BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino

Subject: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: Nick E
Date: 02 Feb 08 - 10:23 PM

I have a Co-Worker John and his life is virtually a soap opera. It is good that he has a medically enhanced sense of humor or none of this would be funny to him, but we all found it screamingly so. This man has five kids, only one , the youngest is his bio kid, the others his wife adopted before they got married. We joke that his tribulations would make for excellent television... "Next Episode on The Crouches..."
As we were on break the other morning he started to tell us how Tommy who is 8 years old, his bio kid, was very upset that morning over the death of a school mate named Dave. The school mate had a tough go of it as he was a Diabetic Albino. Tommy said he was feeling especially guilty because he declined an invitation to Dave's birthday party last month.

Later in the day John told us this story...
Linda, John's wife was concerned about how Tommy was handling the loss called the school to see if they had counciling available for bereavement situation such as this.

The school informed her that they had no such person as Dave the Deceased Diabetic Albino . It turns out Dave was an imaginary friend.
I laughed until I was crying! Say a prayer for my friend John , to continue to have *&^$ like this hapen. It makes break time so worthwhile!

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 03 Feb 08 - 06:19 AM

Well thats so funny I could just shit.

eric

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: Wyrd Sister
Date: 03 Feb 08 - 07:46 AM

Is the son suffering from DDDA?

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 03 Feb 08 - 09:23 AM

Has it occurred to anyone connected with this family to ask WHY the child is being so affected by the death of an imaginary character? By definition, the imagination can revive or re-create anything it wants to; so why is this hitting the little boy so hard? It sounds as though - however fictional the deceased may be - the grieving process is real and should be handled accordingly.

And: Is everyone 100% sure there is no such person (I'm assuming the school has enough sense to look in their files for a surname other than "the-diabetic-albino")? Eight-year-olds don't always have the language to articulate what they mean, particularly if there are emotions complicating it. Could this be a reaction to some external real event which has become conflated in the boy's mind with school, where there are lots of kids? Some of my small students (harp) make the most astonishing word-substitutions, and those are on neutral topics.

This scenario just sounds serious, at least from the little I've read, though it probably comes across quite differently when standing around the coffee machine. But - I have to ask - is he still feeling upset and (more worryingly) guilty?

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: Nick E
Date: 03 Feb 08 - 09:55 AM

Joey told his parents later he made the whole thing up. The child dictates long and imaginative stories that his mother types out for him. He does in fact suffer from developmental issues and those needs are recognized and are addressed. I just found it amazing that for more than 1/2 a second that the parents believed this fabulous story.

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 03 Feb 08 - 10:08 AM

Encourage him to write! Sounds like he has a gift for it. (Might help with the developmental issues too.)

This sounds flippant, but isn't: Rather than the mother typing out his stories, perhaps he could start doing it himself - not because of work-saving but because of the spontaneous line from imagination to medium, which can lose out if the flow is interrupted by having to involve a third party. I'm putting it clumsily, but many writers say that they type all their own work simply for this very reason, and a lot of creative material appears during the re-types as they go along.

I hope something comes of his storytelling. Fantasy certainly didn't do J K Rowling any harm!

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 03 Feb 08 - 10:22 AM

Get him some imaginary councelling too.

eric

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 03 Feb 08 - 10:51 AM

> Linda, John's wife was concerned about how Tommy was handling the loss

> Joey told his parents later he made the whole thing up

Who is Joey, if it's Tommy who was handling the loss... ??

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: Ebbie
Date: 03 Feb 08 - 12:56 PM

Perhaps it is NickE who is the storyteller? lol

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: SINSULL
Date: 03 Feb 08 - 01:05 PM

Sorry - this sounds like a child who needs some professional counseling.Not funny at all.

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 03 Feb 08 - 02:28 PM

"this fabulous story" Well, all stories are fabulous by definition in one sense. But there's nothing fantastic about it. Here's a link to a forum on a Albinism support site where someone with diabetis and albinism is asking some health advice.

