16

JASON

The first impression I have of Jason is from a story told over dinner by Jimmy and Ruby while we were a family of four in Manhattan. The foster parents couldn’t get Jason to eat faster, “So they took the metal spoon and beat him on the head, but he just kept eating slow and he was smiling at us the whole time. They kept hitting and hitting and there was blood running down his face, but he just kept smiling at us and eating slow.” The kids admired him. Hell, I admired him. It was hard not to. Jason was central to every story I heard about the foster home. There was abuse at the hands of the adults, abuse by the older biological children in the home, and a shocking lack of supervision. Jason was in charge of the foster kids. He was the ring leader, the child king. He filled a void.

“Remember when they hung Anthony by his shirt on the hook on the door and then beat his stomach with a stick?” Another kid jumped in, “Remember when Marilyn beat Ruby for washing her feet in the sink?” I wanted details. “Who was Marilyn?” I asked. “She was Ms. Smith’s sister, she lived in the apartment downstairs. She watched us during the summers.” Apparently the Smiths would go to Jamaica during the summer. I asked if Marilyn would come and live upstairs. “No, she had two of her own kids. She stayed in the basement. She would come up and check on us sometimes. And beat us.” I asked the kids what they would do all summer. “Whatever we wanted.” And who was in charge? Jason. He was the feared and malevolent Lord of the Flies.

The picture was becoming ever clearer. The reason Jason hated us so much was because we had taken his power away. He was competing with Dan and me for the hearts and minds of his siblings. He would whisper to them outside their bedroom doors, the bathroom doors, “They hate us! They want to hurt us! Don’t do what they tell you, they’re trying to control us!” The longer we were together as a family, the less influence he had over the others, and the more desperate he was to get it back.

The day after our adoption, Jason had another in a series of psychiatric evaluations. There was talk of using an off-label drug for ADHD to treat his oppositional defiant disorder, just one of Jason’s many diagnoses. His teachers, therapist, and pediatrician were suggesting that if Jason’s defiance was impulsive, there was a chance his brain was not releasing the stop chemical which prompts a person to pause, assess, and choose an appropriate response to a given situation. This was the first time meeting with this psychiatrist, and Jason was in rare form, prowling around the room, agitated, speaking in different voices, and curling his lips back in a weird smirk. I let the line out for about ten minutes, so the doctor could get the whole picture and then I reeled him back in. Consistency was my sharpest parental weapon and I did not want Jason to think that his bad behavior would be tolerated anywhere, ever.

“Okay, Jason, it’s time to put the cars back,” I said, as he was smashing them together, trying to provoke a response from me. “But I’m not finished playing with them,” he said, in a baby voice. “It’s time, Bud. Let’s pack it up.”

Jason did not respond and kept crashing the cars together, ignoring me. “That’s one.” He yelled angrily, “You can’t count me! I said I’m not finished!” I counted two.

“But it’s not fair! You can’t tell me what to do!” He jumped up, kicked the cars with his foot then grabbed a car with his hand and held it behind his head, threatening to throw it at me. “That’s three.”

I stood up and took his hand with the car in it. Jason screamed and began kicking me. I took the car, then picked him up and cradled him tightly. His face was red: “Stop! Stop, you’re hurting me!”

I said firmly, “As soon as you stop squirming, buddy, I’ll let you do your timeout.” The psychiatrist was taking it all in. Jason writhed for another five minutes and then stopped. I let him go. “Have a seat in the chair, buddy. Ten minutes.” The doctor excused himself while Jason sat. After ten minutes, Jason and I went to the waiting room. I let him play quietly while I talked with the doctor.

The psychiatrist was thoughtful. “Let’s assume Jason doesn’t have access to the chemical stop mechanism in his brain. If we were to medicate him, give him that extra second before acting to consider his choices and potential consequences . . . well, I think Jason would make the same choice. All we have left are anti-psychotics.” I said, “Thank you. We’ll just keep working with him behaviorally. He had a rough start. We’re hoping he comes around.”

