stealing, again, and again

Garbanzo has an uncle that has invested a lot of time and energy in setting Garbanzo up with a mowing gig, mowing for both the uncle and the uncle's neighbor. We'll call him Uncle McGivor. Uncle McGivor's knife turned up under the bed that Garbanzo sleeps in over at his grandparents' house. That is, the bed he USED to sleep under, before he was banished from their house for stealing from grandma's jewelry box and lying about it.

What does one do with a child with such poor impulse control, such unreliable morals, that he steals from the his relatives? In a way, you could say that we have given up. Not that we don't care or that I don't lay awake at night worrying about his future, but that we have given up the idea that we have any control over this. I am powerless over my son's stealing. We tell him he has to chose what kind of man he wants to be, and that with choices come consequences. I'm still waiting to hear what consequences Uncle McGivor has in store for him. I would think he will be fired.

Sugar

We've noticed with Garbonzo a strong correlation between the consumption of sugar and the increase of impulsive behaviors. For this reason, we closely monitor his sugar intake. After he's had sugar, he needs closer supervision and simpler tasks. We try to time the sugar intake for times where those accommodations can be made.

And when I mean impulsivity, I don't mean blurting out, or flickering lights, I mean pilfering and stealing. Those impulses are an issue for him even without sugar, but on sugar it's much much worse. 

We have relations that get this.  They've changed their sugaring and even they can see how that improves his behavior.

We also have relations that don't quite get this. We had hoped that they might honor the sugar restrictions just because we asked them to, but that's not really happening.   I think they honestly don't get it and are just trying to be nice to the poor deprived child, When Garbanzo spends time with them, they give him snack baggies full of chocolate chips and sodas and so forth.

This is a two-pronged problem: 

1.) Authority is Disposable if You Don't Agree with It.

The greater problem is that he sees them disregard his parents' wishes because they disagree and he takes it as license to do the same. This is HUGE as it may take weeks or months to re-establish the notion that our authority is not disposable.

It's the same thing we see after he comes home from camp. At camp, things are done differently.  Mom and Dad's ways are irrelevant at camp.  That's fine.  It's camp.  But the week after camp it is so hard for Garbanzo to re-enter the family that we ALWAYS take the week after camp to go family camping.  We are together, Dad is with us, every little twinge of blowing off authority is squashed immediately.  And there are so many fun things to do, so many pleasures around, that it isn't worth his while to maintain insolence.  But we can't go on a family camping trip every time he spends time with his Sugary Relations.  And thus far, we haven't found a manageable reset mechanism.

2.) Lack of Disclosure.

The other problem is that they tend to sugar him up at the end of the visit and then not tell me, so it has taken me awhile to figure out that after spending time with them, he needs a different sort of day.  If this was the only thing, I could live with it.  But the authority issue is trashing our home life.

a tsunami of stealing and lying and sneaking

Today he opened up the boxes containing the personal items of his late Uncle.  Seeing stuff he liked, he took it.  Confronted, he lied.

He also used a key he had previously stolen and stashed to access and pilfer from an off-limits area.

Yesterday he entered our bedroom and took out books that were off-limits.  Apparently he's been tucking in there for awhile stealing his sister's Easter chocolate which was there for safe-keeping.

Over the weekend we visited relatives and he snuck home unauthorized books* from their home. 

And the pocket knives.  Our house is chockful of other people's pocket knives.

Shoplifting is old news.  He is utterly unfazed by having to return the item and confess.  And to my knowledge he has never resisted the temptation.  That is, there has been no time that I let him go into a store without me and he didn't shoplift.

And the inappropriate computer use, both using it to look up sexy stuff and cheating on his schoolwork.  He'll convince his relations that he needs the computer for his schoolwork and then use it to google the wrong things.  And If there is the remotest possible way to cheat on his schoolwork he will find it and do it. I've spent the last two days installing spyware on the computers.

