Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, August 27, 1994 TAG: 9408290020
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: C-4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By EMERY P. DALESIO ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: RALEIGH, N.C. LENGTH: Long
He grew up speaking Portuguese in Sao Paulo, Brazil, where his American parents ran a religious mission. As a teen-ager, they encouraged him to get his college education in the United States. Evans is now enrolled at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro where, despite his American roots, he feels out of place.
``Every day I'm learning that people are not like me. They don't think like I do on some issues,'' said Evans, 24.
Evans is among thousands of children who have faced difficulty adjusting to life in the United States after spending their childhood in a foreign land with their American missionary parents.
Increasingly, religious denominations, mission agencies and private therapists are recognizing the problem.
Research comparing missionary children to the general population is scant. One 1990 study comparing the psychological and social development of both groups found that missionary kids, or MKs, may have less success working through important life crises.
``Although the call of God to missionary work is extremely important, the sacrifice of family for ministry can have disastrous results. Some MKs described bitter feelings because their parents put the work first,'' the study said.
Adjusting to life in the U.S. is an experience shared by those whose parents have careers in the military, foreign service or international business.
Sociologists and other researchers describe as ``third-culture kids'' those who have adopted a mix of their parents' native culture and that of the country where they were raised.
While some have always been overwhelmed by the shock of readjustment, many foreign-raised children benefit from the experience. Studies have shown many are more mature and emotionally tougher than their peers. They have a global vision and speak at least one foreign language.
``The third-culture kid of today is the prototype of the citizen of the 21st century,'' said Rev. David Pollock, whose non-profit group has held scores of cultural re-entry seminars for returning missionaries and employees of the U.S. State Department.
On the down side, third-culture children experience frequent relocation and all the disruption in friends and education that holds.
``Individuals are living in a state of perpetual grief,'' said Pollock, who runs Interaction Inc. in Houghton, N.Y. ``The separation issues are critical and they leave their mark.
``They have to learn to build friendships even if they may be short. The impact on marriage and family is tremendous if they don't realize that a relationship isn't going to end in a couple of years.''
The hardship is more acute for the children of missionaries, researchers and counselors said.
While military children may live in a foreign land for several years at a time, missionary children may spend all or most of their developing years in a foreign culture. Their childhood haunts and best friends are in Caracas, Cairo or a country village with a name Americans can't pronounce.
``The difference I see is that the missionary child spends more time abroad and so their problems are intensified,'' said Doris Walters, a therapist and former missionary who wrote a 1991 book on cultural readjustment, ``An Assessment of Reentry Issues of the Children of Missionaries.''
Also, most third-culture children can blame a move that cuts them off from friends on ``those stupid people in the personnel department at IBM,'' Pollack said. A missionary child is told that God is directing the decision.
``There's the possibility of God getting blamed for turning their life upside down,'' he said.
That's what happened to Nancy Gladen. She left behind her childhood friends and the places where they played in Monterrey, Mexico. She still balances her checkbook with arithmetic whispered in Spanish. At 18, she followed the expectations of her Southern Baptist missionary parents and enrolled at Baylor University.
``The way I see it, my roots were yanked out from under me and I was forced to live in this strange land called the United States,'' said Gladen now 32 and finishing her college degree in Denton, Texas.
She said she felt the God that was so large a part of her family didn't understand what he was putting her through. The shock was not unique. At least two missionary children committed suicide while she was at Baylor, she said.
``The adjustment can be pretty severe,'' said Mark Biddle, who counsels returning United Methodist missionaries through Emory University Hospital in Atlanta. ``You're talking about folks who have strong friends, strong allegiances and they're overwhelmed coming into the foreign culture.''
Mission organizations are recognizing the need to do more. Even Catholics - who until recently did not have to cope with family issues - organized what may have been the first conference for returned Catholic missionary families in July.
Gladen, like Evans and several dozen other former missionary kids, has turned to Walters for counseling.
Last year, Walters started Missionary Family Counseling Services in Winston-Salem, N.C., to focus on the problems of the more than 500 Southern Baptist missionary children in the United States. She also counsels children of other denominations.
by CNB