A Letter You May Relate To

[A Mickeyfan]

I hope you aren't getting the 1% graduation % from my post. If so I m sorry for the confusion. This % is from the students who were removed from the ESE track during their high school years. To graduate with a standard diploma, you must have 24 credits (some in particular Math & English). If the student has say only 12 & he is going into 12th grade, he can still possibly manage to obtain what is needed to graduate remaining on an ESE track & then go onto a trade school. If the parent switches them late in high school, it s next to impossible for them to obtain the credits they need to graduate the year they were originally slated to. The parents are literally setting their child up for failure. They are not capable of earning the credits needed in the time frame that they have to earn them, NOT that the student is very low functioning and incapable of passing everything. If they were that low they would have been in life skills classes. You can't jump from life skills to gen ed in high school.

I am sorry if there was any confusion from my post. ESE is also a broad term, it covers all exceptional student education (gifted too just the opposite end), it doesn't only pertain to students who are Autistic... And I do know you can have a child who is gifted & Autistic.....

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Just as my DS, gifted & Bipolar who graduated at the top 15% of his class, from all honors. He had a scholarship. Played Competitive Baseball, and his team even won Nationals @ Disney. We thought everything as great & he was ok till he tried to kill himself & was on life support for 3 days. Long story short, he lost his scholarship, stopped taking his meds' got caught up with drugs (self medication), in & out of rehab, arrested, sent away. Now home at 25 fighting demons inside of himself as well as around him. Still won't take any meds, feels he doesn't need them, so the roller coaster will continue.
Oh, if you live in the State of FL & try to have your adult child Baker Acted, the police where I live arrest instead. The reason for this part of my post, to show you :
1. When you think things are good, don't let your guard down.
2. They become adults & can decide on their own to continue on meds (if they take them)
3. The law will not always see them for who they are, and arrest instead of help when they are adults.
4. When they break the law, they are treated like anyone else. Mommy cannot keep them from being prosecuted. You can't fight the legal system, the way you fight the school system.

 

[jodifla]

I hope you aren't getting the 1% graduation % from my post. If so I m sorry for the confusion. This % is from the students who were removed from the ESE track during their high school years. To graduate with a standard diploma, you must have 24 credits (some in particular Math & English). If the student has say only 12 & he is going into 12th grade, he can still possibly manage to obtain what is needed to graduate remaining on an ESE track & then go onto a trade school. If the parent switches them late in high school, it s next to impossible for them to obtain the credits they need to graduate the year they were originally slated to. The parents are literally setting their child up for failure. They are not capable of earning the credits needed in the time frame that they have to earn them, NOT that the student is very low functioning and incapable of passing everything. If they were that low they would have been in life skills classes. You can't jump from life skills to gen ed in high school.

I am sorry if there was any confusion from my post. ESE is also a broad term, it covers all exceptional student education (gifted too just the opposite end), it doesn't only pertain to students who are Autistic... And I do know you can have a child who is gifted & Autistic.....

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Just as my DS, gifted & Bipolar who graduated at the top 15% of his class, from all honors. He had a scholarship. Played Competitive Baseball, and his team even won Nationals @ Disney. We thought everything as great & he was ok till he tried to kill himself & was on life support for 3 days. Long story short, he lost his scholarship, stopped taking his meds' got caught up with drugs (self medication), in & out of rehab, arrested, sent away. Now home at 25 fighting demons inside of himself as well as around him. Still won't take any meds, feels he doesn't need them, so the roller coaster will continue.
Oh, if you live in the State of FL & try to have your adult child Baker Acted, the police where I live arrest instead. The reason for this part of my post, to show you :
1. When you think things are good, don't let your guard down.
2. They become adults & can decide on their own to continue on meds (if they take them)
3. The law will not always see them for who they are, and arrest instead of help when they are adults.
4. When they break the law, they are treated like anyone else. Mommy cannot keep them from being prosecuted. You can't fight the legal system, the way you fight the school system.

And what's this other diploma? So often, anything but a standard dimploma is worthless anyway. Can it get you into college, jobs?

My mother was Baker Acted in Florida. She was not arrested. She was committed to a treatment, and in fact it was a turning point for her.

 

[A Mickeyfan]

And what's this other diploma? So often, anything but a standard dimploma is worthless anyway. Can it get you into college, jobs?

My mother was Baker Acted in Florida. She was not arrested. She was committed to a treatment, and in fact it was a turning point for her.

