Years ago I was visiting my brother at the same time that a friend of his from work had come with his very young son. The boy was a whirlwind of destruction, running through the house breaking things with every step and nobody tried to stop him. I did not feel that it was my place as a visitor and my brother appeared to be so engrossed in the conversation with his friend that he failed to notice all of the damage that the child was inflicting on the place. My brother’s co-worker totally ignored the raucous sounds emanating from wherever his son was running like a wild stallion. By the end of the visit the child had cracked a window, bent the window blinds, broken a vase and strewn cookie crumbs all over the floor. It took every ounce of self control from me to keep from grabbing him and sitting him down in a corner where I might prevent his rampage with my evil eye.
When it was time for the boy’s father to leave he simply shrugged and laughed has he attempted to round up the naughty boy who kept running away from him yelling,”Idi Amin is coming to get me.” I was in awe of how the scene unfolded with the father seemingly resigned to the fact that his son was out of control.
I never saw that little boy again but somehow I never forgot him. I often wondered how things had turned out for him. He had reminded me of yet another very bad child from my youth who often attempted to terrorize all of us kids who lived on the same street with him. His name was Tigre, a fitting name indeed because he was as wild as they come and his mother’s only response to his bad manners was to smile with a kind of pride as though his antics were humorous. He is another soul with whom I purposely lost contact but whispers to this day indicate that he went on to live a very difficult adulthood with few friends and multiple divorces.
I have often wondered if such children are actually somehow uncontrollable or if their parents simply refuse to make the effort to teach them how to act properly. They generally are allowed to do and say whatever comes into their minds and they have grave difficulty working with other people. I’ve encountered several of them during my teaching days and I have found them to be confused and incredibly unhappy. Some of them have been downright dangerous like the child whose anger led him to continually abuse his twin brother and his mother. While he seemed to be the king of his family, he was actually quite lonely and friendless. Eventually I saw that he was spending a great deal of his adult life in the penitentiary.
It is difficult to know what creates such a person. Part of it might actually be a form of mental illness but there is also the possibility that the child has never been properly taught how to get along with other children or how to respect people and their property. They run wild without direction until they are so bad that they are frightening and even their parents lie awake at night worried about the kind of violence their children might inflict on them.
As a teacher I learned how to lovingly demand better behaviors from such children. They usually acted properly in my presence but would often revert to their horrific ways when they left my classroom. I did my best to teach them how to control their energy and their tendencies to be mean and cruel. I learned that they were filled with a kind of raging anger that they did not like like but had no idea how to tame. Few people had said “no” to them and most of the responses to them were punishing rather than instructive.
The biggest problem with allowing children to rule the roost without consequences and efforts to help them control their worst instincts is that as they get older and stronger the damage that they can inflict becomes ever more dangerous. They don’t just break things. They break bones and damage souls. They become the abusers and thieves and criminals that wreak havoc on the world. History has shown us that such humans may seem to be strong but are in fact only cruel.
It hurts my heart when I see a child screaming for attention with nobody responding. I cringe when parents tell me that they can’t even try to calm them down because they do not listen. They change their children from one school to another excusing their horrific behavior by blaming the teachers for not understanding what the child needs. They shower the child with things hoping to buy the child’s good graces. What they do not do is the hard work of correcting and talking and setting expectations that the child will control the demons that rage inside. It can be done with patience, consistency and efforts to determine what is causing the anger inside the child. It may take counseling and even medication but mostly it requires time and love on the part of the parent.
I am fully aware that there are indeed cases of children who are mentally disturbed but even they can often change with the correctly administered guidance and love. Luckily most parents do their jobs and the children may go through phases but ultimately come out just fine. Sadly the ones who don’t are generally ignored by parents too busy and afraid to take control. Sometimes such children are actually being abused or watching abuse in their homes. Whatever it is I have learned that a child running through a house crying, “Idi Amin is going to get me!” is already in grave danger of becoming an out of control adult. There is nothing funny about letting that youngster run wild. Out of love its our duty to help him with patience and determination or find someone who knows what to do.
I often wonder how many horrible adults might have been saved if someone had curbed their bad instincts when they were children. If we love the children we should all be watching them and taking the time to help them be better before it becomes too late.
All It Takes Is A Little Love 