Shoplifting

Garbanzo is stealing again.  Just little things, mostly sweeties, that he pockets in the stores.  So distressing.  We always make him go back to the store and confess and then do work for them to pay them back.  This doesn't seem to deter him at all, but I don't know what else to do.  What do you advise?

The Scullery Maid

I have it on good authority that my name, The Scullery Maid, sounds too self-pitying.  I am accepting nominations for alternate names.

is it working?

My MIL called to ask, "Is it working? Being mean to her?"  Not that I am being mean to her on a regular basis, just the one-time here's-what-it-looks-like-to-be-around-you demonstration.

Yes, I would have to say it has.  Between that and the calm two swats, repeated as necessary, Tater has had a total of ONE temper tantrum since Monday.  One.  We have had some fusses, yes, but no raging.  Three rage-free days in a row is a record here.  So yes, I would have to say it is working.

The S-word

So, Tater's behavior is progressively worse: this year is worse than last, last year was worse than the one before.  It's the kind of behavior that if we saw some other kid doing it we would furrow our brows and say, "That kid needs a spanking."  I know. I know.  I just uttered the unspeakable word.  When you have recovered, read on.

Our guiding book Transforming the Difficult Child (which does not advocate spanking) recommends that we acknowledge that all emotional reactions from parents are -- from a kid's perspective -- pay-offs.  Negative or positive, they are the desired response. 

We especially see this when I am doing anything that precludes giving Tater my attention.  She would like to have non-stop undivided attention.  If I am not available for positive attention, she will deliberately trigger negative attention.  Literally, it will go like this:

Me: Tater, I am not available for 20 minutes.  If you interrupt me, you will have to wait on your bed.
(20 seconds pass -- she interrupts.)
Me: Okay, time to wait on your bed.
Tater: NOOooo, I don't want to. (Screams, rages, won't go to her bed, throws things, screams that she hates me and that when she grows up she will come back and stomp on my stomach.)  Pretty much does whatever she can think of that will get me to physically move her to her bed and/or return to the room she is in.  When the mean screaming doesn't work, she will sob that she needs a snuggle.

Oh, she needs a snuggle. I'm supposed to deliver that right?  No!  I used to, but I've smartened up.  Look at this from her point of view.

Mom says she is not available.  If I act up, I'll be sent to sit on my bed but if I don't go, she'll have to take me (attention) and if I scream something loud enough or long enough or mean enough she'll come close my door and windows (attention) and when I stop screaming she'll pop in all smiley that I stopped screaming and I'll get a long snuggle and I'll have her attention.

And this is pretty much wrecking my life. I can't stand the screaming 2-4 times a day, an hour at a time.  I can't keep my cool, so even if I am calm and neutral with her, the anxiety emanating off of me for the next several hours is a tremendous pay-off for her.  How powerful she must be to jangle her adult so thoroughly.

And how can we sparkle and dote upon her for compliance when there isn't any?  For this, sparkling and doting, is (according to our book) the path to happiness: help her see herself as someone who can be pleasing.

This morning:

Tater comes in all scowling and snarling because she doesn't like part of the day's plan.
Me: Please leave my room.  You may come back when you can be pleasant.
(You need to know that our bedroom is the long-established safe house for adults and pets.  The children may be in there by permission and at our discretion.  I have to have somewhere to cool off.)
Tater huffs out in an indignant and surly manner.
Me: Please go sit on your bed.
Tater objects and back-talks and argues.
Me: Tater, I cannot allow you to behave in such an ugly manner.  Please come in and get your spanking. (Now, before you think this is so harsh, remember that past experience causes me to believe that her screaming will escalate into a huge drawn-out long ordeal and my goal for the day is to take the kids swimming with their cousins.)
I give her two swats in a very calm neutral manner.
Me: Please go upstairs quietly and sit on your bed.

