Exploring the child's world II; 2

The Duquesne University Alumni Association presents. Exploring child. That child is father to the man. And this we hope for a world of men of good will. We must look to the conditions of the child's world to achieve it. So we search for the laws of ways and means the sources of the capable spontaneously whole adult. It is not strange that the world of the disturbed child throws a light on childhood in general. Although Father Francis Duffy Professor of

Sociology at Duquesne University was not at first looking for this light when he started working with a disturbed child. He found however that it is not that the disturbed or delinquent child is completely removed from society rather that his position is more extreme and so its obviousness offers us a sharper clearer insight into the world of children. To share the fruit of his research Father Francis Duffy and the Duquesne University Alumni Association present a series of recorded interviews with delinquent children followed by a short discussion with Father Duffy's guest in which the child and his problems are explored for insight. Children who are sick and early youth often exhibit a carry over in later life in the area of their behavior. If the period of air sickness is complicated by a disturbed home the mistakes and the damage are magnified and compounded. The boy we are about to listen to is a product of such a home. Many of the standard

errors are present in the mother and father drank a great deal. They fought in the presence of the child. They finally got a divorce about that time the child became an epileptic. Later on the mother married again and she now works outside the home. The stepfather is interested in a rather kindly man but he doesn't always understand the boy and occasionally he mismanages the boy particularly in times of problems and crises. Tony seems to be so grateful that his home life is considerably improved that he's willing to describe it as the ideal average home. Everything is fine everybody's wonderful. His real father was an alcoholic and the mother became an alcoholic after her divorce she married a second husband and he too seems to have been a very heavy drinker until recently the boy has taken up heavy drinking during the past year and since he must take tranquilizers because of his epileptic condition his drinking has become

peak or Oblivion drinking when drunk he appears to be almost catatonic. He can't walk right he can't support himself and he talks incoherently. Let's listen as he describes himself in the world as he sees it. What's your name. Tony. How old are you Tony. Fourteen. You still go to school and yes you go to Peru or private or public a Catholic I go to Saint Joseph. And how far do you get in school so far. Ten. You doing pretty well in school. I yes I am on the honor roll. You are not you're not a problem in school for cutting classes or anything like that. Oh no no. And how come you're here this time. I drank it. Were you drinking Were you drunk. Yeah I was in my house and my cousin reported me and they came down. The police came and take you up here for a burn a cat which

they did I didn't know nothing about it till some till they told me someone set a cat on fire. Who did that. My cousin did and they tried to blame it on me. He was drinking too. Well let me ask you this we're ever in here before. How many times were once and what was it for the time taken money off my dad tried to say I was took some $400 and how much did you really take 18. So he fined the rest. He knew that you didn't take what he knows now and you didn't take all of the money then. Do you remember seeing me the night you came in. I don't remember exactly. Well do you remember anything about that night. No Mr. Robinson told me I took a swing at him I don't remember that. When did you start to drink how old were you then. This is my first year. And how did it happen were you at a party or at home or

a party and. Yeah we was drinking Thunderbird and some it was my cousins birthday and you see when we went in we took a drink and then another until we got drunk. And do you take any other kind of medicine. Yes. What do you take for what they call metal electric fits I think. You think you have epilepsy I guess. Have you always had it. Yes I started when I was about five and I bought five and I you know have taken the pills. What happened then that you got this. Do you think I got dizzy. And I passed out and somebody would have have to hold me down. Then if someone wouldn't hold me Don I'd start fighting back. Yes and they took me to the hospital for a while and I don't know if this is true or not but they said it took six nurses and doctors to hold me down on a con..

That stuff the medicine or the what's this thing on your hand. It's a club that we made out. What's the name of the club. Well we call it the kitten club. Do the girls get this tattoo and they get that on on their arm and also various placements we plant dances and make cakes and cookies keep the kids off the street. We we you know every Friday I see. It's pretty nice here and I guess they treat you nice. Yeah. You haven't had a spell since you came here not this time but the last. My last time I did when I was here. I see you and Tony you have just one mother and one for you I have a stepdaughter my stepfather works paints hospice in that I see is that in town here. Yeah down here in Pittsburgh. And how does he treat you. I like him better than my father. You like your stepfather but in your real

father. Yeah they have just the one other son that you told me about and he still lives with you. Yes. Was he ever in trouble. No we were in an institution of any kind you know. What do you hope to do when you grow up I want to be a welder for a living. Then they brought me up here for I wasn't drunk we was going down to Pittsburgh and do a job for them in this guy. Are you pretty good at welding. He was going to nail a plane on a plane down there and we're going to put a plate on it. I see. Weld it on. Yeah. Instead of that I think you got drunk and yeah we're there boys and girls with you when you're drunk. You were just at home with your cousin. My I was at this guy's eyes and he got there and it was whining

