What Would It Look Like?

In a follow up question to what I would have done differently with Mike a reader asked what, practically, it would have looked like as she is facing the same decision.

Here are some things that I practically think I should have changed and what it would have looked like. I do not say “we” here, because Bart is much better at a lot of stuff than I am, and these were my issues, not his.

1) I would have talked a lot less (and a lot softer and a lot slower). I am a verbal processor and I talk a LOT. I am sure that by the time I finish a paragraph I start to sound like Charlie Brown’s teacher to Mike. When I rant, he gets NOTHING of it. I would have used a lower tone and talked slower. But, most of all, I wouldn’t have talked nearly as much. My words did nothing but make me feel better for having said them (and sometimes they didn’t even do that).

2) I would have done “time ins” instead of time outs. Mike spent a lot of time in his room as a younger child. When he was about 13 and finally diagnosed with FASD, I read something that said, “By the time a child with FASD gets up to their room, they forgot why they were sent there.” If I were to do it again, I would have had him spend more time with me instead of less, even though I would have had to have more breaks.

3) I would have started PCA services much earlier. Getting Mike out to do positive things when I could not take any more of his screaming (he is a rager) or his behavior would have been so healthy for him. Instead, as I said, he was in time out. He needed LOTS of time doing very active things (he loves extreme sports) but he could not be left unsupervised. I would have gotten someone, PCA, hired person, big brother or something to get him out getting him VERY tired, instead of forbidding him from leaving just because there was noone to supervise him.

4) I would have found more positive things to say. This is a fault I have with all my children and something I am trying to do better with. I would have caught them doing something right more often and praised the little things.

5) I would have, as I mentioned, taken my focus off the behavior and worked on the relationship -- making him feel more special with little things, not taking away things to attempt to correct him through consequences (because it just made him feel deprived), more time together, etc.

6) I think the bottom line is that if I would have known now what I know then, i could have let go of my desire to fix things. I would have been able to see that most of what he did was because he “couldn’t” not because he “wouldn’t”. Now that he is almost 18, I can certainly see that he is not intentionally doing a lot of what he does. His mind is scrambled and he really doesn’t get much of what is going on.

7) I would have resisted the urge to make connections for him and left his crazy, illogical stories alone, just sitting there in the air, instead of having a compulsion to “set the record straight.” I think I have mentioned this before.

8) I would have felt more pity and less anger. For the first few years it all seemed so personal -- as if he was taking it all out on me, that I was the target and he was always on my case. It seemed like he was disobeying just to show me. Now I realize that most of what he does is unintentional. For the last few years what we have said is, “If it is this hard to parent Mike, it must be much harder to be Mike.”

I think I’m starting to repeat my old post some, but I hope this helps. To generalize, I would have thrown all “normal” parenting out the window and would have tried creative things. Kari tells a story of a mom who sewed her sons pockets shut because he kept pilfering things. That’s the kind of stuff I’m talking about -- out of the box thinking that changes the environment instead of trying to change the kid.

Is any of this making sense?