• RealTime Spy for PC
• RealTime Spy for Mac

The core problem is that he flat refuses to live under our authority.  We've talked and talked and talked about it but it comes down to "If you want to live in our home, you need to live under our authority."  Over and over again he has shown us that if he doesn't agree with our expectation, he will just ignore it, and when confronted he will lie, blame us, blame sister, whatever.

He won't comply, so we gave him a sleeping bag and a tarp and he is living in the barn.  I set out food for him and bring him in for a shower and clean clothes and sent him back out.  Horrible, I know.  Heart-breaking.   What else are we to do?  

Consequences matter NOTHING to him.  They are just more challenges from him to try to get around.  Expectations are merely an opportunity for tricksy stuff (can he side-step the expectation and get away with it?)

Every moment of every day is consumed with monitoring him. Taking a shower is a carefully timed event.  He is bright, REALLY bright, and strategic.  Any moment that I am distracted is his opportunity to do whatever he is plotting.  A phone call.  A trip to the loo.  A shower.  But, if he is living in the barn, at least the inside of the home can be a bit normal.

Ha! I'm calling locking my beloved son out of the house normal.  But his obsession with deception is unmanageable. If he were a boyfriend, we'd call this a codependent relationship (because my life revolves around his problems) and we'd get out of the relationship.


We are miserable and heart-broken and angry and scared.  How do we get through the next few years? and what will become of him?



*There is nothing wrong with the books he is sneaking (The Percy Jackson books) for a non-damaged kid, but they are not okay for him.  The basic story line revolves around a clever and self-sufficient young man whose mother loves him, but is not too bright, easily duped, and completely superfluous to his life.  The fate of the world hangs on his shoulders, and the adults in the story are usually wrong.  He has to trick and deceive them in order to get things to unfold in accordance to his superior insight and intelligence.   No.  Garbanzo does not need to read these.

stealing and lying

We seem to be making no progress at all.  He steals from stores.  From family members.  From us.  And he lies so easily.

I am so discouraged.

landmines

It's not just the little jars of pee, actually weird bathroom stuff I could handle. It's the lies. Garbanzo leaves landmines all over the house. We can be having a perfectly lovely day and he will report that he has done something, or not done something, or whatever and then, as I walk through the house I see that exact opposite; I see a little lie landmine awaiting me. And this happens multiple times a day. It wears me out. It drains my love-tank. After days and days of this I have no lovey feelings left.

The cure? Keep him so supervised that he has no opportunity to lie, because he is never away from us. Basically keep him within 10 feet of me all day long.

Oh joy. Constant exposure to the one person I don't want to spend time with.

I'm griping. I don't want encouragement. I want support. Just so you know.

And please oh please don't explain to me why he is this way. I get it. I know why he is this way. Knowing why and living with it are two different things. It's the latter that I am struggling with.

to post or not to post? that is the question

This was written mid-November and I have been equivocating about posting it ever since then. Obviously I decided to post it.

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We've had quite a trying two weeks with Young Garbanzo. I've been debating if I should post or not, as it seems a little odd to broadcast one's son's troubles, on the other hand, other families with children adopted at older ages may be able to advise or console me. Or at least we can say to each other, "what, you too?"

Here is what we have had in just the last two weeks.

He was asked to leave music class -- too disruptive.
He forged our sign-off on his homework.
He cheated on his spelling test.
He was asked to leave art class -- too disruptive.
He was sent to the principal's office twice, once for poking a classmate in the bum with a pencil, and I forgot what the other one was.
I personally pulled him off a schoolmate upon whom he had a choke-hold.
He has lied nearly everyday.
He has stolen his sister's money.

And you know what? If you met him you would be totally impressed with what good manners he has, what a charming and sweet boy he is. And he is! He is a great kid, except for when he isn't, then he really isn't. I guess I should give him credit for being thorough.

As much as the disruptive behavior must annoy his teacher, it's the keeping his hands to himself issue and the integrity issue that really worry me.

He comes by ALL his issues honestly. We completely understand why he is the way he is. This does not, however, inject us with renewed energy to deal with him. Unlimited commitment? Yes. But we are indeed weary.

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