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 03 Feb 08 - 09:27 PM

Nick? Ya there? I didn't mean to imply anything unpleasant with my Joey/Tommy question above - I know how easy it is to get kids' names mixed up, especially with 5 of them. You even hear their own mothers doing it, particularly when trying to call one ("Kath-Lin-Chri-Kev-MIIIIIIIIIIchaaaallllll...").

I'm a bit like a dog with a bone on this one, bothered because children often express things in play or artistic creations that they can't communicate in any other way. It's common for child psychologists to ask kids to draw or dance or make up a song about whatever it is they want to find out more about, and stories certainly fall into the same category. Even if there is no school friend Dave, with his unusual appearance and his affliction, is it possible the boy may be trying to work through something else with this fiction? Some other loss harder to define?

I know kids make up things all the time and are little masters at Let's Pretend, but that excessive grief-reaction seems very strange and troubling. The aftermath to the "death" of someone he created in his mind should be completely within his control - but it seems to have got beyond it somehow (I would say "escaped" if it didn't sound so Forbidden Planet-ish) and is now controlling him. Even if the mourning and the guilt are themselves an act, it still makes you want to know why. And how many real-life boys this child socialises with. (Anyone at his school have any perspective on this?)

Normally kids aren't that skilled at acting. And is emotional guilt something an eight-year-old would know enough about to make up? Of course I'm not expecting you to answer all these questions - you probably can't - but I do believe they should be asked.

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 Feb 08 - 10:11 PM

Anybody remember Raising Demons? I think it was a Larry that didn't exist, who'd been misbehaving terribly in school? Great imagination, don't make it necessarily a symptom...

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 04 Feb 08 - 06:44 AM

It's not the imagination - most kids have that - it's the fact that it appears to have got him into its grip, into a negative place that he doesn't seem able to control. Or else, that it might be masking some troubling real event that the boy can't communicate directly. That's all I've been trying to get across. It's not a good idea to dismiss unusual behaviour in a child as "just imagination" and not investigate further. And that grieving and guilt DOES sound unusual: if he invented it, why can't he simply un-invent it? I think that should be looked into.

Maybe imagination is all it is. But I'm not convinced anyone in that family knows for sure.

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: katlaughing
Date: 04 Feb 08 - 01:31 PM

It warrants looking into as Bonnie and others suggest. Definitely not funny, imo.

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: wysiwyg
Date: 04 Feb 08 - 03:41 PM

I have a Co-Worker John and his life is virtually a soap opera.

I suppose it should not come as a shock that people we know in our everyday lives, who probably think our nice demeanor in the workplace indicates that we mean them well, name us in public forums to hold us up to ridicule. I would suspect that John's troubles are primarily that he has not discerned where his true friends are, who can offer compassionate support, as opposed to where it's least wise to share one's personal information.

Can we delete the co-worker's family name in the opening post please? Ya know, otherwise pretty soon he will find this delightful eye-opener to delight him the next time he Googles himself some slow day at work.

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: GUEST,dianavan
Date: 04 Feb 08 - 04:04 PM

I, too, wonder about children that frequently tell make-believe 'stories' that are told convincingly. I often wonder if the child knows the difference between fantasy and reality. Is fantasy the same as imagination?

I am also concerned that these same children often have difficulty with peer relations and are socially 'at risk'. The issue of trust comes into play because it is difficult to become friends with someone who cannot be trusted to tell the truth.

I would remind the parents that what is 'cute' at five is not so 'cute' at eight.

Subject: RE: BS: The Death of A Diabetic Albino
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 04 Feb 08 - 06:01 PM

I read the first entry and didn't comment; I had mixed feelings about the hilarity of such a story.

However, I must admit that when he was in the Montessori pre-school my son, who would have been about 5, one day had the teacher convinced he'd been born in Australia. When his father picked him up that evening the teacher gushed and asked all about Australia, and it turned out to be pretty funny. (It wasn't carried to the lengths of the story above, obviously.)

SRS