Lehighvalleylive.com Article October 1
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John Lahutsky, of Bethlehem Township, Pa.,was born in Russia and spent the first nine years of his life in an orphanage there.
Because Lahutsky has cerebral palsy, he was deemed incapable of learning and placed in a mental asylum for adults. He was underfed, overmedicated and spent all of his time inside.
“I saw naked children banging their heads into cribs, crying out for attention and lying in pools of their own waste,” said Lahutsky, now 19. “I related to a vegetable because of all the drugs I was given. … I suffered from malnutrition and was stuck in a crib all day without ever going outside for exercise or given attention.”
In the late 1990s, Paula Lahutsky adopted John after reading about him in her church bulletin.
Lahutsky is thriving now, but memories of his childhood still haunt him. The teenager, a student at Freedom High School, used his new book, “The Boy From Baby House 10: From the Nightmare of a Russian Orphanage to a New Life in America,” as an outlet for the pain.
He is hopeful the book, written with Alan Philps, a British journalist who shed light on his plight, will help other children stuck in the same nightmare.
Lahutsky will discuss his experiences during an appearance beginning 2 p.m. Saturday at Barnes & Noble at the Southmont Shopping Center, Bethlehem Township, Pa.
John Lahutsky, of Bethlehem Township, is a native of Russia who wrote about his experience in an orphanage there. The book is called “The Boy from Baby House 10.”
