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Perspective Newsletters
Winter 2007 - 2008
PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE
"Dead-End Thinking"
Page 1
Dear Friends of the Foundation:
Supposedly we are the only creatures who are aware of our lifespan - at least on
an intellectual level. We also believe, to varying degrees, that we can control many
of life‘s events along the way. Maybe that is a bit grandiose on our part but
most of us probably do believe that our awareness, insight, ability to think abstractly
and ability to look ahead and make choices regarding our lives are great gifts. We
value our free will, whatever and to what degree we want to believe in free will.
We also value our individuality.
It is a great gift to be able to think, communicate with one another at various levels
of understanding and to be able to perceive and exchange ideas. Probably most of
us take this for granted. We have many gifts and this is a great one.
Like many things in life, we are frequently reminded of our gifts in their absence
or when perhaps these gifts are challenged or threatened. At times, our ability to
think, remember, process information, conceptualize on various levels and the like
can be innocently compromised in some form. We can become overwhelmed, tired, overloaded,
distracted or perhaps get sick. When these things occur, we may not be at our intellectual
peak or perhaps get a little "brain dead". We do not need to think deep thoughts
all day long and like any one of our biological systems, there are expected ups and
downs and cycles.
However, there are times that we choose to not think deeply when perhaps we should
and sometimes doing so can have tragic or at least negative consequences. For those
working with others who may have learning, behavioral and emotional problems, they
must try to understand others and at considerable depth. Being shallow can be disrespectful
of the gift we have been given.
"Well, that student has a cognitive limitation. The treatment, therefore, must
be primarily and exclusively educational". "Forget insight." "Forget ‘talk
therapy'". "If you assign her to a group, consider a training group".
"We do not work well with conduct-disordered adolescents. In fact, we will no longer
accept them into our program. We do not believe they get better. Why waste everyone‘s
time and energy?"
"Joe has been getting high outside of school. As long as that is going on, there
is no use trying to work with Joe. We need to draw a line and wait for him to get
off drugs."
"Patricia has a hectic family situation going on and a borderline personality disorder.
There is no way we can put a dent into either of those issues. We just need to be
a safe, secure, predicable part of her life at this time and focus on educational
issues."
"Dorie is head-banger, bent on getting herself hospitalized again. Nothing will
stop this process until she gets the intense care she needs."
"Thomas is so out of control, there is nothing anyone can do short of him getting
arrested and detained for a long time. Maybe some follow through, consequences and
firm limits will give him the message, finally".
"Marvin needs to get his anger under control. Probably the best thing for him
would be to put him in an anger control group and design behavior management programming
to help him control his anger."
What a terrible shame these conceptualizations, and I am using that term liberally,
represent. These are largely excuses. These are rationalizations. These represent
short-sighted thinking; being generous, perhaps blind spots but, nonetheless, dead-end
thinking.
We are capable of so much more. Other humans deserve so much more out of us. We have
all heard someone utter something similar to the above. Probably we bought it at
one time or another. It is not hard to conjure up a visual image of two ‘professionals‘,
let‘s say a teacher and therapist, having this dialogue:
" I agree, Abraham is out of control. He needs some type of medication to control
his anger."
"If his parents won‘t cooperate, there is nothing we can do. He is really
out of control."
"He really needs a psychiatrist, someone who can put him on medication and perhaps
hospitalize him for his own good."
"Either that or that PO needs to finally impose some limits on him and stop
making useless threats. That sure is making things worse".
I would hate to be Abraham. These two have written me off. Perhaps not smugly so,
but they believe they cannot help me; I need to be somewhere else. Maybe someone
can punish me or medicate me out of my problematic behavior.
What if we were Abraham? To others then, are we simply the behaviors they see and
dislike? Let us be honest: hostility, frustration, and tough cases do not evoke warm
fuzzy feelings even among those committed to the helping profession. Still, Abraham
deserves more. Abraham is more. The problem also lies on the other side of the equation.
The teacher or therapist, or administrator, or parent, or advocate and the like have
short-changed Abraham and, in doing so, his or herself.
