Kentucky autistic boy booted from Troop

[sctmom]

One more comment....

One problem many people have in dealing with a boy like this is that he "looks normal". If a person has a physical handicap it is easy to see. But someone who looks "normal" and for the most part acts "normal", it's hard to understand when they can't handle certain day to day tasks. People with ADHD and those who are highly functioning autistic, look like all the others and for the most part act like others.

 

[ScoutParent]

I had a boy with serious psychiatric problems in my cub scout den...did I have trouble dealing with him...no. In fact he and my son got along very well. What I did find though was that the boy's parents depending on my son as a companion for their son. Is their anything wrong with this occasionally, not at all that's what friends do but they were becoming more and more demanding of my son's time and his patience. Is this fair to my son--no. Now in reference to this autistic boy, which boys do you put in the tent with him? What reaction can you expect from him when canoeing if he becomes stressed? What impact does that have on the other scouts? I find it interesting how different the reaction is to this disease from the reaction to the scout who manifested signs of another disease, mental illness. This boy sounds like he could be a potential threat to the other scouts. If his mother was so concerned about him being able to cope and knew that it would be difficult in new or different situations, why didn't she take the time to take him on tour of the summer camp a week or two before she sent him off? This is not simply a physical disability, it has other ramifications. Who of us would want to be held liable if this boy had a sudden "lock up"?

[OldGreyEagle]

If the child has that potential, then you need professional help ( for the child). In our troop we have a scout that has a problem with anger management. It must be pretty bad because the guy has an assisitant (pyschiatric aide) who comes to all the meetings and always has a parent at an outing. They are responsible for his behavior and the scouters take care of his scouting. Without the aide, he wouldnt be in the troop. All I am saying is lets work with families and try alternatives before we say I/we cant handle it. Alone maybe not, but why not explore alternatives?

[SagerScout]

Like sctmom, this story hits close to home for me as my son also has significant emotional problems. He's not soiled himself, but he has definitely locked up on us in scouts on several occasions.In several cases, teasing has triggered the melt-downs. He's never violent, at least not toward others, but becomes unresponsive. Gandhi's got nothing on him for non-verbal protest. Well, except Gandhi had better reasons.

 

Support, time, patience, and kindness make happy endings. He's always embarrassed and contrite, and I believe wishes with all his heart that he didn't have this problem. Teasing, impatience and viewing this behavior as intentional make situations that are very bad for all involved.

 

I have talked to the other parents and scouts in his troop to explain his problem. He's been diagnosed as having an anxiety disorder, possible Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. I explained that under stress, his little pea brain appears to lock up on a compulsive thought, and he's afraid to move for fear he'll act on the compulsion. He's not trying to be bratty when that occurs, he's just trying to get a grip. They understand it with varying levels of tolerance. The example I gave to his partner, who has ADHD, was that it was similar to the way his mind races when not on medication. IF he tries really hard, he can concentrate and do homework anyway, but it's almost impossible for him to make his mind stop racing. So his behavior is sort of voluntary and sort of not voluntary. His buddy understood that right away, and thanked me for the explanation.

 

My son's never been kicked out of a troop but he's left troops that stress him too badly. Teasing, as I said, was the worst problem for him and he's definitely a target for it. He comes across as a know-it-all. The fact that he's usually right doesn't help at all.

 

I confess, this is one of the reasons I volunteer with his troop. Being a homeschool troop the parents tend to be rather conservative regarding male/female role models and while I was made welcome, I could definitely feel some questioning regarding why a mom would be jumping in on that scouter thing. (His dad also volunteers for the same reasons, but he's not always available and he's not trained yet. Anyway, I like camping better, and groups of teens don't scare me much....) The issue of independence from Mom isn't a big one to me at his age since he takes care of himself pretty well anyway, and he's gone off with church youth groups with no big problems. There isn't so much of a performance testing situation in church, so he's gotten along pretty well. He did shut down once when asked to wash dishes. It wasn't just having to work - he couldn't bring himself to put his hands in greasy, soapy water. (odd, because he's not a "clean" OCDer, but he really has a thing about this. Has it at home too. ) The youth pastor figured it out and had him dry and put away instead. Yes, I guess that counts as special treatment. Oh well.

 

Anyway, I hope the Kentucky mom is able to work something out, whether it be in this troop or another. Hopefully she'll pitch in some information a little earlier next time, it seems to me that it would perhaps have been helpful.