in that stuff about this cat. Did you see the cat. It was romping down there and I saw something come out burned and smoke red and yellow and stop. Is your mother pretty tolerant of you does she does your mother like you. Yeah. Little How is she sure she's always she's always you know hugging me and your dad your step dad he's he likes you too. Yeah. Do they approve of what you do with the way you dress the boy you go with the club and all the rest of those things. Yeah they prove your schoolwork. In school I'm not allowed to wear overalls or not them. I have to wear a suit every day. I see is either your mother or father a big drinker. No they quit since I've been up here. They used to be drinkers so I said they've never been any kind of problem things. I said do you think this drinking your viewers was just accidental or do you do this pretty regularly. Yeah. You

never run away from home. No I like it too much. You like your home. Yeah. You think you have enough freedom but your mother does work though doesn't you. Yeah. Who watches over you when when she's off at work. My grandmother as she lives upstairs and when I come home she had my supper ready and my mom works night and day time and she has a supper ready. My one works and I turned she still has it. She gets all my suppers and I. Do you have the freedom to tell me I go home and my buddies and that after I do my homework go out. When you started to get sick as a little boy was that about the time that your real dad and your mother broke up or was it before they broke up or after they broke up when I was five years or four and a half years somewhere around that. And that was about the time you first began to get sick was it. You think there was any connection between these two

things. But I you know I think I fell on my head and after I fell on my head I started taking them and I said I started getting dizzy and all that. Does this worry you embarrass you. Yeah which one embarrasses me does it. I want to I want to show the show with his girl and I had one I felt stupid. You know it's coming on you then I get dizzy after after I get dizzy I better lay dying else if I don't lay down I'll just fall right I bite my tongue. And that must carry does is scary when you're having one of these spells. Yeah just feels like my heads fall off and I get real dizzy and and same. Seems like things are coming closer and closer I see. And then then they go away. They move in and they move out. Do you take any kind of medicine to stop these or prevent them. Yeah nurse gives me things. Do

they work. It really does. Sometimes I. I took my medicine before I didn't work and they gave me more of it. Then it's OK now they tell me it's it works. And let me ask you this Tony who's a bad one and a family maybe are you you know he would have who are the good ones. My brother I see. Does your brother get sick does he take any spells or anything like that now I'm the only one. And how come he's better than you are. I don't know he's got a job that he's working all day. Well if you had a job would you be better. I go to school and maybe that's all you can do right now go to school I guess. You see you can't go to school work too. He works but then he doesn't have to go to school. No he bit some guy he was in the middle has all of a grade that he would quit school and some guy bet him $20 he wouldn't quit school so he quit.

That was kind of ill advised Don't you think. Well yeah well I have a great but you expect to finish school don't you. I asked if I could bring my graduation ring up here and I couldn't bring it up myself. They said someone might steal it. Well I think they're right in this case. Somebody might steal it. Besides I don't think they let you wear it anyhow. They put it in an envelope for you and then you pick it up when you leave. That's what they do. You know I saw a lot of boys when rains and crosses and stuff. I said I when I came up here before they took all Almighty took my cross off me and everything. Let me ask you this Tony is there anything special that worries you. Yeah I'm worried about now I'm going to worry about I will get sent away or something. And what else do you remember from when you were little besides beginning to take these spells. What else do you remember.

I think one of them. Yeah not difficult region and stuff before that before you took and what you remember and not them. I couldn't tell you something right now I take one of those and after I got done I wouldn't know nothing I told you. Just get moved my mind not know what I said. You lose your memory. Is there anything special on your mind anything that you worry about right now. When's my one day called case or whatever they call it. You're hearing Yeah. And what did you worry before you had the hearing coming up. I didn't have it yet. I mean before you got into this trouble What did you worry about. Not now not test and schoolwork and stuff. You were afraid that you wouldn't pass in school. Yeah. How many times did you fail so far and yet you worry about failing. Well I might get a I get not do too good and fail get a home great big effort.

Are you supposed to worry about. Yeah. Are you who expect you to worry about family person self I guess. The teacher doesn't think you're going to fail you think you're going to. Yeah I saw that to you. If you can't learn nothing more he can do. He just can't beyond it into you. But I think you learn kind of easily don't you. I learned a lot of things since I came up here. I learned to play Prey not go in with Johnny checkers and all that stuff like at an hour the other boys. Pretty nice to you really. Yeah what do you miss the most. To see my brother he you know he you know he had a lot to come up here you know I think that's why they just let parents come they say to just your mother and father and grandparents guardians as opposed to he was going to come up you know. Is your brother specially close to you your buddy of his. I like him and that he takes me wherever he goes after school if I got my work done and you know he takes me with them and stuff.

