortality rates and tackling the HIV AIDS epidemic.
(18:12):
But there isn't much nuance to Sophie's descriptions of Zambia.
The picture she paints is evocative of those Sally Struthers
commercials from the nineties.
Speaker 10 (18:20):
For about seventy cents, you can buy a can of
soda regular or diet. In Ethiopia, For just seventy cents
a day, you can feed a child like Jamal nourishing meal.
Since nineteen thirty eight, Christian Children's Fund has helped children
of many faiths and their communities with food, medical care, clothing,
a chance to go to school, or whatever is needed
(18:42):
most Today, so many children around the world still need
your help, and through Christian Children's Fund, you can reach
out to one of them by sharing, well, just a
little of your pocket change.
Speaker 4 (18:55):
It takes so little for you to.
Speaker 8 (18:56):
Become a special friend to a child in a developer country,
but boy, the good it can do is worth more
than you can imagine.
Speaker 1 (19:07):
So while there certainly is poverty in Zambia, much like
in most places, Sophie's descriptions feel troubling. Now, it's hard
to say on its face whether the problem here is
that Sophie just needs to take a few more creative
writing workshops, or if this is evidence of something deeper,
but I just couldn't get over how the people she
was with and the place she was in just never
(19:27):
came into focus. Much more vivid than her descriptions of
life in Zambia were Sophie's internal experiences, mostly talking to God.
These were numerous and florid, occasionally veering into downright romantic
passages like this one.
Speaker 8 (19:43):
You will find that I have loved you, Lord. I
have loved you hard and with abandon. My eyes are
on you, locked in I'm gazing. You will find me
fully and holy in love with you. I will drink
this cup, this double agony, this double grief, this searing pain,
this deep anger, and this hatred of injustice because of them,
(20:07):
and I will love you wholly as I drink this cup,
sowing in tears, sowing in tears, sowing in tears.
Speaker 1 (20:20):
In her memoir and when she speaks to the media
about her daughters, Sophie refers to the two young girls
she brought home from Zambia as orphans. And there's an
important cultural nuance here in the United States. When we
say orphan, we usually take this to mean a child
whose parents are dead. However, because of the differences in
family structure, the word orphan has a pretty different context
(20:42):
in Zambia. According to Zambian journalist Lori Machinhi, children become
orphaned when they lose their parents, but parents are not
seen as the only primary caregivers in a Zambian family.
Zambians embrace the extended family system, so the adults that
we would refer to as hans and uncles are also
considered parental figures and often referred to as mom and
(21:04):
dad as well, especially in traditional village settings. Similarly, cousins
are referred to as sisters and brothers, etc. So when
someone loses their parents and can't live on their own,
the other adults in the family automatically take over custody
of that quote orphan. In a few circumstances, where families
are too poor or too abusive, the orphans will be
(21:24):
taken to an orphanage where they will remain until they
are able to be reunited with family, or, in cases
where that's not possible, come of age and go out
on their own. So while in the US we may
think of an orphanage as a place where abandoned children
await adoption. Orphanages in Zambia can serve as more of
what we think of as a foster home for children.
Because of the vagueness and frankly, the strangeness of Sophie's writing,
(21:48):
it's hard to get a grasp on what she was
doing day to day in Zambia prior to meeting and
adopting her older daughter m Largely, it seems that she
was in the business of saving souls. There's a lot
of talk about saving women and children and being a
quote mother to them, but the particulars aren't clear other
than various mentions of proselytizing and Bible study, and occasional
(22:11):
mentions of meetings with various healthcare providers. And Sophie doesn't
appear to have any specialized training. However, as well demonstrated
by the book, she sure does seem to know a
lot of scripture. There's a lot about Jesus in this book.
I would say at least the third of the text
is Sophie in rapturous conversation with Him. Now, as for
(22:32):
any of the earthly men she encounters in her time
in Zambia, Sophie has nothing good to report.
Speaker 8 (22:38):
One afternoon in late twenty ten, I was walking home
through the compound where I lived, dialoguing with Jesus about
my day. Drunken men directed profanities at me as I
passed a tavern, but simultaneously, my eyes fixed on three
little girls playing in the dirt just a few feet
in front of them. Their soil dresses barely covered their bottoms,
(23:00):
making it obvious that they wore no undergarments. My heart
burned and adrenaline shot through my veins as I recalled
that three days earlier, a young child was severely raped
in an alley nearby. A fire rose within me as
I recalled another very complex sexual assault case in which
three precious young girls confessed that they had agreed to
(23:22):
give themselves to a man for a gift, which turned
out to be a single lollipop for the three of
them to share.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
Now, sadly, sexual assault is both pervasive and universal, and
unfortunately it has not been possible to corroborate or disprove
any of the anecdotes Sophie shares in her book. The
story she tells here could be true, but her descriptions
of the people in Zambia particularly, but not exclusively, the men,
often paints them as cruel and violent.
