'I ate from the same bowl with the dog': grown up Mowgli children talked about their childhood
'07.05.2021'
Source: RIA News
Mowgli children were remembered in the spring of 2019, when several feral minors were found at once in different regions of Russia. Leroux was rescued from an apartment on Leningradsky Prospekt. A five-year-old girl was sitting on a pile of rubbish, instead of curls on her head, she had dreadlocks, an elastic hair tie had grown into her neck. A little later, four were immediately found in Mytishchi. The youngest of the brothers bit and was afraid of water. But all of them, although they lived in inhuman conditions, were born people.
RIA News tracked down real Mowgli, who survived only thanks to the care of animals. Viktor Kozlovtsev spent four and a half years in the same room with the dog: he ate with her from a common bowl, shared one rug. Ivan Mishukov spent two years in a pack of stray dogs. Now both of them are over twenty, but they will never forget their "animal" childhood.
Moved on all fours
Vitya Kozlovtsev rarely looks in the eyes of his interlocutor. If the question is unpleasant, he, like a hunted animal, cringes and presses his head into his shoulders. He also shudders when he hears a dog barking. This is because in deep childhood barking and growling were the only sounds available to him. For four and a half years - from one and a half to six years - the boy lived in the same room with the rottweiler. It sounds crazy, but even they threw food in one bowl.
The nurse of the district clinic saved the child. Looking through the maps of young patients, she noticed that Vitya had not been brought to the examination for more than four years. The health worker went to the address with a control visit - no one opened the door. In the apartment on the outskirts of Podolsk, the doctors got only after the intervention of the district and the guardianship.
“When Emergency Situations Ministry officers opened the door, a dog and a child rushed out to race for them. The boy moved on all fours, was without clothes. Insects rained on their heads with a curly head, and their nails grew so much that they resembled the claws on the paws of animals. The guardians tried to put the child on their feet, but the dog rushed at them - she fiercely defended her “puppy,” says Lilit Gorelova, Viti's guardian. Of course, when she opened the apartment she was not present, she described the situation according to the social security workers.
In the room where the dog and the child ran out, there was no furniture or toys. In the center was a bowl with the remnants of food, some rags were lying next to it, replacing the rug.
On the subject: Oksana Malaya: how was the fate of the Ukrainian woman who was raised by the dogs?
The worst thing is that in the same apartment, behind the wall, there were adults - the boy's mother and grandmother. Why they entrusted the upbringing of Viti to the dog remains a mystery.
“I cannot say that Mother Viti drank heavily or led an asocial lifestyle. At that time, she worked as a cleaner at the plant. In her room were both a TV and a refrigerator. Naturally, she was immediately deprived of her parental rights, and a case was opened on the fact of child abuse. However, she did not admit guilt. She assured her that the boy was growing up in a normal situation, “spoiled” him in the hospital, ”continues Lilith.
By the way, Viti's father lived in the same house. After the divorce, he seemed to be trying to see his son, but his ex-wife would not even let him on the doorstep. Then the desperate dad gave up trying to visit the boy.
Knew the only word - "bonduelle"
In all details, the story of Viti Lilith learned already after she took him up. And then, in the winter of 2006, she received a call from custody and was asked to shelter a boy who “will not survive in an orphanage.” "I was warned that he is very strange: he does not speak, he does not walk well, he can bite himself or curl up."
Vitya is not the first adopted child in the Gorelov family. At that time, they had three of them in their education. In total, Lilith and Alexander raised 35 children: six blood and 29 guardians. The head of the family does not deny: they were warned that the child would be weird, but they did not expect that everything would be so serious.
“When we came to visit Vitya at the hospital, he sat down on all fours and huddled under the table. Lilith pulled him out, put him on her knees. We took him back the same day. The boy didn't even have warm clothes, although winter reigned outside the window. We wrapped him in a blanket and took him home in a cocoon. "
Vitya spent only a week in the hospital, but during this time the doctors literally put him on his feet. “Before that, he only crawled on all fours. And when they gave him to us, he could already walk, although not without help - it was necessary to support him under the armpits, - Lilith shares the details. - True, for a long time he could not descend from the stairs, his legs did not bend, because they were like sticks.