The other diploma is called "certificate of completion" You can go to a trade school but not college. As far as a job, yes, you check the box for completed high school. This is also the diploma that the students who were on the standard gen ed track, but were unable to pass FCAT rec'd as well. It was that no matter how high your GPA was, if you did not pass FCAT by graduation year, you did not get your standard diploma.

As far as Baker Acting, I have tried 5 times with my son. Twice the did it, he was under 18. The other 3 times, they did not. Two of them led to him being arrested when I tried to show he was a danger to himself or others. The other the PD refused saying he was only "high" and understood enough to tell them who he was. The ER doc had to agree at that point even though he was taken into the ER via ambulance semi-concious from a drug over dose. His stomach was pumped, IV's were in him .....their reason, he was an adult and a drug OD is not a reason to Baker Act maybe so if they aren't Bipolar.

In my City, my PD do not like doing the paper work that is involved in Baker Acting. In my jail, the guards killed a mentally ill inmate with a heart problem with pepper spray. There have been several mentally ill people shot to death by the Sheriff's. Lee County... Google it if you doubt what I say. Yes, they will Baker Act, if there is no choice. I don't see why you feel the need to disbelieve my posting, or be offended by it. I don't mean to offend anyone here. It just seems there are many parents with young children on here & not thinking of long term and sometimes harsh reality of having their child thrown into society as an "adult".

I am very happy for your mother, that is awesome. If you don't mind me asking, how old was she when this occured? Was she a young adult or just "grown". I am asking this because of my son. We are still waiting for him to even accept the fact he needs help. He still really can't see it as an adult. He was on Lithium @ 21 after several others that were tried & failed over the years. He'll take for a while then he's "cured" ..then after a while his self medicating will start. He's home since Sept & he has already showed signs of drinking again. I am just afraid the illegal drugs will be next. He is a Rapid Cycler (mostly Manic) Bipolar wth ODD

 

[jodifla]

It would make sense to me then that parents would want their child to attain a diploma that would let them go on with their studies. The certificate of completion cuts off a lot of opportunities for a lot of kids.

My mom was Baker Acted in Hillsborough County, but this would have been the mid 1990s. She stayed about a month in a mental health facility, and that's when she truly started to understand the depths of her bi-polar illness, taking her meds, etc.

I'm sure it's much different now...so much has changed in 20 years, and Florida seems to want to provide less services than ever. It's also so difficult if your child is self-medicating with drugs....my mother was not, and she was in her 60s, so she was just a more sympathetic character to deal with.

It's too bad more police officers don't grasp that many of the people they deal with are mentally ill first, not career criminals! I'm sorry for all you are going through with your son.

 

[A Mickeyfan]

It would make sense to me then that parents would want their child to attain a diploma that would let them go on with their studies. The certificate of completion cuts off a lot of opportunities for a lot of kids.

My mom was Baker Acted in Hillsborough County, but this would have been the mid 1990s. She stayed about a month in a mental health facility, and that's when she truly started to understand the depths of her bi-polar illness, taking her meds, etc.

I'm sure it's much different now...so much has changed in 20 years, and Florida seems to want to provide less services than ever. It's also so difficult if your child is self-medicating with drugs....my mother was not, and she was in her 60s, so she was just a more sympathetic character to deal with.

It's too bad more police officers don't grasp that many of the people they deal with are mentally ill first, not career criminals! I'm sorry for all you are going through with your son.

You hit the nail on the head.. to an officer, a 60 year old is more sympathetic than a young "punk" in their eyes.. In their eyes, he is a junkie, not someone who is mentally ill. For parents with children who have violent rages, they will look at them as punks who are "violent criminals" not one in a rage due to not taking meds.

My friend's DS is 24, he suffers from Schizophrenia. He actually is a friend of my DS too. He just recently went off his meds (after being in patient for over a year!) and attacked his dad with a knife. He was arrested for Domestic Violence, & Aggvav Battery. His bond is $75,000. Chances are he will be sent to prison. This is the second time he has been charged with Domestic Violence. He did hurt his dad pretty bad. His Dad is in ICU and has been there since 12/20 It is a no one situation all around. This guy doesn't belong behind bars in my opinion, he needs help, he needs to be in a hospital where he will get the help he needs and remain there. He doesn't belong in a prison mental hospital not getting help. That is the way our state is, I cannot speak for other states.. You are so correct, our State has no funding for the mentally ill, they are always cutting it as if they don't want to help them. They aren't ill, they are all criminals so just lock them up when they become of age. That is the feeling I get from sunny FLA