* * *

He wasn’t coming around. We were trying to stay positive, and keep him moving forward, but nothing was working. He’d been kicked out of karate for desecrating the dojo and talking back to the sensai. Chess club didn’t like cheaters, especially those who threw pieces when they were called out. Jason was expelled from summer school for sticking his finger in a student’s eye while his teacher and the parent of the child were sitting next to them. Soapstone-carving class ended when Jason chased a fifteen year old around the room with a saw. (“I was kidding! It was just a joke!”)

We had meeting after meeting on Jason’s behalf: the principal, the school psychologist, teachers, therapists, Dan, myself, and our live-in tutor. We would sit in a conference room, all of us trying, all of us frustrated. Someone said, “What if we sent him to Four Winds downstate, checked him in for a month, and let them figure out what the hell his diagnosis is? We’re throwing labels around like conduct disorder, oppositional defiant disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, reactive attachment disorder. Which is it?” His therapist and I looked at each other. “He has all of them,” I said. Dan jumped in. “Whatever his diagnosis is, none of these disorders can be treated medically. We have to treat him behaviorally, which we are doing. Sending him away for any amount of time is not the message we want to send to this child.” Jason’s therapist added, “His new home is the best place this child can be. He is with his siblings, and he has two loving parents who are treating him consistently.”

The teachers were afraid to keep testing him. He needed the behavioral support mandated in his Individualized Educational Plan, but his IEP was based on his learning issues. Academically, he was reading above grade level and his solid math scores would disqualify him from the closely supervised classroom needed to control his behavior. However, all of his teachers agreed strongly that he should not be mainstreamed; he lacked empathy. And yet, everyone who did not know him well adored him. The neighbors, the receptionists, the librarians, essentially everyone who didn’t actually have to deal with him on a regular basis, would tell me what a soft spot they had for him. “What a smile! That is one special kid.” They wouldn’t believe his behavior at home could be that bad. They thought I was too strict with him. “Remember, there’s a hurt boy in there. You just need to love him.” Of course I love him. Jason was easy to love, just really hard to live with.

When she came to visit, my own mother took his side: “He’s just a boy, honey. You’re too hard on him.” I smiled. “You’re right, Mom. Say, why don’t the two of you go for a swim at the YMCA?” I watched the car drive away, stop abruptly at the end of the drive, and turn around. My mother screeched back and stormed into the kitchen. “I have never been spoken to like that by anyone, let alone a ten year old! You need to teach that child a lesson! I want him out of my sight!” Jason was yelling at her from the sidewalk, “Liar! You liar! You’re just trying to get me in trouble! Grandma’s a liar!” My mom looked at me, eyes wide, pupils dilating. “I’ll handle it, Mom, just ignore him.” That’s one . . .

He was wearing me down. Jason’s therapist told me he was testing me, “Just keep doing what you are doing. He’s in a tough spot. He trusts no one.” I dug deep and found my pride. If all this was just a test of my mettle by a ten year old, then I was bloody hell going to pass or get my head slammed in a door trying.

* * *

Jason slammed my head in a door. It was not an accident. As I was leaving his room, he called to me, “Mom?” I stopped, leaned my head back into his room to see what he wanted, and BAM! The door met my temple, driving my head into the door frame. He had set me up. The pressure was intense. I groaned and grabbed my head, easing myself down to the floor while Jason stood laughing at me. I grabbed his arm as I slid down, pulling him to the floor with me. I rolled him over onto his stomach, put his hands behind his back and yelled, “NOT OKAY!” He started screaming, “Stop it! You’re hurting me! Stop! Stop!” I picked Jason up and took him outside to the van, away from his audience. It took him two hours to stop screaming.

Dan and I gave Jason two weeks of lockdown for my head injury. The longest grounding up until then had been two days. He ate alone on a ten-minute timer, had no piano, no swim, no outside play, no access to the other kids. The effect of his absence on the other children was profound, a game changer. Meals became more relaxed; we conversed, there was laughter and lightness. We played games together after dinner, read aloud together, passing the book from reader to reader. I got to spend time with my four other children, all of them funny and smart and markedly more open and calm away from Jason’s influence. It was a huge piece of information.

