Gift for haven

Friday, March 31, 2000 | 11:24 a.m.

Listening to Sheri Nork reminisce about her younger days, one wonders where she got her bright sense of humor.

As a child, black eyes were a common trait on her smooth complexion. Bruises frequently appeared then disappeared on her body.

"You hit your head on a door knob. Or you fell down the stairs," her mother would tell her. "Lois would always have a story made up," Nork said.

Lois was the woman who had adopted Nork as an infant, then spent the next 14 years beating her. Together the two would rehearse stories until Lois was sure Nork had the information down to a convincing tale, one that exonerated Lois from whatever it was she had done.

In seventh grade, after Nork finally explained her black and blue marks to a concerned friend, she was placed at Child Haven, the county's temporary shelter for abused and neglected children.

Today following an unusual twist of circumstances, the 32-year-old is back at Child Haven with her husband, Gerry, to make a $100,000 donation.

The story behind the donation stands as unusual as her life's experiences.

As Nork and her husband visited the shelter on Valentine's Day to donate a bundle of stuffed animals -- her first visit since she was a resident 18 years ago -- she was told that the cottage she stayed in while the courts decided her fate, was the only cottage that hadn't been named under the shelter's Adopt-a-Cottage-Program.

For $100,000 Nork could have her old cottage named after her, the manager said jokingly as the three toured the cottage. It took Nork and her husband little more than a quick glance at each other before they said they would make that donation.

A motorcycle accident three years ago in Arizona that took her life away twice -- she was pronounced dead at the scene and again at the hospital -- left Nork with permanent damage and a large settlement, part of which she chose to share with the place that gave her her first glimmer of hope.

"Being here was life," Nork said. "I never had it until I got here."

Nork's donation will go toward finishing a cottage for medically fragile children and another cottage for children with severe behavioral problems.

The overcrowded haven at 701 N. Pecos Road sees nearly 3,500 children a year. Its six cottages, capable of housing 80 children, ages infant to 17 years old, average 120 children on a daily basis, including more than 20 infants.

Because the shelter's $5.5 million annual operating budget doesn't cover the added costs, such as clothing for the children, cottage renovations and play areas, it relies on heavy donations, Peggy Leavitt, manager at Child Haven, said.

"It was a relief to know that Child Haven was here when I thought there was nobody," Nork said.

For some children, being placed at the shelter is a painful experience. For others, such as Nork, it's the first sense of peace they ever experience.

"Her favorite object to use was a belt," Nork said about her adoptive mother who used a partial handicap as her alibi when anyone questioned Nork's cuts and bruises.

"What they saw was a weak individual incapable of hurting anyone," Nork said. "As soon as we were in the house and the doors were shut, it was amazing how her strength would come back."

Nork's adoptive father, an alcoholic, would on many occasions physically protect her from her mother. But they divorced when she was 12.

At Child Haven, Nork said she realized she no longer needed to cover for her mother.

"They knew my story, and it was OK," she said. "Whatever I told Mary (Heine, Nork's case worker) she believed me."

"I felt, 'I have a life. I don't know what it's going to be, but I have a life.' "

Her stay at Child Haven ended after three months when she was placed in a foster home, a family friend of her mothers. Her father promised to take her in, but couldn't sober up for the court appearances. Nork went to three different foster homes -- the last one, three days before Christmas of her senior year in high school.

At 18 she was on her own. Unable to juggle school, a car payment and rent, Nork gave up the idea of college. She married a man she knew from high school, divorced him within a year and bounced back and forth from job to job before getting steady work as a manicurist. She met and married her husband, Gerry, in 1994, and they live in a home outside Phoenix.

The staff was delighted to see Nork again. She had them in tears Thursday -- some from laughter -- as she spoke at a staff recognition luncheon.

Her accident left her walking with a limp and her left arm no longer works (but she's trying to train it to hold a VISA card). She can't smell or taste, but she says she sees life as "a lot of little rainbows."