Mommy Thoughts

Being a mommy is such hard work sometimes but wow... It is a treasure too, isn't it?

It amazes me, as I sit here with one child 'all grown up' at 21 years old and my youngest being 12-plus having my nephew living with me since February, that each child has so much to offer.

Mr.AllGrownUp is a gentle rebel. 

He, really, is the child that taught me to respect non conformance.  He has never had that timid obedience to authority. He is the child that always questioned, demanded that one earned his respect before he gave it and had no problem with breaking the rules when he felt it was necessary. He felt it necessary in Kindergarten when he 'got in a fight' with another child.  He told me and the principal that he did indeed understand that fighting is wrong but "That kid was pushing a girl off the play fort!"
He felt it was 'worth the consequences' in grade eleven when he got in between two girls that were fighting (one ended up in the hospital) and was suspended.  (Zero tolerance policy). 

He is also the child that taught me that not all boys think hitting is fun.  He is the boy that walked away.  That would protect himself, but chose to not hit back.

He taught me that parenting is a valuable skill.  That i had to hone that skill, be flexible enough to learn new things fast but rigid enough to maintain some sort of order.  He taught me, with his sticky hand in mine, that there was nothing more valuable that i could be doing.  That being a mother was the most important thing I would ever do.

Ms Princess is fast becoming 'allgrowedup'.  Being the only daughter, she and I have had some spectacular clashes yet I admire her beyond words.

She is the child that taught me just how important self acceptance and confidence is.  She taught me to have patience for my own weaknesses, to not judge myself so harshly.  She is very confident, close to being 'cocky'.  She excels at everything she puts her hand to.  She can draw, paint, play guitar, sing and write with skill and talent.  She is the junior captain of the Wrestling team, performs in front of her peers without issue, plays sports and is an honour roll student.

Ms Princess is the child that taught me to see the world around me as beautiful, exciting and educational.  From the time she could crawl she demonstrated how a drawer was actually a play area, rich with sound, texture and exploration possibilities.  That flour was a medium for art, an ingredient for play, integral to science (inside joke, she dumped a huge pail of flour on little man's head).  She was constantly 'getting into trouble'-destroying things, colouring on walls, emptying ketchup onto the flour-you name it.  She just HAD to KNOW! To know what it felt like, looked like, tasted like and of course what it looked like on her younger brother's head.

 She taught me that people go through phases.  Princess has been the teacher's pet and the teachers arch nemesis.  She has been the 'popular' child in class and the wall flower.  She has been raucous and loud and ultra calm and quiet.  She has been the burly and been the champion of the bullied.  (I wonder if that is all part of her exploratory nature? )

My daughter, she taught me that I can be spitting mad and filled with love and tenderness all at the same time.  That I can watch a physical sport like wrestling and have the urge to jump on the mat and help.  She taught me be artistic, to create and be proud of my accomplishments.

Little Man is our child on the ASD spectrum. 

He is the child that taught me that every dang child is completely unique.  That experience can be a detriment when we use it to make assumptions.  As the oldest of four children and having run daycare for ten years I went into my pregnancy with Little Man with confidence.  From the moment of the first ultrasound he has been teaching me to leave room for differences, to not be rigid with over confidence.

He is the child that taught me to fight when I feel it is needed.  That passive does not cut it.  He taught me to stand up for what is right regardless of who disagreed (the whole dang family told me I was wrong, that I should not worry about him.)

He is the child that taught me that there is great joy in being an advocate.  That labels are just words-needed to services but change nothing.  He taught me that the things we fear are only scary if we refuse to learn about them.

Little Man taught me to be humble.  His genuine honesty humbles me.  His amazing ability humbles me.  His sweet smile and quirky humor.

Little Man taught me that nothing is impossible. 

I can't imagine my life being without my children-any of them.  Their diverse personalities and their love of life has been the greatest gift I have ever received. 

Hugs and laughter

Mothers who kill their children.... It is not about autism.

Disclaimer: Yes, I am opinionated.  Deal with it.

Age of Ridiculous have a new post up concerning another child who was murdered by their parent.

