Fighting for Answers | Author Archives | Page 75David's Father, Author at Fighting for Answers

It’s your fault Dad for not helping me be honest

David said “It’s your fault dad, for not helping me be honest.” And he still claims he is innocent, and the mentor is lying. About what? Yeah, I guess that would be helpful to know. When David got home last night from his mentor time, he had a basketball. Said that the mentor let him buy it with his flex funds. (Typically, by the end of the month the flex funds are gone.) At any rate, David said that the ball cost 70 dollars. So I confirmed all of this with the Mentor Coordinator who followed up with the mentor. David has mentors two times a week. Yesterday he was with his mentor at the YMCA. Toward the end of their time together, David said he was hungry and demanded to go to McDonalds. The mentor refused. They had already spent the day’s allotted funds on food. So David took

Celebrate the good. Sometimes, he is what I imagine a 13 year old boy is like

Today was by all accounts, a good day. David had a reasonably good day at school. No refocuses. No notes about talking back or being disruptive (more than usual) in class. So I count today as a success. I told him so. He says all he ever hears is what he isn’t supposed to do. So I kept track. And he is right. So I am trying to change my thinking to what he can do. It won’t be an easy transition, but will try. It is refreshing to say yes, within these limits, rather than saying no. no. no. He still has limits, and he knows that we will enforce the limits, but I think it allows him to experience a small measure of freedom. Or at least the illusion of it. ====Update==== I gave him prescribed boundaries where he could ride his bike. Hour later, and no David.

Brown, Gray, Martin and others

What do each of these names have in common? Brown. Gray. Martin. Grant. Not only was someone killed. Rioters proceeded to destroy the very communities that they claimed they wanted to protect. Why burn down a senior center that was under construction? What did the seniors in the community do to deserve that? How does destroying the property of a third person ensure that the victim will be remembered? How does it bring justice? It is a travesty. All the way around, from the killing of the initial victim/perpetrator/drug user/killer to the attacks on law enforcement, the attacks on innocent people who are in no way affiliated with the violent act that caused people to decide to riot. In Ferguson, reports indicate that agitators who didn’t even have ties to the community helped incite the violence. What will Baltimore show? In one example, looters broke through the roof of a