Possibly I should preface this post with the statement, “Not all of my sons have been involved with the law.”

I am struggling hard with the concept of criminal activity. I have some very angry sons; boys who were adopted later in life, very traumatized, and they are demonstrating a clear inability to follow rules, no matter the consequences.

All of my children came from backgrounds in which there was considerable parental involvement with the police. They learned such erroneous concepts as, “The MAN is out to getcha!” There was no understanding that bad behavior results in arrests, it was always the fault of The Man in Blue.

When I have patiently tried to explain to the kids, “If you do this (steal, hurt someone, etc) then you will be arrested,” the furious response I often receive is, “I don’t care!”

And they don’t care. That’s the hard part. The picture above comes from an arrest report in North Carolina. Do you think that kid cares? That’s a vivid example of the attitude I feel as if I am dealing with too much.

The media isn’t helping either with its glorification of violence, its glamorization of criminals; even its portrayal of prison shows cool guys rather than any remorse or any desire to be law abiding. I’m so fed up.

One son of mine just got out of jail for breaking his very easy-to-follow probation rules. He called me, all happy, acting like I’d throw a party to celebrate his victory. His what? He sees this as a rite of passage, now he’s a man, he’s jubilant; I’m ashamed of his behavior. I see a punk who didn’t finish high school, has no skills and no future.

He didn’t ask me yesterday to come live with us, he knows it isn’t an option at all nor does he want to live anywhere that there are rules to follow, or the simple, personal consideration of other human beings.

He did ask to come visit us and I refused to allow his lawless influence on my younger, easily swayed and very impressionable children. I replied with, “Let’s see what you do with your life first.”

He is now under a very intensive probation, he’ll be supervised within an inch of his life, he’ll be provided with opportunities to get a GED, receive resources and therapy, chances to improve his life if he’ll choose to follow the program.

Always hopeful, and often foolishly optimistic, my prayer for him is to take advantage of every second chance he’ll be given, but knowing his severe emotional issues it is now a very guarded and quite burned anticipation on my part.

This awful example represents an illustration, a case in point, an example of where my son once came from before he went into foster care. His life consisted of severe abuse and criminal neglect resulting in a final parental abandonment. He has been in and out of mental facilities, a long term mental hospital stay, therapeutic residential placements, a wilderness program, and countless other interventions where at times he picked up the correct jargon but never the ability to mimic fairly normal behavior.

Sometimes I feel that at least he is safe and well cared for in jail settings. This is so not what I wanted for him. But there is still time…

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