It was a bit of a taxing weekend. My allergies were acting up. I have had episodes of allergies in the past. Most every summer, I have a few days where I convince myself I am coming down with a cold and then “dodge a bullet”. When in reality it is seasonal allergies that are getting the better of me. About 5 years ago, I had such a rough time of it, I went in to see my physician and he prescribed pills (Claritin). That really did the trick – beat the soar throat and head-ache.
This would be the third week of suffering. I finally started taking Benadryl. It works, but also makes me so sleepy that I missed most of the weekend. All Sunday I just sat in my chair and watched Star Wars movies. I started on a Claritin regiment on Sunday. With luck this will help me through this rough patch and all will be better.
It happens to my wonderful wife as well. She gets hit (hard) by allergies, but mistakes them for an illness. She has Flonase for her symptoms. I just can’t do the whole nasal spray. First of all, if you have ever had the pleasure of being around Flonase, it smalls like wild flowers have vomited on a florists shop after drinking a bottle of perfume. It’s overwhelming to be near, let alone shoot it up your nose. I think I would vomit! I was so desperate for relief, I did consider trying it. I was stopped by the label telling me that it takes days to be effective.
I was going to bring the Benadryl to work today. I could have taken a couple of tabs when I got hear and spent the whole day in torpor. This would have been great, but I have a mountain of work that needs to be addressed. With luck I can get through a bunch of it today and tomorrow. I expect the pile to grow because I have meetings all tomorrow afternoon and most of the day Wednesday.
So I made a nice pastrami and cheese sandwich for lunch today. All last week I was pretty bad for budgeting and had nothing left over for saving. I consider it a successful week because I wasn’t over budget, but I really need to save a few bucks (so when the spending goblin comes over for lunch, I can pay for his soup). At any rate, I made a lunch for today as I fixed my breakfast. The thinking is if I can take lunch a few days this week it will really cut down on the $ hemorrhage. It was a nice sandwich. Spicy Jack mustard, Co-jack cheese, and pastrami made a nice sandwich. I bagged up some carrots and a few leaves of home grown lettuce and was set. I filled the thermos and loaded it all into my bag. Then I went to take a shower. Failing to close my bag, the little black puppy decided that the sandwich was too good. He ripped open the bag and ate it. I came down to nothing but dog slobber and plastic bag bits!
Didn’t have the energy or the time to make another one!
I guess the puppy wanted it more than I did. I generally take him into the bathroom when I shower, or let him run around outside, but not today. Either that I close my bag, or put it in a place where he would not be able to get to. All in all, it was a pretty bone head move.
This would be the third week of suffering. I finally started taking Benadryl. It works, but also makes me so sleepy that I missed most of the weekend. All Sunday I just sat in my chair and watched Star Wars movies. I started on a Claritin regiment on Sunday. With luck this will help me through this rough patch and all will be better.
It happens to my wonderful wife as well. She gets hit (hard) by allergies, but mistakes them for an illness. She has Flonase for her symptoms. I just can’t do the whole nasal spray. First of all, if you have ever had the pleasure of being around Flonase, it smalls like wild flowers have vomited on a florists shop after drinking a bottle of perfume. It’s overwhelming to be near, let alone shoot it up your nose. I think I would vomit! I was so desperate for relief, I did consider trying it. I was stopped by the label telling me that it takes days to be effective.
I was going to bring the Benadryl to work today. I could have taken a couple of tabs when I got hear and spent the whole day in torpor. This would have been great, but I have a mountain of work that needs to be addressed. With luck I can get through a bunch of it today and tomorrow. I expect the pile to grow because I have meetings all tomorrow afternoon and most of the day Wednesday.