"Four children with autism under the age of 21 have been murdered by their parents in a single summer. Two in Dallas, TX, one in The Bronx, NY, and now Christopher Melton of Howard County, Maryland. What more can I add? KS"

The above quote is a beautiful example of how those AoA folks want everything negative to be about autism.  Four children in North America, over three months, have been murdered this summer (allegedly) by their parents.  AoA's KimS is certainly happy to demand the nation to see this as a national crisis.  The general consensus among the loons over there is that these poor parents did not have enough support (what parent does?).  That if only there were more supports in place for parents of autistic children then this would not happen!

The statistics do not work with this hew and outcry, however.  According to this and the American Anthropological Association  200 American Mommies kill their children every damn year.  Heck, in 1983 600 American children will murdered by their parents [Kaye, Neil; Neal M. Borenstein and Susan Donnelly (1990). "Families, murder, and insanity: a psychiatric review of paternal neonaticide". Journal of Forensic Sciences 35: 134.]

Why is it we are only hearing (or mostly hearing only) about autistic children being murdered?

Because it is more titilating to read.  Partly because as parents of autistic children (or persons whom are autistic) we also have the word 'autism' flagged in google news. 

Use your head KimS of AoA.  It ain't about autism.  It is about mental health of the parents.  It is about evil.  But it sure as hell is not the child's fault, nor the government's fault.

Not saying, either, that I don't believe that ALL parents need more help than what is readily available.  I am sure that we all have had moments when some respite care would have been more than welcome.

But as adults who are responsible for our children it is OUR job to be aware of our own mental health.  It is our job to reach out for help when we need it.  To make sure that we are looking after our selves in order to be the best damn parent we can be.

Shame on Age of Assholes for implying (and at times outright saying) that the autistic child causes their parent to murder them.  For saying that raising an autistic child is so bloody damn difficult that murder/suicide is a serious consideration.

For Shame...

New Rethinking Autism Video

Click Here to see the new video from www.rethinkingautism.com

Gee, guess Age of Idiots was wrong again!  There ARE adults with Autism!!

Every Child has the Right TO be LOVED-special needs included.

Children have rights.  There are 54 articles (I'm only posting two for examples) listed in the 'summary of the rights under the convention on the Rights of the Child'.  These are WORLD rights.
Those rights superseed their parent's rights to 'freedom of speech' and all other rights to enjoy themselves.  Those rights apply regardless of location, race, disablity, religion and so forth.

Article 2 (Non-discrimination): The Convention applies to all children, whatever their race, religion or abilities; whatever they think or say, whatever type of family they come from. It doesn’t matter where children live, what language they speak, what their parents do, whether they are boys or girls, what their culture is, whether they have a disability or whether they are rich or poor. No child should be treated unfairly on any basis.

A child's best interests must be considered as teh PRIMARY concern when making descisions that affect them.

Article 3 (Best interests of the child): The best interests of children must be the primary concern in making decisions that may affect them. All adults should do what is best for children. When adults make decisions, they should think about how their decisions will affect children. This particularly applies to budget, policy and law makers

Children have the right to live without abuse.  The right to be safe and cared for.
According the the Justice Centre in Canada emotional abuse is "harming a child's sense of self"
I wonder if letting a child know that you think they would be better off dead is considered abuse? (sarcasm).

Now that we know what rights children have, and what constitutes abuse let us look at all these parents that moan and groan about raising their autistic child, those parents that condone murdering a child because that child is autistic... For those parents I have a message.


To all the mommy's (and daddy's) out there that are struggling to raise an autistic child, living the horror that is autism, desperate, would rather their child have cancer, vaccine injured, living a tragedy, overwhelmed or whatever other excuse you feel you may have to harm your child:

Call Child protective services.  Give your child to the Ministry of Children.  Heck! you can advertise on Craigslist. (This is not a serious suggestion-do not sell your child.)

There are millions of people out there that will take your c hild. They will love your child.  Provide your child with everything he/she needs to meet their potential in a home where they are accepted and loved, encouraged and supported.

You really think someone else can't love your child? That your child is too much, too sick, to injured for me to be able to compare my child to?

