DEAR YOGESHREE
Karl was in what we called a four day programme. He was very soon to be 17 and was in the process of disengagement from care and being prepared to be returned to his family. It meant that he went home directly from school on a Friday and returned after school on Monday. He was still completing some programmes and winding down toward the end of that year.
He had been institutionalised since infancy.
Karl didn't pitch Monday.
The procedure was that absent young persons not returning after a leave of absence were reported to the Director after various other procedures had failed to locate them. There were different periods of tolerance in these procedures. In Karl's case, he would be regarded as having officially 'absconded' after 24hours and 'missing in legal system terms, in the same period.
The message I got was that the child and youth care workers knew where he was actually, and that he simply hadn't come back from his parent's house - he was still there. He should be at school of course but was not attending..so he was not missing. He was AWOL.
Considering everything I said that we would adopt a 'wait and see' approach. We knew he was safe and maybe he was 'voting with his feet' That perhaps might be quite healthy in the longer term - so I said that we should not contact him nor the family." Let's agree not to do anything for a while".
The child care staff were not at all happy with this.
Karl re-appeared after five official days of absence. I got a call to say that he was back with.an official 'incident report' which concluded with an official request for a 'consultative meeting'. The request was worded by the primary care workers in a way more like a demand for a 'disciplinary enquiry'. The complaint being that Karl had been absent without official permission for five days. This was interpreted as outright disregard for the rules and had to be officially dealt with. The Director must be present as Karl's behaviour created a precedent and could have further repercussions among the others in the group. The report concluded rather punitively, that Karl may not be ready to be returned to his parental home at the end of the year.
'Consultative Meeting' was a term I coined to take the punitive element out of the previous 'Disciplinary Hearings'. I found that all too often a so called 'Disciplinary Hearing' turned out to be more like a group therapy session, so the name and the intetnion changed to comply with the concept of restorative work..... an idea that seemed frequently to be far from the minds of the child and youth care workers who looked to me to be judge. jury and a sort of magistrate metering out a ' sentence'. This appeared to be the hope for Karl and the expectation on me.
We met in the group home that morning.and were to sit around the diningroom table..(mind you with Karl having been excused school to allow him to attend !??). This was the workers idea to stage manage the formality of the meeting and to stress its seriousness. For me it was a charade, but for the worker couple it was real business.
What unfolded around that table was to be for me a life changing event.... these thing happen at the most unexpected moments.
Karl sat facing me across the narrow side of the table. The child care workers positioned themselves at the top and bottom. The male worker took the lead. He outlined the complaint he had against Karl, giving evidence with dates, times and the procedures that had been followed.
Karl sat emotionless.
Then the worker asked questions to get clarity. And it was in the time of this questioning that the fiirst set of feelings stirred in me.
"What did you do while you were away so long?"
"Nothing"
"'Your Mom was ok, so you didn't stay to look after her or anything?"
"No"
"Why did you just stay then?"
"Don't know."
Why didn't you send your younger brother to tell us where you were?"
Silence.
"Have you heard of this thing called a telephone Karl? Couldn't you have phoned or something?"
Silence.
Did you think tha maybe we were worried about you, or that Ma was worried ( Ma being the female married partner of the child and youth care couple)
Now the feelings in me were strong and I could identify them. They were disappointmant, loss, terrible hurt and let down injury and grief. It was asif Karl had deliberately punctured them.
'Ma' was close to tears
Silence.
The tone of the questions hardened, became more pointed . The boy had to feel their pain.
" Have you no idea after all the time that you have been here that Ma and I might care enough for you that we would worry about you?"
Silence.
This wasn't going well. I would soon have to get this back on track.
That's when the quiet movement of another range of feelings started to swell to a point that I could just begin to identify them.....total stunned confusion, like a voice crying out " Will somebody please tell me what is going on here?",.. trapped in a void and very frightened by the nothingness of it. .. irritation
Then it came.It's not that Karl didn't want to care nor that he simply tried to injure anyone. Karl was not able to care!... Blank !! He had no idea that what he does matters to anyone. "This whole thing is meaningless", he thought "and starting to become frustrating"
When it started to dawn through the feelings to some kind of sense, that Karl. was not able to feel care and so couldn't feel anyone's injury through anything that he did..., the enormity of this for me was overwhelming. .... Karl can't feel caring because his very early history and long- term institutionalisation had left him unable to interpret messages of caring as genuine and real.
I felt the stone wall around him. His motionless and the silences were not fefiance . they were paralysis...This whole thing didn't make sense to him.
The feelings,.. a third wave, were my own this time. Up until now I had been feeling with Karl. Now I recognised that I was feeling for Karl. Not only for Karl, but for all the young people like Karl and for all the children who had experinced me and these child and youth care workers as Karl experienced them now. Pretending The sadness for children who couldn't care because they couldn't or wouldn't allow thelmselves to be cared for formed vague imagesof isolation, prolonged emotional isolation asif people were trees walking around.
"Can we please take a break for about five minutes? Maybe you can have some tea" I said.
I went out onto the verandah, opening the net curtained french doors, - and closing them behind me for privacy - and sobbed... I had no control over it for a good five minutes.
In 20 years of child and youth care work I have cried five times ... and this was one of them. I always have felt so stupid each time it happened, Each time was because of the pathos of a moment with a child or children.
"This is so unprofessional, just so unprofessi0onal". I chanted until it was under control.
I came back into the room through the curtained french doors.
"Now..... let's start again". I said.
Love
Barrie,
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