Tater screams.
Me: Tater, I cannot allow you to behave in such an ugly manner.  Please come in and get your spanking.
I give her two swats in a very calm neutral manner.
Me: Please go upstairs quietly and sit on your bed.

Tater: Stomps and kicks and scowls.
Me: Tater, I cannot allow you to behave in such an ugly manner. Please come in and get your spanking.
I give her two swats in a very calm neutral manner.
Me: Please go upstairs quietly and sit on your bed.

Tater goes upstairs quietly and sits on her bed.

Twenty minutes pass.  Nothing is thrown.  No mean words are shouted.  It is amazing.  Garbanzo is amazed.  I am amazed.

I call her down. I lavish her with praise and admiration for using her strength (she likes power, remember?) to go upstairs quietly and to sit on her bed.  I do a silly happy dance.  She giggles.  I hug her. Garbanzo high-fives her.  I lighten an unpleasant obligation that she is carrying for the day.  We eat breakfast together.  Life is good.

I know the spankings are so questionable.  I question them.  But in this instance, they were able to derail the Tantrum Train, so she could experience what it might be like to obey and please Mama and received positive energy and have a nice day.

I like the train analogy.  If she is on a speeding run-away out-of-control train heading for wreck, and I can shove her off the train, I'll do it.

Right now she is pleasant and helpful and singing.

the one more

What do you do about this pattern?

Parent: Don't do xyz.
Child does one more xyz and shoots a saucy look.

Tater does this every time.  EVERY TIME.

and what I did about it

Okay, here is what I did. If you think I am a dreadful mother you may be right. Please let me know and also let me know what time you will pick the kids up for a stay at your house. I'll have them all packed. Bring them back in a month and I'll make tea and you can tell me all about how horrible I am.

So, I analyzed Tater's tantrums. They pretty much include these elements:

• say as many mean things as you can think off.
• take whatever yucky feeling you have in your heart and spread it around on as many people as possible.
• completely ignore other people's requests to modify the behavior.
• in fact, use those requests as a trigger to escalate the behavior.
• get completely absorbed in yucky feelings and try to make other people get involved in them.
• be really mean and scream at other people when they come near.
• ruin meals, mornings, outings, whatever, by acting out whenever the feeling strikes.

Well it just so happened that I had a whole boat-load of yucky feelings on hand.  So out-the-blue I just started being really mean.  Really mean.  Hard looks and hard voices and hard words.  I didn't say every mean thing I could think of, but I said mean things.  I made a point of making everyone around me miserable.  I shouted at Garbanzo when he solicitously asked me what was wrong.  I stomped around grumbling about how ill-treated I was and how unfair everything was. (Now I have done this before as role-plays and they knew I was role-playing and giggled. No giggling this time.)  When they crossed paths with me I groused louder and with a more ferocious looks and harsher words.

Basically I scared the socks off them.

And then I asked Tater if my behavior was appropriate.  No.
Was my behavior selfish? Yes.
I was having big yucky feelings and making sure that everyone else in the house felt as yucky as I did, was this okay? No.
I might feel this way 3-5 times a day and I was going to handle it this way each time. Please don't.
Why not? It's not right.

Yes, Tater, I agree. It's not right.  It's not right if I am 46 and it's not right if I am 9.

And then I went and apologized to Garbanzo.

I just asked her to write down what she learned this morning.  She wrote:

I lund that I should not have fits and if I bo then Mom will be lick me.
I learned that I should not have fits and if I do then Mom will be like me.

I thought it interesting how quickly she recognized who I was copying.

how is it going, really?

I am defeated. I wake up in the morning DREADING seeing my children. Tater's rages and defiance and horribleness makes planning for anything pleasant or lovely a waste of time.

I'm turning into a cold person. I hear so much sobbing and wailing on a daily basis that even when it is legitimate, I don't care. I have nothing left to give. I just want to run away.

We rarely make it to breakfast without a confrontation that includes at least an hour of her screaming how much she hates me.