Your brother has his own car. Your dad has a car too and your stepfather there is he had a what he called accident you know some boy wrecked it. This was your brother. Yeah he wrecked a car. Your brother let this other boy drive and he smashed his car and he was you know he came down here and my brother wasn't with them and he hit into this car both panders flew out really well he probably lent the car to this other boy because he didn't want to lose the other boys your friend but he lost many how maybe for good. Yeah he said I'll have to live to pay for it and that I'm like don't you think Adele still be friends especially if he pays he will. And what about your brother. Well when he drives the speed the thing's 35 he goes 35 and that's pretty Why didn't he get it like my dad one time I was supposed to go to the hospital and he was taking the hospital because I had a spell on that news 135. You think he should have gone faster because you were sick. No he might have gotten a ticket.

And there's nothing else really worries you right now as you know. Have you had a pretty good time since you came here. Yeah. Trying to stay out of mischief and stuff. You think to be able to stay out maybe. I think we're going to take you back now. OK. And now joining from adultery to discuss the preachers of this child's world as his guest Dr. William Shellenberger former chairman of the Psychology Department at again university here are Father Duffy And Dr. Schonberger It's nice to welcome back again today a doctor Schanberg a chairman of the Psychology Department at Duquesne University. Berger today we had the story of a boy 14 he's picked up for being intoxicated and underneath intoxication we found out by talking to him that he also was an epileptic and apparently this

involved in a combination of things epilepsy and the drugs that they give for that probably tell Antonin Phina Barba tall and this Thunderbird wine which is what the regular hoboes by it's a very cheap wine and has a delightful effect on them. Well the first thing is that it isn't clear to me just what his feelings were about being picked up especially under the circumstances here. Spoil was sort of invited to partake. Of the vine and he does and he's turned in by his friend and some Why was the story as I got it. Yeah well that struck me first it didn't occur to me to ask him about it but as I think back on I think the story was. I just happen to have been there the night that he was brought in and when he was in a helpless condition he couldn't walk and they had to lay in the floor and they pulled his tongue out and put a spoon in there so he wouldn't bite himself. I think what happened was that the two of them went out to a

party and got pretty heavily intoxicated. But you know this boy it took much faster and went deeper than the other one. When they get on the street this boy simply totally collapsed and the other boy panicked I think and that's why he called the police and they they brought him to a juvenile court rather than to a hospital. And then from there he went directly to the hospital was there about two days. So I might have been more a question of the other boy getting scared of him that's good being made the victim of a joke or something. Yes oh yes it was. I think you and the cat. I'm not so sure about the cat. Why they're spoiled actually set the cat on fire and I had the feeling that he did. I had a feeling that he didn't like the way that he. The way that he put it when he said I couldn't do that. Still I don't know how you could ever prove it but at any rate he has no memory of it and it was completely inconsistent with himself as he knows himself to do something special to the boy appeared to be

very honest in his answers both to me and although it probably sounded like a trap I didn't intend it. He said he was accused of stealing two hundred forty dollars by his father and I merely asked him how much he really steal he came right down to $18. It took well some of the other things that sort of general impressionistic things that I get a feeling here of a kid who is really puzzling and baffled in some way by what has happened to him. I would say I don't get the feeling he had that this is a mean kid or a bad kid who's been in a lot of trouble before but who suddenly finds himself after this experience in a detention home and he seems the most important thing to him seems to be to. Make a good impression at this hearing. That's coming up and to get back to his home again try to walk. The straight and narrow line and he gives an impression that he likes is his mother he likes his

stepfather with whom he lives and he certainly indicates a liking for this older brother. Yes in the words he speaks of the home situation in John positive tones it's as if he is saying what I'm really I'm trying to do my best and I'm a good boy and all of a sudden here I am I got mixed up in this little thing and I'm really worried about it. And I hope it works out all right for me. I find myself sympathetic. With that with this Yes and he does seem to try and he get it gets along well at school I wonder how much of this trouble he's in could be attributed to his epilepsy. I thought it was interesting that the onset of epilepsy seemed to coincide with a big flare up between mother and father soon after which they did get a divorce and it was permanent and the mother has since remarried a boy likes the new stepfather and the stuff likes him. I also thought I heard in there that he fell and hit his head. Or did I dream that when I think you know I think you're right but I think he fell subsequent to the epilepsy. Absolutely so