 

I know all about the odd looks and sidelong glances sctmom talks about, but I personally think we oughta be as upfront about this type of problem as we would be about diabetes, asthma (another weight on my poor kid's cross), epilepsy, or a pulled muscle. That's the only way we'll ever communicate the right attitude toward these conditions. Like OGE's son and his unique plumbing problems - just deal with it already.

 

 

[Rooster7]

Like OGE's son and his unique plumbing problems - just deal with it already

 

I think that argument loses credibility if you lump all special cases into one basket. For example, using OGE's son as an example (sorry, OGE - I hope you don't mind), it seems to me that his son is the one who's learned to "deal with it". That is to say, I don't recall hearing any stories of extraordinary effort made by the troop's leadership. From what I've heard, most of the heroics (in terms of effort) belong to the boy himself. It does sound as if the boys in the troop have accepted OGE's son without causing him any more pain. That's not a given. I just haven't heard any horror stories from OGE. So, if by "deal with it", you mean we should learn to accept other people and their situations without causing them any more pain than they've already suffered, I agree. However, I don't think we should be expecting folks to be making sacrifices and/or unusual efforts on our children's behalf. If it's my child, I'm certainly going to ask folks to do so (because I want my son to have and enjoy everything that other boys have and enjoy), but I don't think I have a right to demand it from every organization I encounter, especially if volunteers run that organization.

 

[sctmom]

So I should pull my son out of Scouts because sometimes he has a problem? Or I should put him in a troop that includes boys that are so severly handicapped they will never live on their own?

 

Geez, thinking about this, there are so many thing I didn't tell the troop -- how my son pinched my arm so hard I have a bruise, the time he locked himself in the restroom at school during a meltdown, the time he was pulled from a little league game because of meltdown, he has been known to throw up and run a fever, he cussed at me one time, he doesn't like to write, he had nightmares once or twice, he doesn't eat broccoli..............

 

Am I being sarcastic? Yep, figured it was my turn

 

I don't mind a volunteer saying "I don't know how to handle this about your child". But that should be followed by "What should we do about it?" Not "bye bye".

 

[SagerScout]

OK, well, maybe OGE's son is a bad example. What I meant was that he apparently got to the point to where he was pretty open about his condition.

 

What I have observed is that "normal" kids are often more trouble than theoretically "abnormal" kids. I have a girl in my troop that is pretty handicapped (low IQ) but she's no trouble at all; another girl that was a "normal" girl was a giant pain in the you-know-where until she gave up Scouts for basketball.

 

I've come to the conclusion that God has given us all different gifts, and some teacher/child pairs are just more productive than others. It's not like there's something wrong with that kid or with me; we're just not a good fit. Both my sons had the same elementary school teacher in different years - she loved my older son, my younger almost put her into a mental hospital. This is where a deep bench comes in, so you have ASM's around with different temperaments and hopefully each scout will hit it off with at least one of them. Goes for both the "normal" and "different" scouts. You have to wonder what really happened as I can't imagine a troop taking an autistic boy to camp and not realizing some accomodations and extra support were going to be needed.

 

 

You would think the parent should be up front as the child's advocate, but that is not always the case. I personally have seen scouts and others who don't seem to work well with their own parents. (Sadly, some parents don't appear to like their kids very much....) Same kid is no trouble at all to me.

 

[ScoutParent]

Let's not forget that this autistic boy got in a physical altercation with another scout while at camp. And certainly let's not forget that the mother made inappropriate comments in front of other scouts after the sm told her that her son could not participate in the troop.

[sctmom]

Does this troop kick out every boy who has an "altercation" with another scout? From what I read on here and what I have seen, most troops don't do that.

 

There is a boy my son has been in school with for about 5 years. I knew that C. is shy and not like the other kids. He has no sense of personal space (which drives my sensitive son up the wall). He is what you might consider "immature". As he gets older he will be considered "eccentric". Last year I found out he has a form of autism. I'd been around the kid in a few different situations and never knew. He's been at my house before. I thought he was a bit bold and loud at times, but never dawned on me he had a disability.

 

So it is very possible the adult leaders never noticed anything different, even if they were told the boy was autistic. They probably thought "okay, whatever, he seems normal enough."

 

The mother admitted she said things she should not have said. Her son was in the car crying because he had been kicked out. Is this reason to remove the family from scouting? Is she the only parent to have said something in anger in front of boys? Are you going to kick out the boy who cusses in front of the troop or is telling the crude joke?

 

[yaworski]

Sctmom,

 

The simple fact of the matter is that we still have only one side of the story and unless the Scoutmaster in question comes here, we aren't likely to hear both sides of the story.