FUCK YOU.
Each and every last one of you that compares your child to AIDS, the Houlocaust, Cancer should hang your head in SHAME.

If you truly, really feel that your child is so damaged, so sick, so unworthy of being loved the way they are you should hand that child over to the applicable government agency that WILL find a family that will NOT feel that way. 

It is every child's right to be loved and accepted, supported and nurtured.  I don't care if your child has every disability known to mankind-you still do not have the right to choose to abuse or murder your child.

Is it hard to parent a child with special needs? Yup, you bet.  Do parents sometimes feel overwhelmed? Of course!  Does that justify harming your child? Absolutely not. 

Dealing with the pain and frustration that comes with parenting is part of being an adult.  And loving parents that know they are not coping get help.  Real adults let someone else care for their child if they cannot.  Period.

JRC house of perversity

The text below in black font is taken from www.judgerc.org/history.html



The words are quite complex, so I have translated it into simple phrasing in red font.



A thoroughgoing behavioral approach differs markedly from these traditional approaches in certain ways. Some of these differences, which are itemized below, have caused JRC to experience difficulties with licensing agencies from time to time.

Our approach is unethical, unproven and torturous. Some agencies just don’t get that we are getting results and that is all that should matter.

• Near-zero rejection and expulsion policy. In order to have victims we take all cases. We have always accepted any and all individuals for treatment and have tried to maintain a zero or near-zero rejection and expulsion policy, provided that the needed treatment procedures are made available to us. As long as you do what we want, and sign our many waivers, your child is most welcome to come here to be subjected to our abuse. So no worries, you will never have to deal with your child again! We do not limit those whom we accept to persons with certain psychiatric diagnoses and labels. In fact, once we have determined that the least restrictive and most effective treatment for a student is behavioral treatment, we really pay relatively little attention to psychiatric diagnoses which are essentially labels for groups of behaviors. Instead, we look directly at the behaviors that are the individual’s problem and simply set about treating each of those individual behaviors. Of the first two students we worked with, one was labeled autistic and one was labeled schizophrenic. We don’t give a flying fuck what disabilities your child has. Blind? We will zap her until she can see! Emotional disturbed? We will spank them till they get over it! We make no allowances for anything-in our school your child will do what we want…. Or else.



Our policy of near-zero rejection and expulsions, coupled with the success we demonstrated in treating our students, resulted in agencies referring their most difficult behavior problems to us. Most agencies do refer us! And please don’t read that bit about agencies not getting us-we wouldn’t want you to realize just how full of it we are. Seriously folks, no other school or hospital will let you dump your child off? They will be welcome here! Most of our referrals had been unsuccessfully served in numerous other private and public mental health and educational facilities before they were referred to JRC. Many of our students arrive directly from unsuccessful psychiatric admissions. Your child will live here with some of the most troublesome cases. Because we don’t give a shit what your child is like, we blend together children of all different ability levels. The psychotic child with violent tendencies will bunk with the child who compulsively needs to tap their nose.



• Active treatment rather than warehousing. We do not solve behavioral problems by simply accepting the problem behavior as it is and adjusting our treatment environment to allow it to occur; instead, our goal is apply active treatment and educational procedures to change the behavior so that the individual can function successfully in the normal environment outside of our treatment facility. While we are an institution, a warehouse for children whose families drop them off to us, because we will torture your child into behaving we like to be called an ‘active treatment centre’ because it sounds more friendly. Our goal is to employ untrained goons to spank and zap your child!



The fact that our mission is to provide active and relatively rapid treatment of severe behavior problems, with a no-rejection and no-expulsion policy, and not merely to serve as a care facility for children whose only problem is that they lack a normal home environment, explains some of the issues we have had with licensing agencies from time to time. Licensing standards that are set up for the latter type of facilities are not appropriate for programs that are designed for the active treatment of extreme problem behaviors. The fact that our mission is to quickly punish your child for any behaviour we feel is a problem, with all children’s disabilities not considered, and not only to house these unwanted children, explains why we have been allowed to torture children for this many years.



