WOW, no he can’t. He can’t see past his own pain. He is a kid, he is male, and he is in pain. Right there are the three strikes keeping him from thinking like you. You are an adult, you are a female, and you are more equipped and capable of handling and dealing with pain. He doesn’t think like you do, he is not mature like you are, nor can he rationalize or be logical like you can. His brain is not yet as developed as your is, nor has he had the life experience, knowledge, nor seichel that you posses. It is foolish to expect him to follow your expectations of him.
As parents we have these little scenarios go off in our brain. This is how we want and expect our children and even our spouses to behave. If we do this, their answer and response should be this. We are shocked, dismayed and extremely disappointed when they don’t follow the script exactly as written. But they are NOT dreaming or fantasizing the same dream nor scenario from the same perspective, need nor desire as WE see it. Their needs are different, their desires are different and they just plain don’t see things the way we do. Now add to that the issues of a child at risk, going OTD and in the midst of all that confusion and how can you expect him to follow your script? He is still getting used to the OTD and at risk script. He still doesn’t know where he is heading and what he will still experience. I know. You might know, but he doesn’t believe any of that will happen to him until it does.
Remember he told you that HE will not be one of those kids that take drugs. I knew it was inevitable, I knew he would follow that script. He is following a well traveled road. It is almost a by the book case. He is putting up a barrier where you are concerned and yet he is communicating with you. Like a pull me push you toy. I don’t want to talk to you, I am angry with you, you don’t love me, and yet I AM talking to you, I AM communicating with you, and I AM letting you talk to me even thought I am telling you that I don’t want you to talk to me.
WOW, he is telling you that he is taking drugs because he is angry at you. In all honesty I believe that YOU are right. He is angry at himself. He is probably realizing that HE has achrius in all of this and he could have made other choices for himself. He could have done something to stop it, but he wasn’t brave enough to stand up for himself. HE could have allowed YOU to help him at the time and let you switch schools for him like you offered, but he didn’t. It is easier for him to say that YOU don’t love him than for him to say that HE doesn’t love himself. He doesn’t want to say that he blames himself, it is much easier to say he blames you. But at this point maybe the best thing for you to do is to tell him in words and in notes that we can’t live in the past and we can’t allow the past to dictate to us how we choose to live in the present and in the future.
Even if we made mistakes in the past, we don’t have to allow those mistakes to follow us around for the rest of our lives and define who we are. We have the choice to learn from the mistakes that we made and choose to never make those same mistakes again. WE can choose to take a good harad look at our mistake and figure out what we could have done differently to bring about a different outcome and then actually learn how to do that other action. So if that means that we have to build our self esteem and self confidence so we don’t allow anyone ever to bully us again, then that is what we need to do. We don’t shrivel into ourselves and disappear. We build ourselves up, by recognizing the good qualities that we posses. We work on our skills by taking classes in areas such as Karate and body building as well as coaching and debating.
We use the brain Hashem gave us to outwit and outsmart anyone who would try to hurt us. We are each created in tzelem elokim and we each deserve to be treated with respect.