Speaker 8 (23:55):
The transition from my Southwest Michigan normal to my new
Zambian compound was tough. It was now normal to cry
myself to sleep every night, to be fondled and grabbed
by men throughout the day, and to encounter severely abused
women and children. It was also normal to hear heinous
sexual comments by drunken men. It was normal to have
(24:19):
bruises and sore limbs from being dragged into an alleyway,
to be threatened with stoning and being thrown in fire
while fighting to rescue children, and to be harassed and
followed by individuals with legions of unrestrained demons possessing them.
It was normal to hold babies who had been dumped
in sewers, to feed children whose bellies and bottoms were
(24:42):
being eaten away by worms, and to listen to little
girls replay the abusive events of the night prior.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
And while we don't get any sense of the daily
details like meals or dress, the passages about the suffering
of the children she encounters are vivid and grows. The
book positioned Sophie as both a martyr and a savior
helping various women and children at great risk to herself.
And while Sophie talks a lot about Jesus, she also
(25:12):
paints herself very much as a christ like figure. Her
story culminates with the adoption of her two daughters, C
and M, following a lengthy battle with the Zambian government, who,
according to her, fought her every step of the way.
Sophie was under twenty five at the time, which made
it against Zambian law for her to adopt children. She
(25:33):
was also less than twenty one years older than M,
her eldest daughter, which went against a separate legal requirement. However,
the adoptions did eventually go through, with M in twenty
fourteen when she was five, and with C the baby,
when she was less than a year old.
Speaker 8 (25:47):
In twenty fifteen, one day after I had completed my
primary responsibilities, I was prompted by the Holy Spirit to
visit a crisis orphanage. I had been there only one before,
and since then I had repeatedly asked Jesus for another
opportunity to go. I declared under my breath that because
(26:08):
Jesus made it clear in the Bible that visiting the
orphan was true religion. I knew that more would happen
during my time at the Orphanage than would meet my eye.
I walked in, and there she was. As she wiggled
beneath three blankets. I could start to make out her
tiny frame. It was obvious just by her face though
that malnourishment had left her entire body skeletal. Her body
(26:32):
came to a rest as I drew her near. I
looked down, gazing into her eyes. I couldn't help but
stare at such beauty. She pulls her little fists close
to her face and she rubs her tired eyes. I've
never seen something so precious. My hand supports her damp bottom.
The smell of urine meets my nose as the most
(26:53):
fragrant glory.
Speaker 1 (27:06):
Every other case I've covered on this show has concerned
parents and their biological children, so I wanted to better
understand the nuances of the adoptions in this case and
get some insight into the girl's experience. To help us
understand the process and complexities of transracial adoption. We sat
down with Chad Golder Sojourner, a Seattle based writer, educator,
(27:27):
and performer who counsels, families and organizations on this topic.
What do you think is the biggest kind of misconception
or set of misconceptions about transracial adoption, in particular when
you're talking about like a white family adopting black children.
Speaker 5 (27:43):
So I think so I've been one of the misconceptions
is that the white parent knows more. Think about that way.
We have this weird way about adoption and especially transracial
adoptee is this narrative that they adoptees should be grateful.
Some home is better than no home.
Speaker 10 (28:04):
How dare you.
Speaker 5 (28:05):
Not be grateful?
Speaker 10 (28:07):
You know?
Speaker 5 (28:07):
In this man? You know, I remember the whole album
was that Sally's thruthers ads with the kids and the
flies and all that, even at mentality, And the fact
is that's not right, you know. And the fact is
that you have to put in more energy and time.
So one thing I did when I did We're we're consulting,
(28:28):
is that somebody's going to be uncomfortable. It's just how
life is. And if the parent is not feeling uncomfortable,
you can assume that the child is uncomfortable. For translational adoptees,
especially when dropping black kids, is you have to prepare
them to enter into the world they're going to live in.
