Family Matters 227of inappropriate behavior, and began to hang out with
other children who have come down a similar path.
Unfortunately, society isn’t yet well prepared to help
these children. Many school personnel don’t have the expe-
rience or expertise to handle the difficulties of students
whose learning disability is in the domains of flexibility and
frustration tolerance. Many alternative day-school place-
ments still use traditional reward and punishment pro-
grams as their primary therapeutic modality. The police
and courts often aren’t equipped to provide the type of in-
tervention needed by many families. Often, the best the ju-
dicial system can do is hold the threat of a significant
consequence over a child’s head. Many social service agen-
cies are overwhelmed; the problems of an explosive child
and his family may pale in comparison to the problems of
other children and families that are referred to and fol-
lowed by these agencies. Mental health professionals aren’t
especially effective in working with individuals who won’t
come in for treatment or whose needs require attention
outside the boundaries of a fifty-minute session in a thera-
pist’s office. And managed care issues are sometimes a sig-
nificant obstacle.
After all else has been tried—therapy, medication, per-
haps even alternative day-school placements—what many of
these children ultimately need is a change of environment.
A new start. A way to start working on a new identity. Once
alienation and deviance become a child’s identity and a
means of being a part of something, things are a lot harder