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Rebirthing Controversy, Page 2

Quackery?

Advocates argue that the therapy is valid for those suffering from attachment disorder, and that by recreating the birth experience, bonds that had been severed due to trauma, abuse, or neglect are somehow re-created.

But Dr. Ron Federici, author and internationally recognized authority on neuropsychiatric evaluations of internationally adopted children, has a very low opinion of the practice:

Rebirthing therapy is not held in any regard by well-trained child therapists and has no validity in medical or psychological research. It was an offshoot of bizarre therapies of the 60s and has been continually practiced by many individuals untrained in proper child assessment and therapy teqhniques to where they make up their own (or offshoot) ideas, who tout this as being the only way for damaged children to 'have a new life' with their new families. Furthermore, it only serves to retraumatize children due to the aggressive nature which is in the same fashion as rage reduction therapy which was big in the 80s.

[Readers may recall controversies over this type of therapy which, in one instance, resulted in an $8.4 million judgment against a Texas psychiatrist for assault, battery, and intentional infliction of emotional distress in the name of "rage reduction therapy."]

Dr. Federici adds,

Traumatized children may need certain types of holding therapy to contain aggressive urges, but the majority has to be done in a reconstructive family modality. The entire thought of rebirthing, which was done to Candace Newmaker, was both bizarre, psychotic on the part of the therapist, and further traumatizing to the child while she was alive and before she met a most gruesome death according to the coroner. People who practice this type of treatment are often unlicensed and untrained, but make a lot of money by enticing the most needy and desperate families.

Douglass Gosney, a Marriage & Family Counselor whose practice is located in Los Angeles, reportedly told authorities he taught the head-covering technique to Watkins and Ponder.

A Good Person

Many jumped to the defense of Connell Watkins for her work with them, their family members, or their children. Supporters called the four "well-meaning" and Watkins' former attorney, Dan Edwards, is quoted as saying he doesn't think anyone should be charged. He said his client was following standard practices for rebirthing; that this has been a valid technique for more than two decades, and "a 'last hope' for disturbed children."

The justice system has spoken, but serious questions about diagnoses and treatments have been raised. In the meantime, parents - adoptive and not - face a present or future need for help for damaged children.

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