Speaker 1 (28:48):
I have a two year old and a six year old,
and I really see my job as a parent to
prepare my kids for the world that they live in.
And this is hard enough as it is, so I
can only imagine when an uphill battle be if you
had such a difference in your lived experience to what
you know that your children's will be. So it's really
important to me to note that neither Chad nor myself
(29:09):
is against adoption, transracial or otherwise. Families come to be
in all kinds of different and often beautiful ways, and
families are always complicated. It's also true that there are
some additional layers of complexity when adoption comes into the picture,
and as I know from talking to friends who've adopted,
including our Season two family The Wayburns, it's just a
(29:31):
lot to navigate. As Chad explained, there is always the
risk that children in these situations will come to be
seen as commodities, and consideration for them and their birth
parents isn't always top of mind Sadly, in the worst
case scenario, adoption can be seen as a marketplace. For example,
prospective parents can flock to states that allow shorter windows
(29:52):
of time for birthing parents to change their mind. And
when you add international borders into the discussion, children are
also at an en increased risk of being fundamentally and
profoundly disconnected from their homeland.
Speaker 5 (30:05):
I think one of the reasons that people benefit from
it it's their national adoption, it's yeah adopters, is because
it's harder for you kept the kid away, so there's
no three days you can't take him back. You know,
it's less likely this kid's going to be taken from right.
Speaker 1 (30:25):
So this family, you know, it is a transracial adoption.
It's a white mother of two black daughters. And it's
also an international adoption that is a faith based adoption
that took place in the context of this woman when
she was quite young, going to Zambia to do missionary
work and then eventually returning to the States with these
two girls. So can you help us kind of understand
(30:47):
these these different sort of complications that come around with
these things.
Speaker 5 (30:51):
Well, so, first of all, somebody who's been running with
Jesus is the Carter administration. I will tell you that
God will never tell an eighteen year old to go
six thousand miles to get a child. Okay, he might say,
and go down to the soup kitchen, go mow the
guy's lawn. So I think the problem with the international
(31:11):
adoption for a couple reasons is you have no idea.
First of all, you don't know what you're gonna get.
And I don't mean that you know you're going to
play sweet on a local currency. You can't spell, you
can't find it on a map, I can't play. I'm
not saying, but I'm not going to Zamber to get
a kid. There's all these different things. You know nothing
with history, and you want to take a kid and
(31:32):
remove them. Just erase that part, which is very bold
and brash. It just seems like who, like where? Like
where is that biblical? You know? If you know Golb'm
talking about guard helps some widows in Orpher and she
doesn't like talk about just removing them.
Speaker 1 (31:51):
Missionary work itself is very fraught territory. It's mostly young
white kids going to countries that have often been destabilized
due to long histories of colonialism and foreign conflict, and
as Chad pointed out, Sophie's traveling to Zambia to take
two girls Home was probably not the most efficient or
economical way to help out.
Speaker 5 (32:13):
I mean, being the playing there's all the money that
they were, all of the stuff that goes into these.
Speaker 8 (32:20):
Couse.
Speaker 5 (32:20):
It's like why. It goes back to why my other
concern about transracial international adoptions. I just think this thing
that kids should be able to put their feet on
the soil. Somebody, you know, like, are you taking the
kid back? Like when are they going back? You know,
becau it's all interesting, Oh we can't afford it. Well,
you afforded it the first time, you know, you went
(32:42):
to et open and get the kid, but now you
can ever afford to go back. So I think, I mean,
I want to see just totally disparaging about but I
think there's you know a lot of stuff there that
is still doesn't make sense. I think when you looking
at you know, this whole concept an I don't want
to use the white nationalism the way and we all think,
(33:03):
but there is this white savior complex.
Speaker 1 (33:07):
This is the troubling vein running through Sophie's book. It's
the grandiosity of thinking that Zambia is a problem and
it's one that she's equipped to solve.
Speaker 8 (33:17):
A fierce fire started to burn in me with the
knowledge that I had been born to fight for justice.
The core of my god given personality, combined with the
circumstances of my life, had given me a unique skill
set that seemed particularly valuable in Zambia's darkest compounds.
Speaker 1 (33:35):
And the two kids that Sophie ends up adopting are
not the only kids that she tries to quote save
from Zambia. She attempted to adopt twins before she successfully
adopted her older daughter m She also describes many other
instances in her book where she's saving kids in a
different way.