I do see your point about the diploma, I really do. You have to look at the big picture though. With the certificate of completion, your child can still go to a vocational trade school. They can become an electrician, a plumber, a mechanic etc... they just cannot go onto college. Some parents want their child to have a standard diploma no matter what. That sometimes hurts the child. They may not graduate with their class. That will lower their self esteem, who wants to be 20 graduating high school. Even if the do manage to get it, it will be hard for them in college anyway. Not everyone is college material. We need those trades. Without them, our economy won't survive.. Don't look down on those jobs.. Some of them make better money than those who get a college education.... Up until this past year, if the student didn't pass FCRAP opps, I mean FCAT, they would get that certificate of completion instead of the standard diploma anyway.. and even some of those with high GPA's and all honors have been known to freeze on FCAT and fail each and every time.

 

[minkydog]

I am very happy for your mother, that is awesome. If you don't mind me asking, how old was she when this occured? Was she a young adult or just "grown". I am asking this because of my son. We are still waiting for him to even accept the fact he needs help. He still really can't see it as an adult. He was on Lithium @ 21 after several others that were tried & failed over the years. He'll take for a while then he's "cured" ..then after a while his self medicating will start. He's home since Sept & he has already showed signs of drinking again. I am just afraid the illegal drugs will be next. He is a Rapid Cycler (mostly Manic) Bipolar wth ODD

I can feel the pain behind your words. My DS25 also has bipolar 1 and refuses to be medicated. Although he has not had any serious run-ins with the law (yet) we have had many MANY difficulties with him, including two hospitalizations. Like your son, mine also self-medicates, with alcohol. I worry about him a lot, but I find that i have to keep pretty strict boundaries with him. Love him to pieces, but my son is a MASTER manipulator. You might want to join us over at Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance: ...www.dbsalliance.org (if you haven't already been there, that is.)_

 

[NotUrsula]

It's tempting, but no, don't send that letter. Letters like this are seen as self-righteous lectures by those who feel that they have been wrongly maligned. Sending that letter is almost guaranteed to cause a family rift, and it won't be pretty.

The only "letter" that should be sent is a written apology from the child to the aunt, explaining that he is sorry that he lost control and that he apologizes for disrepecting her. Then the parent should discuss the child's condition with the aunt in person and explain why he has limits that neurotypical children do not have, and how she unwittingly provoked the reaction that she got. The parent should be sympathetic to how the aunt felt, because it IS infuriating to be insulted by a child.

Yes, I know that the adult shouldn't have teased him, and that his reaction was natural for him, but even ASD kids need to learn that disrepecting adults is simply not acceptable, and ALWAYS requires an apology, even if the adult provoked the reaction. (And yes, I've got an ASD kid.)

 

[Piper]

It's tempting, but no, don't send that letter. Letters like this are seen as self-righteous lectures by those who feel that they have been wrongly maligned. Sending that letter is almost guaranteed to cause a family rift, and it won't be pretty.

The only "letter" that should be sent is a written apology from the child to the aunt, explaining that he is sorry that he lost control and that he apologizes for disrepecting her. Then the parent should discuss the child's condition with the aunt in person and explain why he has limits that neurotypical children do not have, and how she unwittingly provoked the reaction that she got. The parent should be sympathetic to how the aunt felt, because it IS infuriating to be insulted by a child.

Yes, I know that the adult shouldn't have teased him, and that his reaction was natural for him, but even ASD kids need to learn that disrepecting adults is simply not acceptable, and ALWAYS requires an apology, even if the adult provoked the reaction. (And yes, I've got an ASD kid.)

This wasn't MY letter, but my daughter's. The aunt (and the whole family) know the child's condition. Their answer is "if you'd just beat his butt" he wouldn't act that way. The child did write an apology the next day because that is one of the things my daughter does with him....discuss the situation and how he could have handled it in a different way + he apologizes.

Unfortunately, the teasing isn't uncommon from this adult. The fact that she had been drinking probably played a part in her goading him on and refusing to listen to his parents when they told her to not touch him (this escalates his meltdown.) My daughter just hit that point of frustration when she decided that writing things down so they couldn't say "we didn't know" was in order.

This took place several weeks ago and the episode is closed now.

 

[JACH1976]

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