And I am supposed to be the grown-up here. I'm supposed to maintain the Deborah Gray attitude of gentle, attentive, curious, kind and so on. I fail. I am not gentle or attentive. My current posture is defensive.

Code Names

I'm searching for new code names for the kids. I'd like them to be soupy themed. Any ideas? My going idea is Mac for him and Cheese for her. I've settled on Garbanzo and Tater.

so much to say

I think a great part of my unhappiness has been not being able to talk on this blog. I couldn't tell you about the fire-setting. I couldn't share about ALL the lying and the stealing and the rest.

A family of home-schoolers moved in up the street with kids the age of my kids, so I began to worry about the local community having too much information about my kids.  But keeping it all in has really dragged me down. I need you guys.

I'm moving the TMI posts over from the old blog, so don't be surprised if it looks like reruns here.  I'm deleting them from there.

how many hours before I need something do I have to start being nice?

Garbanzo's behavior was dreadful this morning, just plain awful.  At some point his sister asked me if we were going anywhere today.

Me: No.
Tater: I thought Garbanzo had Basketball.
Me: Well, we not going.
Garbanzo: (bursting in): That's not fair.
Me: What do you mean?
Garbanzo: Yeah, I know I'm being bad, but I was planning on turning it around in time to go.
Me: Well it doesn't work like that.
Garbanzo: Why not?
Me: You can't treat people badly and then shape up when you need something from them.  That's using people. It's not okay.
Garbanzo: Well, what time should I have started then?
Me: Started what?
Garbanzo: Being good.
Me: Well, when you got out of bed would have been a good time.
Garbanzo: No, I mean, how many hours before I need something do I have to start being nice?

follow up

So, Garbanzo got up this morning and said that he didn't like living in my orphanage and that he would rather live in a home. So we talked about the differences in how family members treat each other and in how orphanage staff and residents treat each other. He could easily list off observable behavior that a mommy would do and that a care-giver would not do. He could not as easily list how a child with parents would behave differently from a child with care-givers, so we made a list. Now when I see him start down the wrong path, I can hand him the list and he can see where he is headed.

Behavior of a child with parents that he respects and appreciates and wants to be close to:
· Do good work all the way (do the whole job, the right way, the first time).
· Trust Mama and Papa’s decisions (don’t argue or contradict).
· Be trust-worthy (tell only real words, leave other peoples’ things alone).
· Wear a pleasant face.
· Obey.
· Respect adult conversation (stay out of it).
· Do your chores independently.

Behavior of a child with temporary caregivers that don’t really care about him and that he doesn’t really care about:
· Push into adult conversation.
· Contradict the adults.
· Give the adults advice that they don’t want or need.
· Manage the adult’s tasks, responsibilities, things, etc.
· Say “I will” but do a poor job or don’t do it.
· When an adult asked you do to a job, pretend that the adult asked you for a smaller job and do only that.
· Change or cancel adult instructions.
· Sulk.
· Argue.
· Yell at them.
· Storm off.
· Sneak.
· Disobey.
· Grumble.
· Snoop through their stuff.
· Take what you want.
· Plan ahead for the naughty thing you want to do the next time the adults aren’t around.
· If one says ‘no’ ask another adult.
· Bully and boss the other children around.
· Damage things on purpose.

limitations

You know, if my child had no legs, people would not come up to me and extol the virtues of running and how beneficial it would be to him and question why I won't let him do this normal lovely activity, why I won't let him be normal.  They would see that my child could not do this normal thing and that it wasn't because I wouldn't let him, but because there is some intrinsic limitation built into the way the child is made.

Yet, I get this all the time from well-meaning relatives: when are you going to let him got to school? when are you going to let him do this and that? wouldn't it be fun for him if he could . . . ?  But no, he doesn't get to to all that because his mean old mother arbitrarily says 'no'.


