Author Archives: carl

Beginning to Transform Our Parenting Style

Transform Parenthood – the beginning

In my last post, I shared the beginning stages of how we transform ourselves as parents. I also talk about the impetus behind the transformation. Like I stated in that post, making the decision to transform  your style as a parent is easy. Following thru is something else entirely.

Do What is Right, Not What is Easy.

Right for David is being the in the community with his peers. Public school. Mainstream classes.

It means trust where none existed before.

In addition it means that we need to be accepting of the fact that things will happen.

It means holding David accountable while basically ignoring the incident for a minimum of 24 hours, though 48 hours is better.

On his first day of school in the new district, David asked for an aide to support him. We told the school staff that there was a risk that he would steal a cell phone. David explained that an aide would help him stay on task and out of trouble. Initially it was denied.

While it may appear that we are letting David get away with whatever he wants to do, the reality is far different. What we do, if something happens, is diffuse his anxiety over being “punished”.  We basically call a timeout for the incident. This is only to prevent a build up of his anxiety  and by diffusing the situation, we then reduce the likelihood that he will erupt in violence or very negative behaviors that have accompanied past confrontations of any kind.

By removing as much anxiety and restricting the violent response he is able to calm himself. At the end of the “calming” period, we address what he might have done differently in a given situation. Because of the Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder, he has little to no executive function processing. As a result he has difficulty relating consequences of any kind to a specific behavior or incident.

Transform

An example. On March 20, David stole a cell phone. He lied about taking it. Then he denied it. Following the denial he shared what were for him intact memories around the event that didn’t actually happen. This false memory is called “confabulation“. Because of the confabulation, he was charged with theft. He was also charged with lying to law enforcement.

made that up

The punishment he received from the school was immediate. Out of school suspension. Because of the timing of the event, he had a weekend between the event and the punishment commencing. We used this time to distract him and decrease his anxiety.  Any compulsive behaviors we might have experienced had then been mitigated by the distraction.

For David, the suspension was a non-event.

Eventually we had court for the charges. David received six months of probation. Again, he was accepting of the punishment.

Fast forward two months later. It is now the end of the school year and his grades are in. The grade report is strong enough that he isn’t required to take finals. This opportunity to avoid finals was cancelled. In it mind it was no relation to the cell phone that he stole. It was and is entirely tied to his out of school suspension.  There is no correlation between the incident with the cell phone, and the out of school suspension. He simply doesn’t have the ability to tie the two together. For most people it is intuitive, for him it is part of the organic brain damage caused before he was born.

Punishment

So, what punishment did mom and I give him?

Do what is right. Not what is easy

None.

Mom and I decided that the punishment he had been given thru both the school and the courts was sufficient.  We actually followed thru with our plan to give him a cell phone. Something we had planned to do the Saturday immediately following the incident.  Sure we could have delayed, but why? We asked ourselves one simple question; “What would we have gained?”

Symptoms

The symptoms he displayed the day of the cell phone incident are part of his disability. On the day of the incident, once I calmed him down enough to be able to have a conversation with him and help him to understand the need to return the cell phone he gave up its location.

By assuring him that we had his back, and would stand behind him, we were able to decrease his anxiety. Which also decreased his “fight or flight” instinct. All of this allowed him to respond without becoming explosively violent.

We celebrated that!!!

More to come.

Houdini Part V. – a Six Year Update

Hard to believe it has been six years since I wrote the Houdini/Ronald McDonald posts. You can find the first in the series here.  By and large I have been living life. In fact, most of the last six years are documented within the pages of this site. There has been a lot of advocacy work. Learning new things, adapting our parenting style to our sons needs. But life does move on.

Houdini – aka the birth father

In the time that has passed, we have lost the birth father.  He died alone. There was no obituary. There was no funeral. It is a sad end to a life. Every life deserves to be celebrated. He was such a “bad” man that no one in the family even knew he died. He has been gone almost 18 months now, and I realize that I have no feelings one way or the other.

Thru the use of ancestry tools, I have tracked some of my bio siblings down. Well, not so much tracked, as that seems rather stalker-like. Let’s say we connected. Lost a couple of them to cancer. Discovered that the family genetics include abnormal liver function, which explains the abnormal liver panels I have had for most of my life. Beyond that, in regards to the birth family, there isn’t much else to say. I don’t have a picture of him, so will use the photo of Houdini instead.

The Uncle

The uncle that I wrote about, you know the one I helped put in jail. He was sick for most of the last five years. Pancreatic cancer because of Agent Orange. I spent as much time with him as I could the last months of his life. We were able to make amends, and apologize to each other for the things we did and didn’t do. It was healing. He passed on in November of 2017.

On being a grandparent

In December I became a grandfather for the first time. Cute little boy. I am not ready to share that part of life with anyone. He deserves as normal a life as he can have. But he is a cute little man who stole his grandpa’s heart.

Marriage and family

My wife and I are coming up on 24 years of marriage. Hard to believe, those two kids – a family. A life together.

I continue to be disabled. My body doesn’t cooperate for very long when I try to work, so I just do the advocacy work for the mental ill as much as I can.  It’s not much, but it helps me to feel useful. It’s not the same as an actual job, in some ways it is much more draining, much more rewarding and it gives me purpose.

Words of Wisdom

I don’t have any words of wisdom to share. Mom and I are working on a relationship, and for the most part, it is going very well. We understand that we need time away from contact, and that a good thing for us is the distance between our homes. We talk often. I see her when I can, in fact, Dad and I surprised her for her recent birthday by driving up and having lunch with her and my sisters family. It was a very nice visit and day.

Until next time. I hope you have a great day. Try to mend relationships with family when you can. It’s worth it.

Reblog: Speculation about the Florida Shooter is Divisive. – FASD – Learning with Hope

Adults with FASD and others are concerned media speculation perpetuates stigma.

via FASD – Not All News is Good News: Speculation about the Florida Shooter is Divisive — FASD: Learning with Hope