Our BetterMost Community > Chez Tremblay
Another viewing, and a revelation
Ellemeno:
--- Quote from: ednbarby on October 28, 2006, 07:12:13 pm ---A couple of times I've seen a kid carrying on with his or her Mom in the store and walked by with Will and said, "It's a *fun* age, isn't it?" They've always given me such a grateful look. Just being reminded now and again that your kid isn't the only one who's ever behaved atrociously in public helps.
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Thanks for this story, Barb. Yes, sometimes I'm the mom hanging by not much, and sometimes I'm the smile. I am always grateful to see another kid acting up. we went to a birthday party at the Little Gym the other day, and I was so relieved to see a couple of kids not getting with the program, in terms of following the grop activity. Miranda often marches ton her own drummer, and I usually feel self-conscious.
ednbarby:
--- Quote from: Ellemeno on October 28, 2006, 08:31:18 pm ---Thanks for this story, Barb. Yes, sometimes I'm the mom hanging by not much, and sometimes I'm the smile. I am always grateful to see another kid acting up. we went to a birthday party at the Little Gym the other day, and I was so relieved to see a couple of kids not getting with the program, in terms of following the grop activity. Miranda often marches ton her own drummer, and I usually feel self-conscious.
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Oh, man, do I know from that kind of thing. When Will was about 18 months old, I enrolled him in a Gymboree program (kind of Mommy & Me) down here. He was always the *only* kid who was busily going in the opposite direction of everyone else. Didn't want to sit on my lap and clap and attempt to sing like all the other little kids - he just wanted to chase balls around on the mats and roll them down stuff to see what they'd do. The whole time. I was so embarassed. But Ed said "So he isn't a sheep like the rest of them. Just means he'll be an interesting adult later. Screw 'em." The teacher was not very understanding about it, either, so that didn't help matters.
Now, at almost five, he sits in the center of every circle of kids and leads them in song. We took him to a birthday party last weekend where there was a clown (a non-scary female one). She was very interactive with the kids and actually did very entertaining magic tricks. He was right there in the center responding enthusiastically to everything she said and did - he even got called up to assist her with a trick (he was a plant, actually ;)). It'll come. And in the meantime, just remember she'll be an interesting adult later.
Case in point: The photo below is from his third birthday party. I'm doing everything I can to hold him down while they're singing happy birthday to him. Right after that, he took off and the other kids blew the candles out for him.
delalluvia:
--- Quote ---And the threat of “I’m going to punish you for telling” paralyzes you because you cannot imagine what could be worse than what happened in the first place.
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Too true. There is no point, either as a child or adult, for abusers to be punished if they are not going to be prevented from contact with those they have victimized.
--- Quote from: ednbarby on October 28, 2006, 07:12:13 pm ---God, Del. That's awful. What makes some people such monsters? Are they born or made? I lean a little towards the latter but I'm sure it's a combination of a lot of things. My brother punished me a couple of times, too, when I threatened to tell, but nothing like what your (boy) cousin did.
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I don't know, barb. I would have thought a bad homelife, you know, the abused becoming the abusers, but from all I can tell, their homelife was just fine. Currently, they are good children to their aged parents, come over and help when they can, run errands, take them to doctor's visits....[shrugs]. It may be all a facade, but how can anyone who isn't on the inside tell?
I can only pray for karma, though your faith can be shaken by the slow response of the gods. Right now, both these abusive cousins are what we would call successful, happy pillars of the community. Both are married to loving caring spouses, are doing well financially, have children who show every sign of being extremely intelligent and doing their parents proud...my sister is divorced, living paycheck to paycheck, has 'let herself' go, is in remission for cancer, recently diagnosed with diabetes and while I maintain my health and a not much better financial situation, there doesn't look like there will ever be any loving spouse in my future.
Life really sucks sometimes, but things could be worse, much worse.
isabelle:
--- Quote from: ednbarby on October 28, 2006, 07:12:13 pm ---God, Del. That's awful. What makes some people such monsters? Are they born or made? I lean a little towards the latter but I'm sure it's a combination of a lot of things.
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A little piece of information that might interest some of you here: I am reading a book by Lionel Shriver entitled "We need to talk about Kevin". It was inspired by the Columbine killings. The narrator, the mother of a 16 year-old mass murderer in a school, speaks in the first person through letters sent to her estranged husband. I have only read 50 pages so far but am hooked. Among other things, it addresses this big question: is evil innate or not?
I also agree that it is a mixture of both.
ednbarby:
I think we're all born with tendencies towards things. What we experience and how we react to it then pushes us more towards what our tendencies already are. And I think that how each of us reacts to our environment is actually predetermined to a certain extent. Not in a creationistic, fundamentalist Christian way - in a scientific one. Our very genetic makeup dictates how our minds and bodies will react to trauma. And no two people are truly identical, not even identical twins. Because even though they have the same DNA, they can't possibly have exactly the same chemical makeup in their brains and bodies - they can't possibly experience exactly the same stimuli in exactly the same way, and thus the different stimuli each experiences will affect the chemical makeup of each differently.
OK, I'm blathering. But nature vs. nurture has always been a fascinating topic to me. I've seen really compelling cases made for each, but I can't shake the notion that monsters are born, not made. Sure, most if not all serial killers come from abusive childhoods. But so do a whole lot of other people who'd never hurt a fly. Of course, mine is a very troubling notion. It suggests that we can't change a human predator at an early age. But I believe we can. I've seen autistic children cured by hours and hours of intensive therapy weekly for a couple of years. Like Marilyn Manson, of all people, said about the Columbine killers when asked if given the opportunity before it happened to talk with them, what would he say, "I wouldn't talk at all - I'd listen. And that's what no one did." I think I'm fascinated with serial killers because I want to know what exactly makes someone have absolutely no pity and no remorse for his fellow human beings and to think of them as animals that are somehow beneath him? If we could know that - if we could know that there is a turning point in childhood that could be thwarted... Well...
I'm blathering again. I really should get out more.
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