 

 

[sctmom]

Yaworski,

You are right, we have part of the story. Just like every post on this forum and every other forum, regardless of the subject. Yet that doesn't stop most from giving advice, does it?

 

Scoutparent wasn't so eager to kick "humper" out of the troop. Wanted to look at his background, did he know he did wrong, how did he feel afterwards. But hey, here is a kid that has such a strange problem, get rid of him.

 

I'm also very amazed none of you have picked up on a bigger issue (one I stress constantly with my son, especially around swimming pools) --- health. One person who is the least bit "unclean" in as swimming pool can make others very sick. When I sent my son to summer camp, I provided him with lots of plastic grocery bags with instructions of disposing of any soiled underwear and washing himself thoroughly if there was a problem. He also knows he better not get in the pool if there is any chance he might have an incident.

 

 

[yaworski]

"Scoutparent wasn't so eager to kick "humper" out of the troop. Wanted to look at his background, did he know he did wrong, how did he feel afterwards. But hey, here is a kid that has such a strange problem, get rid of him."

 

We know how to deal with "humpers," must of us aren't prepared to deal with kids who smear feces on the wall.

 

We don't know what steps the Scoutmaster took. For all we know, the following conversation took place (bear in mind that she reportedly used foul language)

 

SM: I wish that you had told us what form your son's problems took.

 

Mom: You F-ing idiot, you're supposed to be the trained Scoutmaster, you should be prepared.

 

SM: None of have any experience with matters like this, perhaps you should look at joining a special needs troop or go to training, become and ASM and go on every outing.

 

Mom: So you're telling us to leave?!?

 

SM: Not at all, I'm just presenting options.

 

Mom: F all this sh--. We'll go but we're not going quietly!

 

 

[sctmom]

"We know how to deal with "humpers," must of us aren't prepared to deal with kids who smear feces on the wall. "

 

That is not what is being talked about! A child doing that is going to cause a lot more problems, probably be unable to communicate, wander off at all times of the night, scream at strange times, etc.

I know a Cub leader who has a daughter like that. Therefore the family doesn't camp, he just can't take the risk of her walking out of the tent at night.

 

 

 

Let's consider another scenario.

 

SM: Your son is no longer a part of this troop. Either he goes or I quit.

 

Mom: Fine, let's go.

Wait, I brought other children with me, I have to go get them. SM, I can't believe you being such an A** about this. This is f*** ridicously.

(thinking my son is devasted, he loved scouts so much and was learning so much personal responsibility)

 

SM: You need to leave now. Again, I can't fathom that your child would do SUCH A THING! It's so disgusting and abnormal. (thinking this boy needs to be in an institution, the whole family is nuts, why doesn't he just use the toilet?)

 

 

I'm reminded of the time a few years ago when my son went into meltdown at the baseball park before a little league game. I'm standing there alone with him, my hands full with lawn chair, keys, etc. He goes into "brain lock" and kicks me. I take the glove and bat from him (potential weapons). He is at the point of no return. I am trying to remove him from the situation and get back to the car. If I turn loose of his arm, he will dart out into the traffic or attack me, he is hitting and kicking and screaming. I'm juggling bat, chair, glove, keys in one hand. The parents are all standing there whispering. One coach looks at us and says "You're lucky you aren't my son right now". I looked the man in the eye and said "For 5 bucks he can be."

Don't know where that came from! Was that me? Do you know that man has always been very nice to me since then and very concerned about my son. I think he realized that I was doing the best I could and there was more than met the eye.

 

Maybe we should all have signs around our necks that list out all of our problems. Then things would be simplier.

[ScouterPaul]

I reside in the Linclon Heritage Council, which is the same Council that this young man's Troop is from. Several posters have stated that there was more to the situation than the newspapers told. They are right. We only heard the Mothers side of the story. The SM, CE, DE and everyone else involved kept their mouth shut about what happened. They protected the right to privacy of this young Scout. The Scout was offered alternative solutions before being asked to leave the Troop. The Mother refused all solutions.

[evmori]

sctmom,

In yours and yaworski's scenario the mom used the F word and the SM handled the situation well. In my Troop, anyone using the F word goes home. Adult or Scout. And since it seems mom in this case is a wonderful influence to her son, I can only assume more happened at camp than we know. I respect the Troop for not embelishing on what happened. And form the last post of ScoutPaul, mom seems to be unreasonable.

 

This boy needs the Scouting program. The only problem I see in any Troop he will join is mom. The reason I say this is it seems she has the attitude "my son has a a problem that causes all his other problems" and he does no wrong.

 

Ed Mori

Scoutmaster

Troop 1

1 Peter 4:10