So I made a nice pastrami and cheese sandwich for lunch today. All last week I was pretty bad for budgeting and had nothing left over for saving. I consider it a successful week because I wasn’t over budget, but I really need to save a few bucks (so when the spending goblin comes over for lunch, I can pay for his soup). At any rate, I made a lunch for today as I fixed my breakfast. The thinking is if I can take lunch a few days this week it will really cut down on the $ hemorrhage. It was a nice sandwich. Spicy Jack mustard, Co-jack cheese, and pastrami made a nice sandwich. I bagged up some carrots and a few leaves of home grown lettuce and was set. I filled the thermos and loaded it all into my bag. Then I went to take a shower. Failing to close my bag, the little black puppy decided that the sandwich was too good. He ripped open the bag and ate it. I came down to nothing but dog slobber and plastic bag bits!
Didn’t have the energy or the time to make another one!
I guess the puppy wanted it more than I did. I generally take him into the bathroom when I shower, or let him run around outside, but not today. Either that I close my bag, or put it in a place where he would not be able to get to. All in all, it was a pretty bone head move.
Psychology:
I was taking the kids to work over the weekend and was told by one of the boys that he thought it was fine to lie to everybody. He did not see a problem with lies as he “knows” everybody lies to him all the time. The perverted thought process is that because he lies to everybody, everybody must lie. He places no value in honest responses. Using people and manipulating people are necessary for him to survive and thus everybody does it to survive.
I try to deal with people honestly and generally I am successful. As an integrated and relatively functional member of society, I know that lies are part of life. What could be described as white lies are part of social grace. Additionally, I use lies to protect my kids and make life easier. As an adult I have the privilege, and the responsibility, to protect these kids; lies are sometimes the easiest method of protection.
The conclusion is that it is a matter of easy that I use lies with the kids.
I am wrestling with lying to this kid. It may be best to deal with him in only truth, but this opens the door to harsh reality. EXAMPLE: I am not willing to do XYZ because I don’t want to be around someone who is abusive. This creates a feedback of more abuse and deepens the cycle. If I am busy or tired, or have a million other reasons, then I don’t have to be battered with a billion reasons why his actions were perfectly justified and how I am so wrong.
Ok, so I just re-read what I wrote and it is pretty obvious that I am lying to him in order to avoid being abused by him. This is a perfect example of why I need to write many of these things down.
Lies for my own protection v. truth and abuse:
I am trying to predict the effects of total truth with this child. He is old enough, to where he should know better, but obviously is so damaged that he can’t yet grasp normal social interactions.
He is very abusive, but has a messed up construction of self-esteem. He begs and fishes for positive feedback. This is frequent when he cooks or bakes. It was when he would do house work or chores, but the feedback was usually pretty poor.
This created a problem of positive feedback for a poor job, thus repeating the poor job.
This child is vengeful and nasty. We need every tool to manage his behaviors. He is a huge problem in simply existing. (I blame his mother).
Over the past few days he has been trying a new tactic with my wife. He is trying to be extra nice to her, but then is hitting her up for immediate consequences. He offer to help, but then asks for something. She sees right through it and has called him out on every occurrence. This just starts the fight cycle. It quickly degrades into negative reinforcement for his “nicer” (and I use that term loosely) behaviors.
Psychology:
I see him as turning into an Anti-Social Personality Disorder. The question I am wrestling with is if he is past redemption. Is he a lost cause?
I know that on the present course he is a goner. He is not getting mental health services that will impact him. No offense to his individual counselor, but I doubt the sessions are anything other than stonewalling and manipulation. I pity his counselor; he must forced into a constant exercise of anti-manipulation. This kids likes to cheat. The rules of life are his favorite target. Let’s take his issues with driving. He is in foster care and the agencies involved do not allow children to get their drivers license. There are a number of reasons, but the end result is a big fat NO. Well, he wanted to take Driver Ed. over the summer. I was willing to pay for half of the class ($200 total) and thought that is was education that would serve him well later (like when he turns 18 and can get a license). We talked many times about the fact that he would not be able to get his license until he was 18, and that he would not be able to practice drive unless he was with his mother. This is one of the ways the agencies try to get 16 year old kids to spend time with parents. As Bush (sr) says “Not gonna happen”. Well he worked the rules around in his head and convinced his brother to “sponsor” him. This would be perfectly legal, but for the agencies rules. So when this topic came up, he informed me that he would be driving with his brother. I explained that he was endangering visitation with his brother, as the agencies could and would disallow contact with his brother. He retorted with the idea that he was given permission by the court to see his brother, and thus interpreted it as a right to contact. When I explained the error in his interpretation he simply said that “it will happen” (he will drive with his brother). At this point I realized that I was not going to correct his faulty thinking (based on lots of experience in this area), but instead of just dropping the subject I asked him if jeopardizing his contact with his brother (sister-in-law and niece and nephew) was worth the drive. He said “yes, as they [the agencies] won’t be able to stop me”. He was already scheming up a pack of lies to try and manipulate the situation and get what he wanted.
