Letter 40 – I’m Talking About School

Dear Garrett,

I’d like talk to you about your school life. I told Kevin before that I do not feel any anger over anything that has happened, but I that isn’t true. When I think of you and school, I feel angry. I feel angry when I think about some of the people at your schools. There was so much chaos and frustration near the end, when I couldn’t get a solid grip on anything, and really, they just made it worse.

Two things.

One. In middle school, a group there decided that you had to be on a behavior plan, to control how you acted at school. You were given a form and each teacher had to sign off on it after every class, declaring that you had met the standard of behavior for that hour. You had to do that day after day, hour after hour. How humiliating. How stripping of self-esteem this was. The last time I saw the principal, he made a vague threat of expelling you if you didn’t conform to the straight and narrow. They were putting a yoke around your neck and strangling you with it. When you already were strangled. I transferred your papers to another school, and we started over.

I don’t feel anger toward the teachers who were so frustrated with you. I understood and sympathized. They were just trying to do their jobs and you made it difficult. You never listened, you drove them to the brink of outrage, and when something was sure to happen about it you would suddenly concede. You tested them right up to the edge of whatever the boundaries were and when you reached them, most times you stepped back, but sometimes you didn’t. I know it was tough for them.

But for the people who put you on this plan, who created shame in front of everyone, for every hour, I will just say, that that was not a good choice. I saw the results of that choice.

Two. I am angry with one of your high school counselors. When I made judgments about what was right for you at school, they were often ignored and this person gave you different instructions. When I asked for this person’s help, several times, and for some intervention, this person never replied. As in, they never. Replied. Several times I reached out and was met with this response. Which was, none.

When Kevin and I decided that we needed to get you away, at first, they said you couldn’t finish school there if you left the area. You were in your senior year. You were almost finished. This was so pressing, but you needed to be done with school, as well. They said you wouldn’t be able to finish there if we took you out. You’d have to start over somewhere else. That would be terrible for you. You really needed to be done. But we couldn’t wait for school to be done before helping you. And this person did not help us, in any way.

So we formed a different plan. When we found a rehab in state, the initial plan was that you would bring your school-work with you and do the work there. The rehab was set up for this and you agreed to this plan. As we were waiting for a space to open up, you went to school one day and your teachers asked you, what are you doing here? and they told you that you weren’t in their classes anymore. What? What had happened? Unbeknownst to you, or to us, the counselor there had decided to disenroll you from regular school and enroll you in a completely different online program. No one told us. No one asked for our permission.

You were completely blindsided. We were blindsided. And you felt bad. Embarrassed. Overwhelmed. Confused as what you were supposed to do. Unprepared for this completely new thing that was put on your plate that you had no capacity to deal with. And why was the online option never brought up before now, when we were struggling so much and looking for other options? Why not tell us before now? Why wait until we made another plan and then had that ripped out from underneath us?

I am angry. How dare this person do this without asking permission, without telling us what was going on. My respect for this person is negligible. I never want to see this person. If my daughter goes to this school I will hear nothing that this person has to say, and will never communicate with them in any way. When I saw this person at your gathering, I said nothing, because the event was for you, and about you, and I wanted nothing so sour as their presence to spoil it. But I never want to see or hear from this person again.

One more thing, and then I’ll be done. Toward the end, you asked for someone. One of your old counselors who had helped you when you needed it. This person is the only counselor I trusted, you said. Can you see if they will see me? I contacted them, and initially this person agreed to you see you. But, for whatever reason, they then made the decision that they were unable to. Theoretically, I understand that. It was not this person’s job to see someone who was no longer at their school, as a private patient. They most likely weren’t prepared to take on something as big as what you would bring to the table. I understand that. But for you, Garrett, my heart breaks. You finally asked for someone, and that person did not come. It’s not their fault. But it was just one more thing I felt so impotent about. You finally asked for someone, and they wouldn’t see you. I can’t say that it would have made a difference, but it was one more thing that I wasn’t able to make happen. And I felt powerless.