Vitya could not speak either - he just moaned. Even a six-year-old child could not cry - he whined like a dog.
The only word that the boy pronounced distinctly was “Bonduel”. Adoptive parents for a long time could not understand what this set of sounds. Then they realized: apparently, in the next room, the mother and grandmother were watching TV, and the boy remembered the brand name from the advertisement.
She taught six-year-old Mowgli Lilith to speak in parallel with her own one and a half year old son. A woman shows a video: Vitya is sitting on one knee, her blood son is on the other. Both boys click on pictures in the talking book and repeat how a crow croaks and a cow bellows.
Only a year later, his adoptive parents managed to teach Vitya to put words into sentences. “But he could not build a logical dialogue for a long time. We tell him: "Victor, go eat." He replied: "The light is on."
However, the hardest part was teaching the boy how to use the restroom. Lilith admits that at first he tore off diapers and relieved himself anywhere. “We then had Vietnamese children under our care. One of them, Kim, followed Vitya and, if possible, taught him the skills of everyday life. So, if Vitya was offended by Kim, he could do his "dirty deed" to him on the sheet, cover him with a blanket and leave. " The adoptive mother does not hide: most of all, she and her husband were afraid that they would not be able to teach the child hygiene. The situation was aggravated by the fact that the Mowgli boy was terrified of water. “When we turned on the tap, he screamed with fear. It was a huge effort to get him to take a bath. "
In the classroom huddled under a chair
The first public place where Vitya was taken was Sunday school. But, barely crossing the threshold of the classroom, he huddled under a chair. “I hid like this every time for a month and a half. We decided to move the chair closer to the children. After a few more sessions, Vitya was almost forced into prison. He held out for 10-15 minutes - and hid again. " And only six months later, the boy was able to calmly hatch a 45-minute lesson. And a year later he was sent to the first grade of a school (of course, a correctional school).
Despite all the efforts, the doctors maintained that Vitya never adapts to life in society. The argument is strong: the most important period when a child realizes himself as a human and learns elementary skills, the boy lived with a dog. In the young man's medical record, the “diagnosis” column still shows “Mowgli's syndrome”.
Now Vita Kozlovtsev twenty. However, if you close your eyes, it may seem that the child is talking to you. Here he excitedly tells how he drove home from college on his own. “On trol trolbus. Dva-dtsat stops, "- the guy crushes the words, as if every time stumbles about their complex structures. Then he brings and lays out the patterns of bath slippers on the table - so the first-graders brag about their crafts.
On the subject: In India, found a girl-Mowgli, brought up monkeys
He graduated from college with a degree in tailor. “We made this choice for him,” admits Lilith. - But he likes to sew, he happily holds a needle in his hands. True, he himself wants to master the profession of a landscaper. So after this college, let's go to the second. ”
Most likely, Vitya will never be able to lead his own life. Lilit and Alexander have already issued a lifelong custody of him. “Of course, we are trying to teach him all the skills of an adult. And he has great progress. For example, this year he independently began to go by public transport. We only sometimes secretly follow him in the car and see that he behaves well. ”
When asked whether Vitya remembers something from his childhood, he waves his head. And again hides his head in the shoulders - like an animal. “Even if he remembers, he is unlikely to say. I think, subconsciously, he is still afraid to return to that apartment, ”concludes Lilith.