• Treatment with a unitary, coordinated and comprehensively Skinnerian, behavioral approach, rather than with a “multi-disciplinary” approach. The hallmark of JRC is that it is makes use of a behavioral approach and that this approach guides and informs all services provided by the agency to staff, students and parents. Although JRC has always employed nurses, speech therapists, physical therapists, psychiatrists, physicians, medical consultants and teachers, all of these special services are administered in a manner that is as consistent as is possible and practical with an overall Skinnerian, behavioral approach. JRC is probably the most consistently behavioral treatment program in existence.JRC is famous as the ‘school of shock’. We employ a wide variety or persons, from nurses to joe blows, and all of them are involved in torturing your child. Each and everyone of our employees is a sadist.



• Behavioral rather than a psychiatric, approach. A behavioral approach essentially views a treatment problem as one in which the individual has certain behaviors that need to be decreased and certain ones that need to be increased. The fundamental technique for accomplishing these increases and decreases is the application of rewards and punishments. We use as one of our most important measures of effectiveness, the frequency of problem and desired behaviors. Behavioral frequencies and trends are displayed on Precision Teaching Charts that had been designed in the 1960s by Dr. Ogden Lindsley, another student of Skinner. Behavioral treatment decisions are based on the data shown on these charts, rather than on clinical impressions, hunches, or observations alone.As mentioned before, we really do not care about your child’s existing disabilities. We will simply decide how we want your child to behave and then enforce our wishes by shocking, spanking and restraining them when they do not comply.



• Behavioral, rather than traditional counseling. At JRC counseling is done as a fully coordinated and integrated component of a total behavioral approach. We call our counseling “behavioral counseling.” This means, for example, the following: the counseling is not given on a regular schedule but rather on an as-needed basis; the counseling is not given at points where it might function as an inadvertent reward for some problem behavior that has just occurred; the counseling is given by clinicians and other trained staff that are employed by JRC, rather than being provided by persons outside of JRC; the content of the counseling session is not necessarily kept private between the counselor and the counselee, but instead is shared with other professionals in the agency as needed; and the purpose of the counseling is to enhance the student’s cooperation with, and progress within, the JRC program and to change his/her behavior toward the treatment goals set by JRC. We don’t give a fuck about your child’s tortured past. What we do care about is getting results. Fear is much faster, although a lazier, way of ensuring compliance. Everyone involved with your child has been screened by us and will not tattle.



• Behavioral procedures as the means of treatment, rather than the use of normalization. The dominant philosophy of the care of mentally disabled individuals during much of JRC’s existence, which continues even today, is that of normalization, also sometimes referred to as social role valorization. This approach, which insists that such persons should be placed in, and cared for, with as “normal” a set of procedures as possible, is frankly opposed to the notion of behavioral treatment. In behavioral treatment, normalization is accepted as the goal of the treatment process, but not as the means for reaching that goal. Indeed, behavioral procedures that will effectively eliminate problematic behaviors and help the student improve his/her condition and live a more normal life often have to be highly abnormal at first until the behavior changes sufficiently. As the behavior changes, however, the environmental conditions can and are made increasingly normal. The key word is DOMINANT. We ignore the standards of accepted behavorial treatment and do the opposite.



In this respect, JRC is like a medical hospital. The goal of most medical hospitals is to return the individual to good health and to a normal living situation outside the hospital; however, in order to reach that goal it may be necessary to do some highly “abnormal” procedures within the operating rooms and in the emergency and intensive care wards of the hospital. Like a hospital we get cranky when you try to remove someone from our care. We provide a physically colourful environment with an emotional sterile lifestyle.



• A complete treatment facility—i.e., not tossing the treatment problem to others when the problem becomes difficult. We view our program as a “hospital of last resort” where whatever behavioral treatment is needed will be applied to solve the problem. If a student becomes difficult to handle, we do not turn the problem over to a psychiatric facility or to the criminal justice system; instead, we adjust our treatment procedures to adequately deal with the problem behaviorally. Because we do not wish for other professionals to note the abuse your child has been subjected to, we treat all problems in house. If your child needs medical or dental problems, we will deal with it. If your child should be turned over to the police for their actions, instead we will up the intensity of their physical punishments.



