Laughs: Counseling and Abrasive Adolescents
I pulled up to a brick building way down south in Chicago. I’d never been so far south within the city limits. One might as well have lived in Indiana at this point when compared to the impoverished Roseland neighborhood. I lived on 21st and this place was 12 miles south of me on 137th. Viewing the historical neighborhoods of Chicago’s World Fair didn’t disappoint. Seeing new neighborhoods in the city was a pastime of mine as a crisis counselor. I entered the school and what began to unfold brought me some joy on a dark and gloomy day.
At the main office, the teacher thanked me for coming and stated with vigor, “He’s the most oppositional and disrespectful kid I’ve ever seen. His parents are monsters and I can never finish anything in my classroom with him around!” I ensured the teacher that this was not my first crisis call and that I was well prepared to deal with a 6-year old. Eh, maybe he was 5. It doesn’t matter. I only ever took one childhood development class in college, so 5 or 6, who cares?
I walk toward the principal’s office and start asking, “What else is so bad about this kid?”
The principal responds with, “He’s quite disrespectful and his family has a lot of issues. They’re in here all the time and they’re very resistant to any kind of treatment. I don’t think you’ll be able to convince them to hospitalize Jimmy, but if we call for a crisis evaluation, something’s gotta change. Maybe we can help get him some counseling”.
“Okay. Let’s see the kid!” The teacher and I walked into a colorful classroom see a young African American boy playing with his dinosaur toys. We greet Jimmy and I ask him about the toys he’s playing with. I told him that I like dinosaurs, too, and that I had “all the dinosaur toys” when I was a kid. I asked him what his favorite dinosaur was. He responded by looking away. Clearly, there was something wrong or maybe he was just shy.
Looking at him I spoke, “My favorite dinosaur was the dimetrodon. Do you like that dinosaur?” Jimmy did not respond. There was an awkward silence for a good minute, but I continued to stare at him. My pestering went on and something surprising happened.
“I don’t talk to strangers”, he said. I responded with, “That’s a good rule, but I’m not a stranger. I’m a counselor and I work with your teacher”.
“I don’t want to talk to you. I don’t like you”, he said.
“Why don’t you like me?”
“Cuz you a bitch-ass hoe”.
I just started tearing up trying to stifle my laughter. Wiser words had not been spoken. Maybe I was an inexperienced counselor or maybe I had just never been shut down by a 6-year-old’s annoyingly high voice. I stared back at Jimmy with a straight face and said to him, “That’s not a nice thing to say”.
Persistently, he repeated, “You a bitch-ass hoe”. He got me good. Never had I ever been compared to such vile terminology, but there was some good news. Language and defiance alone were not enough to hospitalize a 6-year-old, which meant I had no need to find a hospital bed for Jimmy. I informed the teacher and principal that I would not be hospitalizing Jimmy, but that I would highly recommend counseling just as they’d suggested.
Ultimately, this kid was a victim of poor parenting or well, any parenting. I never met Jimmy’s parents. The teacher and principal had regular interactions with them, but they did not answer the phone when I contacted them. I’d like to wonder what type of people they were for a 6-year old to pick up such incredible language, but by the time he’d hit the 4th grade, he’d know all those horrible words anyway. Sending him to the psychiatric hospital wouldn’t have done any good, but I wonder what happened to Jimmy. He’d be 11 years old now. Was he still cursing out teachers? Was he on the way to the criminal justice system like many of my other clients? Maybe he’d end up in foster care. Crisis intervention has its bad days and I don’t know if this is a happy story, but maybe he’ll end up being a comedian.
This is based on a real event, but the client’s name and any identifying information have been withheld.