“Dogs didn't give me a pick from the pack”
At the time of the interview, Ivan Mishukov was twenty-seven. And, unlike Viti, the young man clearly remembers the two years that he spent in the dog pack. “I was four when we moved to Reutov. Mother immediately disappeared - she drove off somewhere for a walk. I remained in the care of my aunt and grandfather. At first everything was fine, but then the aunt had her own child, the grandfather started drinking - he could not bear the death of his grandmother. Nobody needed me. In addition to this, my aunt's husband began to beat me severely. I could close the door so that I would not go into the apartment. "
One day, four-year-old Vanya remained on the street. “With the guys behind the playground, we built a hut - I settled there. One went to the garbage to find something edible, and met his first dog. I have always loved animals, so I was not scared, ”recalls Mishukov.
Then two more mongrels nailed to the boy - Jesse and Laura. Ivan does not remember the names of the rest, but says that at different times from seven to ten dogs ran after him.
“I walked around the district with them, collected bottles, handed them over, bought food with this money. Naturally, when I could go home, I spent the night in the apartment. Or lay down right at the entrance. The dogs were grouping around me, so it wasn't cold. "
The boy was allowed to go home less and less. They even sawed a hole in the grate on the window through which he, like a cat, could climb into the apartment, take something edible and get out. Fortunately, the family lived on the first floor. Housemates cut Vanya's hair, nails, dressed him, and in the store opposite they regularly fed him. “I ate something myself, wrapped something for my flock,” he recalls.
Now this story may seem implausible - at the sight of sleeping with dogs at the entrance of a five-year-old child, anyone will call the police. But then there were 1990. “Difficult times, everyone thought about their own family - they themselves would have survived to feed their children,” explains Ivan’s foster mother Tatiana Babanina.
In addition, the young man recalls that the mongrels simply did not allow strangers to approach him. “Several times they tried to take me out of the pack, but the dogs attacked passers-by and policemen. Probably, from the fifth time, the police officers managed to lure me out. I always went to the store and the dogs stayed outside. That time he also came in, they fed me, and when I got up from the table, two policemen grabbed me and dragged me to the back door. Then they put me in a car and drove me around the city for a long time to cover my tracks. All this time my dogs were running after us. I screamed and struggled. Only in the evening they brought me to the orphanage. "
Could bite the teacher
Vanya's story thundered throughout the country after the boy - the leader of the dog pack - was written in the newspaper Trud. One of the first publications miraculously survived.
Then the journalists came to visit the child in the orphanage two weeks after he was taken from the pack. And we recorded a small interview with him:
- Can you count. Who taught you?
- I learned it myself. I myself and the house for my dogs made - iron. And also wooden. Laura lived in a wooden one, and Masha lived in an iron one. Others just ran away every day. Jesse went to the house where my brother lives. Non-native. He climbs the garbage dumps in another yard. He fights. And he searches for toys in the trash heaps. When I was in his garbage for a long time in the summer, he beat me.
- Do you miss your dogs?
- Yes, I want to see them. They would not let any uncles near me. <…> Dogs were given food in the store. And they gave me too. I was treated to buns, sausages and ice cream. I broke off my dogs, they asked me. He even gave Rex, although he is not mine, he is very biting ...
In the orphanage, Ivan confesses, it was not easy to adapt. For a long time he did not talk to anyone. “They knew everything at the boarding school about the fact that he lived with dogs,” says Vanina’s stepbrother’s wife. “I had an acquaintance working there, so she said that Vanka could bite the teacher and the children.”
She knew about the difficult fate of the boy and his adoptive mother Tatyana Babanina. However, she insists: two years in the flock did not affect the psyche of the child. “You ask if he barked?” - she notices with a call. - Good guy: handsome, smart. Why not take it? ”By the way, in addition to Vanya, Tatyana Babanina raised 26 children, three are raising now.
In the fifth grade, Vanya entered the Kronstadt Naval Cadet Corps. Then there was military service. Now Ivan lives in the same Reutov, works as an operator at a cable plant. He tries not to talk about childhood.
“I understand that if it were not for those dogs, I would hardly have survived on the street. But I am also grateful to the police officers who took me out of the pack. And, of course, my mother, who raised me. ”
