True Stories from KDS: Like Mother, Like Son

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This is a true story…

At KDS we had a student named TJ.  He had a mix of developmental disabilities.  His IQ was in the 50’s. He had some physical disabilities in that he was long and thin with very poor bipedal balance (he had a sort of funny walk that looked like he was stepping out of deep snow.)  He seemed to be on the verge of falling often, but never did.  He had speech irregularities which made him difficult to understand.  He compensated for his speech by repeating himself often and even more often when he was anxious or upset.  He thought he was a bit of a hip-hop gangsta (however, he may be the whitest kid I’ve ever known.)  He would call himself “TJ Fresh” in which I would respond, “TJ Stale” which always made him grin.  He had been removed from his home because his mother was unable to provide adequate care for him, and we suspected TJ was subject to some hurtful situations.

TJ’s mother also had developmental disabilities and had her own caseworker.  Debbie was often homeless and was unable to keep track of her own finances or get and maintain employment.  She also was difficult to understand and had many of the same speech-patterns TJ had.

I had to supervise the phone calls between TJ and his mother.  TJ would come into my office, I would put Debbie on the speaker phone, and they would talk.

One afternoon Debbie called from her caseworker’s office to talk to TJ.  I brought TJ into my office and shut the door.  Here is the “conversation” they had:

            DEBBIE: TJ,TJ,TJ. Areyouthereareyoutherareyouthere?

           

TJ: I’m here Mama, I’m here, I’m here.

DEBBIE: I want to tell you something TJ, I want to tell you something. I’m codapenantcodapenantcodapenant TJ, I’m codapenantcodapenantcodapenant.

TJ: (stares blankly at phone)

ME: I’m sorry, Debbie. We don’t know what you are saying.

(shuffle,creaking,sliding,scooting sounds)

DEBBIE’S CASEWORKER: Hello, Mr. Geil, TJ.

ME: Hello, Miss Smith.

DEBBIE'S CASEWORKER: What Debbie is saying is that in therapy we have talked about “codependency.”  She is telling TJ that she is co-dependent.

DEBBIE: (said mostly in one breath) That’s right TJ, codapenant, codapenant, codapenant, codapenant codapenant, codapenant.  TJ, I want to tell you I’ll never do anything to hurt you, to hurt you, to hurt you and I’ll never do anything to hurt myself, myself, myself, like, you know you know when sometimes I get depressed and I say I want to kill myself kill myself kill myself when I get depressed and like the other night when I met this man and we were in his apartment and about three in the morning I was getting depressed depressed depressed and I started saying I wanted to killmyself killmyselfkillmyself and then the man dragged me into the bathroom and put a knife to my neck and said, “If you want to die, I’ll kill you right now!”……I’m not going to do that.

TJ:…………Mama…………can I have a “Starter” jacket for Christmas?

ME: (and then my brain exploded)

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