What if he doesn't get to do all that because he unravels when we try things like that? What if he doesn't get to do that because he is opportunistically sneaky and we have to keep an eye on him all the time? What if he doesn't get to do all that because even one week of sleep-away camp set us back about 9 months to a year in attachment? What if the reason his life is limited and not normal is not actually my fault?  What if I am constantly trying to expand his world and running into the clear message that he can't handle it yet?




What if I am grieving all the things my child doesn't get to do and be and experience and you walk up and extol the virtues of running to me?







Yes, some of my relatives read this, and yes, I am responding to something you said or did.  Be at peace though; I know your one suggestion was well-intended and seemed reasonable to you.  And if your suggestion was the only one, I wouldn't be reacting, but I am carrying a large basket of friendly suggestions that are all clearly oblivious to the fact that all those good things you want for our son, we want too.  All those desires that you spend 20 minutes on? We spend hours on.  We weep over them.  We grieve.


We are not, however, the source of his limitations.  We are the repair squad.  It's a yucky job and we are doing our best.  You can help us by stopping with the assumptions that if we would just get out of his way he could be a typical kid.  We are doing all we can to help him get to be a happy kid, but there are a lot of obstacles -- most of which you know nothing about -- none of which did we put into place.

"If you don't like my orphanage," I say, "don't live in it."

Two weeks ago, Garbanzo went to sleep-away camp.  He came back in what we call orphanage mode.  In orphanage mode, adults are obstacles to be worked around or resources to be manipulated.  Maintaining relationships is a silly waste of time as is establishing and preserving trust.  In orphanage-mode, a child presents surface compliance and sneaks and steals and disobeys as soon as the adult is not looking.  And why not?  The orphanage adults are paid staff members -- their real lives happen when they are off shift; how would it benefit a child to be genuine with these transitory care-providers?  It doesn't matter if a child tricks them or sneaks things from their private areas or says 'yes I will' and then promptly doesn't.  It doesn't matter because the child's food will keep arriving at the same time, their activity routines will be unaltered (because keeping a child from a group activity means supplying a staff member to supervise them -- easier to just let it go).  Sure, they'll get a scolding, but that is a temporary annoyance.

(As an aside, people -- especially my Dad -- remark on how well my children handle scoldings.  This is not a good thing.  They endure it as they would a cloud of gnats: annoying, but only on the surface -- and forgotten once the gnats leave.)

Okay, so Garbanzo is in orphanage mode.  His behavior is defiant and willful and demanding and bossy and contradictory and deceitful and tricksy and mean and dismissive and pretty much dreadful to be around.  He is in a mode where he will do what he wants and does not care if we say "no" or if we have asked him to do something else.  He is treating us as disposable relationships.  He can't manipulate us into doing as he wishes, so he has dismissed us.  We exist to feed him and drive him around.

Not!

We keep trying to impose the family model on him and he will have nothing to do with it.  He smirks and gives lip service and then goes right back to his yucky ways.

So, for today, he wins.  For today, this is Suzanne's Orphanage. The staff member is grouchy as she doesn't like/didn't want this job.  The food is so-so as the cook is in a bad mood.  The activities are all chores as the activity director is also grouchy.  There is a lot of sitting-on-the-stairs-waiting-for-a-supervisor time.  It's a very boring drab life in this orphanage.

He complains.  He doesn't like this orphanage.  He liked the last one better.  Yeah, well, orphanages vary.  He doesn't like the food (unsweetened hot oatmeal).  He doesn't like the activities (stacking wood).  He doesn't like the matter-of-fact interactions with me, the staff member.  He doesn't like it here.

"If you don't like my orphanage," I say, "don't live in it."


-----------

And before you all post asking me if he knows what his options are, yes, he does. We made a long list of how orphanage relationships are different from family relationships and he could recognize which one he has been living and we talked about how I've been trying for the last two weeks to live in the Family Way and he is rejecting it and that I can't MAKE him make a better choice but that I can choose what I do, and what I choose is to stop wrestling with him over it.