I have tried to roll back many of our conversations to a level where he is unable to use most of his tactics. I keep beating him over the head with a question until he answers. I use the broken record technique to just keep hitting him with a question. I refuse to engage in other talks until the question is answered, and I try and resist biting on any abusive or antagonistic behaviors.
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I was taking the kids to work over the weekend and was told by one of the boys that he thought it was fine to lie to everybody. He did not see a problem with lies as he “knows” everybody lies to him all the time. The perverted thought process is that because he lies to everybody, everybody must lie. He places no value in honest responses. Using people and manipulating people are necessary for him to survive and thus everybody does it to survive.
I try to deal with people honestly and generally I am successful. As an integrated and relatively functional member of society, I know that lies are part of life. What could be described as white lies are part of social grace. Additionally, I use lies to protect my kids and make life easier. As an adult I have the privilege, and the responsibility, to protect these kids; lies are sometimes the easiest method of protection.
The conclusion is that it is a matter of easy that I use lies with the kids.
I am wrestling with lying to this kid. It may be best to deal with him in only truth, but this opens the door to harsh reality. EXAMPLE: I am not willing to do XYZ because I don’t want to be around someone who is abusive. This creates a feedback of more abuse and deepens the cycle. If I am busy or tired, or have a million other reasons, then I don’t have to be battered with a billion reasons why his actions were perfectly justified and how I am so wrong.
Ok, so I just re-read what I wrote and it is pretty obvious that I am lying to him in order to avoid being abused by him. This is a perfect example of why I need to write many of these things down.
Lies for my own protection v. truth and abuse:
I am trying to predict the effects of total truth with this child. He is old enough, to where he should know better, but obviously is so damaged that he can’t yet grasp normal social interactions.
He is very abusive, but has a messed up construction of self-esteem. He begs and fishes for positive feedback. This is frequent when he cooks or bakes. It was when he would do house work or chores, but the feedback was usually pretty poor.
This created a problem of positive feedback for a poor job, thus repeating the poor job.
This child is vengeful and nasty. We need every tool to manage his behaviors. He is a huge problem in simply existing. (I blame his mother).
Over the past few days he has been trying a new tactic with my wife. He is trying to be extra nice to her, but then is hitting her up for immediate consequences. He offer to help, but then asks for something. She sees right through it and has called him out on every occurrence. This just starts the fight cycle. It quickly degrades into negative reinforcement for his “nicer” (and I use that term loosely) behaviors.
Psychology:
I see him as turning into an Anti-Social Personality Disorder. The question I am wrestling with is if he is past redemption. Is he a lost cause?
I know that on the present course he is a goner. He is not getting mental health services that will impact him. No offense to his individual counselor, but I doubt the sessions are anything other than stonewalling and manipulation. I pity his counselor; he must forced into a constant exercise of anti-manipulation. This kids likes to cheat. The rules of life are his favorite target. Let’s take his issues with driving. He is in foster care and the agencies involved do not allow children to get their drivers license. There are a number of reasons, but the end result is a big fat NO. Well, he wanted to take Driver Ed. over the summer. I was willing to pay for half of the class ($200 total) and thought that is was education that would serve him well later (like when he turns 18 and can get a license). We talked many times about the fact that he would not be able to get his license until he was 18, and that he would not be able to practice drive unless he was with his mother. This is one of the ways the agencies try to get 16 year old kids to spend time with parents. As Bush (sr) says “Not gonna happen”. Well he worked the rules around in his head and convinced his brother to “sponsor” him. This would be perfectly legal, but for the agencies rules. So when this topic came up, he informed me that he would be driving with his brother. I explained that he was endangering visitation with his brother, as the agencies could and would disallow contact with his brother. He retorted with the idea that he was given permission by the court to see his brother, and thus interpreted it as a right to contact. When I explained the error in his interpretation he simply said that “it will happen” (he will drive with his brother). At this point I realized that I was not going to correct his faulty thinking (based on lots of experience in this area), but instead of just dropping the subject I asked him if jeopardizing his contact with his brother (sister-in-law and niece and nephew) was worth the drive. He said “yes, as they [the agencies] won’t be able to stop me”. He was already scheming up a pack of lies to try and manipulate the situation and get what he wanted.