The problem which results in such "dead end thinking" has its roots in
our frustration, lack of understanding, limits of empathy, identification and basic
compassion and, bluntly, our opting out for the easy out. We may also not believe
enough in ourselves. We may also be tired. We may have a mindset which allows us,
like a pressure relief valve, to write off a few cases. Not every case will get better.
We are not supposed to be able to understand and fix everyone. Maybe we should not.
Maybe we are not qualified. Maybe we should not start something we probably cannot
finish. It might be a disservice to try to provide treatment for a case for which
we do not feel confident in our abilities, training and level of compassion. Should
we even try? There is some - but usually only a little - legitimacy in this line
of thought. Sure, if a student would do better with another teacher, another therapist,
and another program then that needs to be dealt with in the open but not by default,
not as the result of self-serving, dead-end thinking.
There is no anger control pill. I suppose we could sedate students but that might
get dangerously close to our real feelings - we do not like the anger and want to
see it eliminated, which has little to do with helping the student. Anger is not
the real problem anyway. Anger only has its roots in hurt and frustration. It is
recognizably an arduous trip to get through anger to get to the roots. However, we
must, at the least, understand the connections between behaviors and feelings and
self thoughts and then judge others – and, of course, we constantly judge -
with this in mind and with the same level of depth with which we would appreciate
being understood and judged ourselves.
"Diagnose and be rid of them and the work they bring. Borderlines do not get
better usually. It is a waste of time to even try. They will cause havoc to your
program and bring down others around them. Forget them. They are a mess and tons
of work. They are better off placed in a hospital for long term care". Anyone
know the hospital they are all using? Referring problems away can end up like a very
sad version of musical chairs.
Pretty much the same thing can be said about conduct disordered children and adolescents.
Maybe conduct disordered is code for sociopathy.
Cognitive limitations = no feelings, no insight, no need for therapy. Really?
Are there really hopeless children and adolescents?
Of course there are cases that will not get better. Of course, none of us is expert
at everything and there is a time to accept our limitations. In fact, it is unkind,
unprofessional and egocentric to think otherwise. There is, however, the other extreme
- giving up before trying, writing cases off too easily, not challenging our own
thinking and feelings, getting caught up in dead-end thinking. Got a diagnosis? It
is now just a short step away to put the case in a nice neat box and stop trying
to understand what is not coming easily. Stop the internal struggles, put the tough
cases in boxes marked "diagnosed and done", "won‘t get better", "needs
a special pill", "needs an anger control group", "needs a specialized
program/approach" (not so sure what it looks like but it must be out there someplace), "needs
a new school", "new set of parents", "can‘t help him while
he is doing drugs or drinking all the time", "she does not have the capacity
for insight or talk therapy".
Who does not have what capacity? It may not be the student. The formula is not that
hard.
Put yourself in the shoes of others. Try to understand. Do not stop. Let compassion,
understanding, experience, humanness, and intellect carry you. Do not stop. Know
the difference between our issues and limitations and those of others. Use our gifts.
Students with cognitive limitations certainly can learn and certainly have feelings
and a realm of internal thinking. They deserve the same level of consideration as
anyone, as we do.
The obstacle sometimes is our resistance to approach these cases with a different
level of communication, maybe even a different language, certainly a different framework
but we are kidding ourselves when we write these cases off and ascribe the problem
to the case and not ourselves. We simply need to communicate and understand with
an ear to someone who might have a different way of understanding and communicating.
Maybe it is not so easy to get inside of their heads due to our fear or hang-ups
with identifying with others with these limitations. Maybe the reasons some cases
are tougher than others have something to do with us, even if just a little. Being
truly committed to young people with disabilities has to mean a commitment to being
sensitive to individual differences, whatever that may mean in each case. Following
this, we all have to remind ourselves that each case is supposed to be different.
Each case is supposed to be challenging. Life and life processes can be challenging.
The cases and people behind the cases are real and should never be put in a box,
particularly for the sake of simplicity. Again, would any of us wish to be diagnosed
and done, written off, seen as little more than a group of behaviors, meet a new
team of people who might label us and apply interventions like recipes? I hope not.
Ed Schultze, Ed.D.
President/Executive Director
eschultze@learyschool.org
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