boot camp report

Very very happy to report that after 5 days of detention we have seen the first flickering of remorse and a desire to comply. Whew.

Detention

It's Day 5 of Garbanzo's detention. The honeymoon is definitely over (did we have one?). We have had a horrific run of sneaky, duplicitous, destructive and sometimes mean behavior and have implemented a modified boot camp. Modified because Chickadee and I were not misbehaving and did not want to be deprived of our outings.

We talked to Garbanzo about trust. We talk a lot about trust. We talk about how at the detsky dom being sneaky and manipulative works as the care-givers and the children do not live in a circle of trust with one another. The care-givers keep the kids safe and fed (marginally) whether or not the care-givers and the children are in a circle of trust together. Trust really doesn't matter in an orphanage.

In a family, trust is everything. We live in a circle of trust and when someone lies, or steals, or is sneaky, the circle is broken and that person falls out of the circle. We draw pictures of a nice family of four inside a circle. Then we draw pictures of a broken circle with 3 people in and one out. We illustrate how this would apply if Mama and Papa lied to each other. Garbanzo agreed that it would be awful to live with one of the parents outside the circle.

Being out of the circle is a bad bad thing. Because he is not ready to be trusted to move around the house, he is confined to whatever room I am in -- and if I am busy -- to a throw rug in that room. Because he is not ready to be trusted to stay in his bed at night, he has lost his bedroom. He sleeps somewhere where we can easily spot-check him. Because he is not ready to be trusted to obey me on outings he takes his rug with him and sits as we do whatever we are doing (visiting friends or family or the lake).

We avoid saying "We can't trust you." as this can become a label. Instead we say, "We notice that you are having a hard time making the good choices with such-and-so and this tells us that you are not quite ready to be a boy that we can trust with this choice. When you are ready, we can try again."

So, Day 5 of being the warden. He is compliant, but not contrite. He does not get off his rug without permission, yet when I give him a wee task -- "Do A then B then C" -- he'll do D. There is a strong oppostional streak running. We are hoping that he'll apply it to the "not ready to be trusted" bit and say "Oh yeah? Just you see how trust-worthy I am!!"

This morning he is filling in his Trust Notebook. I got a binder and he is drawing pictures of all the things he is sure he is ready to be trusted with. We've talked about how these are promises he is making. If he messes up on one, he'll have to tear out the corresponding page and lose whatever bit of freedom went along with it.

So far his notebook says he is ready to be trusted to take out the garbage, feed the cats, have good table manners, tidy up the bunny area, and have books and shoes. I think what he has left out is as telling as what he has included. He did not include his bed, nor being out of the room from me. He included lots of chores, and very few behaviors.