I have tried to roll back many of our conversations to a level where he is unable to use most of his tactics. I keep beating him over the head with a question until he answers. I use the broken record technique to just keep hitting him with a question. I refuse to engage in other talks until the question is answered, and I try and resist biting on any abusive or antagonistic behaviors.
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Antisocial personality disorder is defined as, a pervasive pattern of disregard for and violation of the rights of others occurring since age 15, as indicated by three (or more) of the following:
Failure to conform to social norms with respect to lawful behaviors as indicated by repeatedly performing acts that are grounds for arrest
Deceitfulness, as indicated by repeated lying, use of aliases, or conning others for personal profit or pleasure
Impulsivity or failure to plan ahead
Irritability and aggressiveness, as indicated by repeated physical fights or assaults
Reckless disregard for safety of self or others
Consistent irresponsibility, as indicated by repeated failure to sustain steady work or honor financial obligations
Lack of remorse, as indicated by being indifferent to or rationalizing having hurt, mistreated, or stolen from another
DSM-IV-TR lists the following additional necessary criteria:
The individual is at least 18 years of age.
There is evidence of conduct disorder with onset before age 15 years.
The occurrence of antisocial behavior is not exclusively during the course of schizophrenia or a manic episode.
Common characteristics of people with antisocial personality disorder include:
Persistent lying or stealing
Recurring difficulties with the law
Tendency to violate the rights of others (property, physical, sexual, emotional, legal)
Aggressive, often violent behavior; prone to getting involved in fights
Inability to keep a job
A persistent agitated or depressed feeling (dysphoria)
Inability to tolerate boredom
Disregard for the safety of self or others
A childhood diagnosis of conduct disorders
Lack of remorse for hurting others
Superficial charm
Impulsiveness
A sense of extreme entitlement
Inability to make or keep friends
Lack of guilt
Recklessness, impulsivity
Failure to conform to social norms with respect to lawful behaviors as indicated by repeatedly performing acts that are grounds for arrest
Deceitfulness, as indicated by repeated lying, use of aliases, or conning others for personal profit or pleasure
Impulsivity or failure to plan ahead
Irritability and aggressiveness, as indicated by repeated physical fights or assaults
Reckless disregard for safety of self or others
Consistent irresponsibility, as indicated by repeated failure to sustain steady work or honor financial obligations
Lack of remorse, as indicated by being indifferent to or rationalizing having hurt, mistreated, or stolen from another
DSM-IV-TR lists the following additional necessary criteria:
The individual is at least 18 years of age.
There is evidence of conduct disorder with onset before age 15 years.
The occurrence of antisocial behavior is not exclusively during the course of schizophrenia or a manic episode.
Common characteristics of people with antisocial personality disorder include:
Persistent lying or stealing
Recurring difficulties with the law
Tendency to violate the rights of others (property, physical, sexual, emotional, legal)
Aggressive, often violent behavior; prone to getting involved in fights
Inability to keep a job
A persistent agitated or depressed feeling (dysphoria)
Inability to tolerate boredom
Disregard for the safety of self or others
A childhood diagnosis of conduct disorders
Lack of remorse for hurting others
Superficial charm
Impulsiveness
A sense of extreme entitlement
Inability to make or keep friends
Lack of guilt
Recklessness, impulsivity
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