• No or minimal use of psychotropic medication. We have always employed either no psychotropic medication at all, or the very minimal amount that is needed. Psychiatrists are employed to help us assess whether such medication is needed and to help us diminish or eliminate the psychotropic medication when it is not needed. Our psychiatrists make considerable use of our behavioral charts as they make these decisions. We can’t be bothered with medications-it is too hard to track and impedes on a persons ability to fully feel our punishments.



• Use of powerful rewards. In order to treat individuals without drugs, and without traditional counseling or warehousing, a program will obviously need alternative effective procedures that can be used in their place. In JRC’s behavioral approach this means, among other things, that first and foremost the program must have available as powerful a set of rewards as is possible. The first area in JRC’s present school building that we created was a large arcade-type reward area to motivate students to behave well and learn. We also created a reward corner in each developmentally delayed classroom, reward boxes for the teachers to use, a contract store where students could pick rewards to purchase and work for, etc. We are not aware of any other treatment center that uses as wide a variety and as powerful a set of rewards as we do. Not being tortured is a powerful reward. But on top of that we offer all sorts of things that are known to increase negative behaviours (sugar, video stims, electronics, flashy lights and confusing noises) to ensure we will have future opportunities to punish your child.



• Giving the parent the option to supplement the reward treatment with physical aversives when rewards and educational procedures alone prove to be insufficiently effective. If treatment with the use of rewards, loss of privileges, fines, other non-physical aversives, and educational procedures, prove insufficiently effective by themselves, then the parent should be given the option of supplementing the student’s program with carefully administered physical aversives. In the 1970s and 1980’s, JRC employed physical aversives such as the pinch, spank, muscle squeeze, water spray, vapor spray (mixture of compressed air and water), ammonia capsule, unpleasant taste, and white noise. During the 1991-1993 period, JRC substituted a 2-second remote-controlled shock to the surface of the skin for all of these procedures. This procedure is called the GED (Graduated Electronic Decelerator).



At the time that JRC was starting (1971), a movement to limit the use of punishments in the raising of children was already well under way. In that year, for example, Sweden passed a law banning the use of punishment with children. (Interestingly, no punishment was specified for failing to obey the law). The use of punishments in the education and treatment of children is still, today, vigorously opposed in certain quarters and has even been banned in the regulation of certain state agencies. OCCS regulations, for example, explicitly ban the use of aversive procedures. Every year or so a bill is introduced in the Massachusetts state legislature to ban the use of aversives. (This bill has never passed, however.) Because of all this, JRC and its parents have had to battle fiercely over the years to create and preserve this important component of its treatment. Not only will we zap your child at will, but we will give you equipment to do the same! Just imagine, everytime you are annoyed you can push a button and BAM! A child terrified to disobey you! As an added bonus, you can shrug your shoulders with a ‘the school says to do it!’ and feel blameless!



• Video monitoring, 24/7 of staff performance. The best-laid behavioral programs in the world are to no avail if they are not carried out as designed by the direct care staff. Ever since JRC’s first residential program in 1975, we have used videos cameras in all rooms to monitor staff, and sometimes student, performance. Your child will be videographed at all times, so that we can watch, rewatch and rewatch our favourite perverse moments of your child’s pain and torment.

This set of policies has always enabled JRC to provide unusually effective treatment. Ultimately, the parents and placement agencies are interested in is just that—effective treatment. As a result, during the period 1971 through 1985 JRC grew from 2 students to approximately 65 students. Our school and administrative offices were in Providence, Rhode Island during this period.

The fucked up system we follow allows us to torture, torment and otherwise create fear in children. Ultimately the parents and agencies that hand us children are just as effed up as we are and find sadistic pleasure in their charges pain and suffering.

From 1971 to 1975 JRC operated as a day school/treatment center. The program was approved by both the Rhode Island Department of Education and was licensed by the Rhode Island Department of Mental Health. In 1975 we opened a residence for some of its students in Seekonk, Massachusetts. In succeeding years we added other residences in Attleboro and Rehoboth, Massachusetts. These residences were licensed as group residences by the Massachusetts Office for Children (OFC).



We have grown! Please send us more children to abuse so that we can quote our number increase as being a way to validate what we are doing!