I seen subsequent to the epilepsy. Yeah well regardless of the cause of it he certainly even as he puts it he's embarrassed by it as a condition and it certainly is a difficult thing to live with. When one is an epileptic you you're just not sure when you're going to have a seizure. And imagine yourself living with with epilepsy when you're not sure when you're going to have blackout or or a seizure and the medication apparently as long as he takes it regularly. Seizures are under pretty good control but there's some kind of a delicate physiological balance there that apparently has to be maintained which is a pretty good description of the aura. It's only one form that MRI can take their highly individualistic. There's an awful lot of misunderstanding about epilepsy aches and I just wonder myself how this

kid this boy is seen by his classmates by the other boys his age there would seem to be kind of strong temptation in my thinking to treat this kid differently to perhaps even to take advantage of him and in some way making for a continuous chain you know when you're living you're just not sure when he going to black you know what are you going to. Fall down again and be embarrassed and embarrass others. This might provide the other children you think with entertainment and set him up as kind of a number one in the pecking order. It could but he doesn't express notice as happening that I don't know. He is one of the few boys that mentions a belonging to a club. You don't get a chance to see the boy but he does have Mark. It's a kind of a modified Roman cross tattoo would just be too in the crack between the index finger and the thumb. And then when a man gets to be a leader in these

put you because he has another mark further up the arm girls belong to the group. They also are tattooed. And I don't really have been familiar with that or not but they are a common way of doing it as they get regular indelible ink and then they get a needle they wrap thread around it within about an eighth of an inch of the end of it and they dip this needle into the ink and simply. Make it to some of these of course you get infected and that has resulted in death in some cases. But a lot of these kids will wear these tend to march and I thought I saw a pit you can mark on him he says it isn't. He denied it they went up and shook it. Yes I know he said this was a friendly social club. Keep the kids off the street and again it probably is as you pointed out he tells the truth. I think you get a feeling that he cares and he's not trying to fool you in that he wants to make out all right. One thing that puzzles me about this thing is that he does describes a home situation

where things are relatively good with his mother and stepfather. Well there's an aside on that too but he's only like the stepfather yet his stepfather turned him in to juvenile court once before August for supposedly stealing a fairly large sum of money. And this strikes me as inconsistent with what he describes as a positive kind of relationship. And I would think there would be other ways to try to work this out rather than. Turning a kid in. If you really were with the kid. Yes in some way. The other comment on his home situation with a mother working she's out of the home quite a bit. Which may be necessary. I don't know the circumstances but the boy feels it and some way he doesn't come right out and say it that I don't like this but underneath what he's saying I kind of feel that he's saying gee I wish my mom could be home for dinner. I don't see a whole lot she works the night turn

and grandma is there to help things along but grandma is a mother no matter how you slice it. I thought it was interesting too that when asked about it why is his brother better than he is since he identifies himself as a bad one in the family. He correlates being better with working as opposed to going to school so if you go to school you're worse if you work you're better. And some day he will be better because someday he will be better yes. Although he seems to want to graduate and me. He was unhappy about not being able to bring his school Ransley adulation ring and I think to the mention the mention he made of his brother doing a very foolish thing of betting $20 that he wouldn't finish school so the boy quit school and won the $20 and I think he brought it up because he wanted some reassurance that he had made a wiser choice than this. But I thought two of the things that he showed interest in the area of worry was that he was afraid of

losing his mind which would tie in with what you said previously. This must be a constant fear with these children. When this tragic thing her occurs them and they don't quite understand it themselves. The other thing he says you worry about is tests in school. Yeah and that seems to be damning. And he continues to worry in spite of the fact he never has failed. This didn't reassure him either. Yeah of course I think worrying about passing is to a certain extent a normal almost healthy kind of worry there is something there you can always fail even though you haven't. Yes I think it was you who sometime ago point out to me that this is one of the bad things about tests. If you make a dichotomy between good and bad in a test you always to face the possibility of failure all tests or tests are fine when they're indicated they don't solve problems. I think they have to learn something. And I'm all for them but not for over testing. I didn't mean to downgrade him but. Well we have again come to the end of another program in which we have discussed the case of Tony a 14 year old white boy.

He seems to be a fairly wholesome boy who will probably make a very fine adjustment with the kind of guidance that he's going to get as a result of some counseling situations on this problem of alcoholism. And they very often say alcohol and gas don't mix well alcohol and barbiturates can be a lethal combination to like to thank Dr. Shannon Berger for his time and his fine insights into this specialty of his. You have been listening to exploring the child world a program in which the child speaks. Father Francis Duff a professor of sociology at Duquesne University has conducted the interview with the child and to find the outlines of this world in the discussion with his guest Dr. William Schanberg a former chairman of the Psychology Department at Duquesne University. This has been a presentation of the radio services University in cooperation with the Kings

Alumni Association technical director Frederick Williams program director and I listen again next week for another in the series exploring the child's world. The interview heard on this program was a recreation exploring the child's world is distributed by the National Association of educational broadcasters. This is the end he b Radio Network.