She Is Not a Duck, Part 10

A Mother’s Journey into the world of Mental Health and Spectrum Disorder Challenges

She walks like a duck, talks like a duck, but she is not a duck.

Chapter 9 Advocating for All of the Sarahs

With no forewarning, tears burst from my eyes and I had lost complete control to stop them.

Everything in the room, papers, pens, conversations, came to a screeching halt.

Respectfully waiting it out, until I could regain my composure, the fully seated table was confused by my breakdown. I felt awkward and exposed. I sucked in my breath and tried to get back to the business at hand. It had been going well before my emotional display.

The school meetings were never-ending. In attendance was always a half dozen or more of the school personnel. Administrators, teachers, resource instructors, and guidance counselors partook in the assessments.

I was seated next to Sarah’s teacher. She was one of the very few in the school that went the extra mile for my daughter. Sarah responded well to her, also. She always spoke ‘to’ Sarah and not ‘at’ her like many of the others.

She gently put her hand on my arm, looked me in the eye, and asked what the problem was.

My response sounded foreign to me because I didn’t even realize these were my thoughts.

“I’m afraid to die.”

“What do mean? What’s going on? Is there something we’ve missed?”

I went on.

“I’m tired. I’m the only one who truly knows Sarah’s language. I can never die and I don’t know what to do anymore. Who will be there for her when I’m gone?”

After I composed myself and apologized, I was promptly reassured that we would all address the best approaches, together, to allow Sarah to receive a proper education. The meeting concluded and I was given yet another copy of yet another revised plan.

Someone, somewhere, somehow asked me if I had read “The Explosive Child.” And that’s all I knew. A book with a pretty self-evident title for what would lie in the pages.

This memory bubbled to the surface when I was contemplating my next course of action to help Sarah. Maybe it would contain some good ideas.

Barnes & Noble had a huge gaping emptiness right where it was supposed to be shelved. Now I had the author’s name though and took a look at some of his other offerings.

I started thumbing through “Lost at School” which was written for educators. Of course, I am not a school teacher but convinced myself that, in essence, I teach my own children all the time. Doesn’t that make me their teacher of life skills? I flipped back to the beginning and started to read right there in the aisle.

And, the skies opened. The first few pages described a scene right out of a day in the life of Sarah. Specifically, a boy randomly hauled off and kicked another student. I was dumbfounded.

It’s like the author had been secretly living in our home to document our lives.

My mind was racing. Just who is this insightful man complete with studies revealing the proven effectiveness of simple approaches to modify explosive behaviors?

Ross W. Greene, Ph.D.

This man is most likely a hero to many with his developed model of intervention known as CPS. Collaborative & Proactive Solutions. His Ph.D. is in clinical child psychology and he is also the founding director of the non-profit “Lives in the Balance.” He has penned a variety of books based on kids that have behavior challenges.

Greene says,

Challenging kids are not always challenging: they’re challenging only when the expectations placed on them outstrip their skills.

Only when the expectations placed on them outstrip their skills.

This statement, stimulated a reaction of such great magnitude for me, the ‘Aha’ moment, that my door to understanding swung wide open and with full force.

The world, and I, had asked Sarah to behave in a manner that she didn’t come by naturally. Oh, she was practicing behavioral responses in therapy and that indicated her desire to learn. They seemed to take forever to stick.

It became clearer, thanks to Greene, that she didn’t have the skills.

She had the desire, a want, to interact with society on its terms. She didn’t actually want to be explosive, disruptive, and a train wreck at times. She didn’t possess the skills to do better. Yet.

Greene goes on to say,

“Kids do well when they can,” and when they can’t, it’s because they are delayed in the development of crucial cognitive skills.”

“Specifically, the way to reduce challenging episodes is by (1) identifying both the skills he is lacking (lagging skills) and the specific expectations he is having difficulty meeting (unsolved problems); and (2) collaboratively solving the problems underlying the misbehavior.”

I felt like I had just discovered treasure. His words of explanation resonated with me, to my very core.

He touches on adult will and how imposing it on a challenged child will only increase explosive episodes. There is no solution in the method of putting a square peg into a round hole. My layman’s words to interpret his message were immediately shared with family.

This proactive, evidence-based approach to help solve the problems that are at the root of her reactive behavior was not only earth-shattering to me but it would be to the school as well.

I would make sure of it.

I promptly purchased the remaining copies and requested another school meeting.

They had assured me we were in this together and I would return armed with materials.

I had 5 copies of the book and it was time for them to meet Dr. Greene.

• Thank you for joining in part 10 of my series. We will travel through the hallways of the psychiatric world, the school system, and our family dynamics. I look forward to sharing more and hope you will see that none of us are alone.

Please access the link below if you need to start with the Introduction to the series and many thanks. Each subsequent Part will also be linked at the bottom of the story, upon publication, for continuity and convenience.