Speaker 8 (33:53):
I took a few steps in Espina's direction. She immediately
retreated backward and began shouting, almost barking. In that moment,
I became certain that she was under a demonic influence,
and I immediately felt a generous boldness to share the
gospel completely unhindered. I began to share the gospel from
Genesis to Revelation. Espina was now seated with intense anger
(34:16):
across her face. I calmly approached her and gently placed
my right hand on her head. She pulled away, falling
down in the dirt, and immediately I could tell that
the little girl inside her was held captive by darkness.
I got down in the dirt beside her and proclaimed
freedom over her. I could hear her calling out Jesus, Jesus,
(34:36):
and then suddenly she would stop. I made no retreat
and simply continued to declare freedom in Jesus's name. Aspina
thrashed around on the ground for quite a while, sometimes
extending her hands up to the sky, but kicking up
a dust storm. She screamed as if her entire body
was chained, and I stood in agreement with Jesus as
(34:57):
he ordered the demons to let go.
Speaker 1 (35:00):
I don't want to be dismissive of anyone's beliefs, but
also what will The religious piece of Sophie's perspective feels
pretty foreign to me as an agnostic, and we're going
to bring in an expert to help us unpack those
parts of the story. The positioning of Sophie as both
a martyr and a savior feels extremely familiar to me,
(35:23):
as does the book's fixation on crisis and suffering. So
much is glossed over in the book, but the scenes
like this one where Sophie is heroically saving children feel
downright cinematic, so as we move away from Sophie's account
of her origin story and the adoptions go through for
both C and M in twenty fifteen, this brings us
(35:44):
back into the real world, a world where Sophie is
now a single mother of two, and after leaving Zambia,
she doesn't choose to head home to Michigan, where her
family and friends live, where her childhood church congregation is,
or where her entire supports AYSM appears to reside. She
moves to Seattle, where I live. This season on, nobody
(36:12):
should believe me if.
Speaker 8 (36:13):
She wasn't guilty of these allegations, if she was not
doing what this search warrant was alleging.
Speaker 1 (36:20):
You know how horrific.
Speaker 3 (36:22):
I mean, she seems like a saint.
Speaker 10 (36:23):
She would start to talk about money and how you
know she doesn't have any money and she needs fundraisers
and all those stuff.
Speaker 8 (36:30):
But her daughter is in one of the most expensive sports.
Speaker 6 (36:33):
And I believe the church raised about around thirty thousand dollars.
Speaker 3 (36:39):
Something like that.
Speaker 11 (36:40):
I'd gone through a very traumatic experience having your children
taken away, and we as han church, got the opportunity
to support her and hold her up with our prayers.
Speaker 2 (36:53):
But from my observations, she's like the healthiest kidder.
Speaker 7 (36:55):
Of seeing her life.
Speaker 11 (36:57):
Would eat as much as we'd feed her. But given
the fact that her digestive system is so messed up,
my daughter has to regulate that.
Speaker 6 (37:06):
I had a hard time imagining being a parent and
making videos of those kinds of things for my kid.
Did you ever witness having what Sophie calls one of
her episodes. I did not.
Speaker 2 (37:23):
She allegedly had this journal entry that talked about how
she had an issue with lying, so.
Speaker 3 (37:29):
Every time I go in, like to the doctor, she
wouldn't be exhibiting those symptoms. I'm like, I know this
sounds crazy, but.
Speaker 8 (37:34):
I'm not making this is not this is not. Yeah,
well you're the mom.
Speaker 6 (37:38):
Yeah, would it surprise you if I told you that
AC is not a terminal disease?
Speaker 8 (37:44):
Yes, it was, so.
Speaker 5 (37:45):
I think that all of the signs and symptoms are
here for that. It's obviously a concern that she's pushing
this child towards death.
Speaker 1 (37:56):
Nobody should believe me. Is written hosted an executive produce
by me Andrea Zumma. Our senior producer is Maria Gossett.
Story editing by Nicole Hill. Research and fact checking by
Aaron Ajaii and our associate producer is Greta Strongquist. Mixing
and engineering by Robin Edgar. Book passages were performed by
(38:17):
Ilana Michelle Rubin. Special thanks this week to Chad Goler, sojourner,
Glori Machinhi Francisco Alvarado, who originally covered this story for
The Daily Beast, and the many people who spoke to
us on background. If you, or anyone you know is
a victim or survivor of medical child abuse, please go
to munchausensupport dot com to connect with professionals who can
(38:38):
help
Host
Andrea Gunning
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