Reflections Magazine Issue #71 - Spring 2010 | Page 10

Feature Article

At age 11 and illiterate, children’s welfare workers finally rescued Milligan from his abusive
environment. But the trauma of that experience
lingered. A ward of the state, Milligan began
a nomadic existence that included living with a
combination of family, foster parents—even
pastors—in his struggle for acceptance and a
better life.
After attending four high schools in as many
years, Milligan managed to graduate—no small
feat. However, even his own family didn’t believe
he was college material. But Siena Heights was
willing to give him the chance—maybe his only
chance at the time. And he made the most of it,
graduating with honors. Milligan now has a
successful career, and last spring, his son also
graduated with honors from SHU.

“At the age of 11 it was very embarrassing to be
reading this children’s book, so I would hide the
book if I was reading it in the library,” he said.
“When checking the book out, I would pretend
it was for my youngest sister.”
He spent most of the rest of that summer in the
library desperately trying to catch up to children
his age.
“I had a thesaurus and a dictionary at my side
and was forcing myself to look up the words and
understand what they meant,” Milligan said. “At
the end of the summer, my reading level was still
far behind seventh-graders.”

Another motivating factor was his involvement
in athletics. He joined the junior high track team
and experienced “a spirit of accomplishment I
never felt before.”

Learning the Basics

“It was the first time in my life I was ever exposed
to a library,” Milligan said.
The first book he attempted to read was Dr.
Seuss’ “Green Eggs and Ham.” He liked it because the pictures helped tell the story.

10

Reflections Spring ’10

After “squeaking by” junior high, Milligan
entered high school barely able to read—but
the fires of learning had been lit. Because of his
unquenchable desire to learn and be accepted,
Milligan said “something amazing happened.”

“I was deprived of love and affection for the first
11 years of my life,” he said. “No one had an interest in what I did. When I raised my hand and I
knew the answer and the teacher was very positive, that began to drive that craving for affection
that I never had.”

Although he can’t forget his past, he now uses
it as an example of how anyone can overcome
abuse and illiteracy to become a productive
member of society.

Unable to read, tell time—or even tie his own
shoes—Milligan went to live with his eldest
stepsister, who first introduced him to the idea
of learning.

“Something Amazing Happened”

Calling his learning process “exponential,” Milligan said his grades went from Ds in junior high
to As during the early years of high school as
he experienced the positive reinforcement from
his teachers. Learning was no longer a chore,
but a passion.

Last fall, after a nearly 10-year writing and editing process, he authored the book “A Beautiful
World,” that detailed the abuses of his childhood.
His triumph over his past has allowed Milligan
to become a powerful advocate for child abuse
prevention, and his message has even attracted
the attention of national media.

By the time state children’s welfare workers
arrived and finally removed Milligan from his
abusive surroundings, what they found was an
11-year-old boy who felt total isolation from the
rest of the world. Emotionally scarred from years
of physical and sexual cruelty, Milligan said he
often felt “a feeling of dread” and even experienced what he called “hysterical paralysis” while
trying to cope with what was being done to him.

He called junior high a painful and humiliating
time, with Milligan barely clinging to a D average while trying to hide his deficiencies from the
rest of his classmates. He remembers spending
eight hours trying to solve just one algebra
problem. Despite his struggles, that determination and development of “severe study habits”
would pay dividends later.

“When I raised my hand
and I knew the answer
and the teacher was very
positive, that began to drive
that craving for affection
that I never had.”

“Just like academics, the more praise I received,
the harder I tried and the harder I trained,” said
Milligan, who eventually made the high school
varsity track team. “Literally, it was just the absolute craving to be accepted. At the core was the
need to be normal. I was abnormal, and I knew
it. The elation I felt when I was treated like all
the other kids was by far the greatest compliment I got because it was normal. I just wanted
to be accepted.”