After his grounding, Jason was welcomed back for two days before we had to ground him again. Infractions during that two-day period included but were not limited to: throwing rocks at passing cars, holding smaller children under water in the swimming pool, carving his name into the veneer on the piano, using the vacuum cleaner to torture the dog, and punching Jimmy repeatedly in the groin.

What to do with our angry, ousted dictator? Exile. If it was good enough for Napoleon, it was good enough for Jason. We packed up his bedroom on the second floor, moved him to a room on the third floor, and grounded him for a month. He was the only child on the floor. There was a tutor living in the room next to him with whom he shared the third-floor bathroom. He used the back staircase to get up and down and was not allowed on the second floor. He was livid. For days his cheeks burned with rage. “It’s not fair! You hate me!” He plotted his revenge. He showed me his secret journal, in which he chronicled the crimes of adults against children. “Just because adults are bigger they boss us around. Children can take care of themselves. There is no difference between adults and children. We should be left to manage ourselves.”

Jason showed me picture after picture of himself as a stick figure, shooting, stabbing, blood spurting from adult-sized stick figures, rockets flying at spherical heads with no ears. On his couch was a cloth doll, a gift from Aunt Marie, marked up with sharpies, cut with scissors, clothes gone, hair shorn, and every orifice violated. “Vengeancy is the only thing on my mind,” he said, growling at me. I said, “You mean ‘vengeance,’ Honey. ‘Vengeancy’ isn’t a word, but I love that you are working on your vocabulary.” Time to redirect that energy.

Dan bought him a simple, sturdy, handmade dollhouse at a garage sale. It cost ten dollars unfurnished, but had good light and lots of potential. I carried it upstairs and talked Jason through the basics of real estate. “It’s a fixer-upper, Jason. We got in low. If you put some sweat equity into this beauty, we can flip it, and walk away with some serious bank. I bet you could double our investment.” He was listening. “My suggestion? Put your money into the bathrooms and kitchens. That’s where you’re going to get the biggest return on your investment in the resale.” I handed him a new set of markers for the common rooms, “Don’t fear color!” I said. He was interested, “What about the bedrooms, Mom?” He was looking for suggestions. “Feng Shui. Look it up.” Jason grabbed a pencil and paper, “Can you spell that for me?”

We discussed window treatments and lighting fixtures. “If you upgrade the electric, the value added would be significant.” We had an electronics lesson. We bought wiring, a breadboard, tiny buzzers, and lights, and a miniature fan that could run off an AA battery. “What about outside lights? You know, for the yard.” I nodded. “Well, then I guess you’re going to have make a yard.” Dan bought him some magazines on landscaping in miniature, borrowing from the model railroad tradition.

We gave Jason reams of plain white paper, six rolls of scotch tape, and set up project tables for him. He covered the tables with paper and made cities with streets and buildings, parking garages for his Hot Wheels cars. We brought out the Lego trust, four file boxes full of Legos that his Aunt Marie loaned us. He swam at the YMCA every day. I supervised him at chess club on Fridays, drove him to and from school, walked him to piano lessons, and therapy sessions. He rode his bike, ate his meals with just me. And Jason read. He read aloud to me, he read alone to himself, and he read along to books on tapes. Monday afternoons I let him use the kitchen to bake bread, which he would sell to the neighbors, still warm, for $2.50 a loaf. Friday night was movie night; the only time he could see his siblings. Dan and I sat on the couch between him and the other kids.

He was for all purposes an only child. He hated it, and complained bitterly. Once he was down on the first floor, he did not want to go back up to his room. Every time I asked him to go upstairs, he experienced an abbreviated version of the five stages of loss: denial, bargaining, anger; and instead of grief and acceptance, Jason would substitute profanity and violence. After one of his more dramatic episodes, Jason accused me of being an abusive parent. I asked my jailbird to sit down for a minute and list for me his activities from the two previous days. He wrote it all down on a piece of cardstock. The list was extensive, full of fun and varied activities.

I put the list up on the refrigerator with a magnet. He looked sheepishly at me, grinned and tried to backpedal, “Okay, okay, so maybe I exaggerated a little.”