REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

in 102 counties ... about 1 in 6 working-age residents draw disability checks

POSTED BY: 1KIKI
UPDATED: Wednesday, June 7, 2017 00:08
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Friday, June 2, 2017 11:03 PM

1KIKI

Goodbye, kind world (George Monbiot) - In common with all those generations which have contemplated catastrophe, we appear to be incapable of understanding what confronts us.


Generations, disabled

http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/local/2017/06/02/generations-disabled
/?hpid=hp_hp-banner-low_famliydisabled-1030a%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.9b94d4282407

PEMISCOT COUNTY, Mo. — The food was nearly gone and the bills were going unpaid, but they still had their pills, and that was what they thought of as the sky brightened and they awoke, one by one. First came Kathy Strait, 55, who withdrew six pills from a miniature backpack and swallowed them. Then emerged her daughter, Franny Tidwell, 32, who rummaged through 29 bottles of medication atop the refrigerator and brought down her own: oxcarbazepine for bipolar disorder, fluoxetine for depression, an opiate for pain. She next reached for two green bottles of Tenex, a medication for hyperactivity, filled two glasses with water and said, “Come here, boys.”



The boys were identical twins William and Dale, 10. They were the fourth generation in this family to receive federal disability checks, and the first to be declared no longer disabled and have them taken away. In days that had grown increasingly tense, as debts mounted and desperation grew to prove that the twins should be on disability, this was always the worst time, before the medication kicked in, when the mobile home was filled with the sounds of children fighting, dogs barking, adults yelling, television volume turned up.

And so went another morning, loud and chaotic, right up until the moment someone dropped the puppy.

As it fell the four feet to the ground, the trailer suddenly quieted. The four children stopped fighting. The two adults stopped yelling. Then the weeks-old puppy hit the scuffed linoleum floor, whimpered softly, and events, no longer suspended, began to unfold again.

“It’s dying,” Dale said, looking at the cocoa-colored dog, which had gone limp. “It’s dying. It’s dying.”

“It might have snapped its neck,” Kathy said.

William looked at the puppy, then at the medications collected above the refrigerator, then at his mother, Franny, who wasn’t saying anything.

“Mommy, give him some medicine to keep him alive,” William said.

“He’s dead,” Dale said.

“Give him some pain medicine!” William said.

“Your puppy just died,” Dale said.

“Give him some pain medicine!” William said again.


Talk of medications, of diagnoses, of monthly checks that never seem to cover every need — these are the constants in households like this one, composed of multiple generations of people living on disability. Little-studied and largely unreported, such families have become familiar in rural communities reshaped by a decades-long surge that swelled the nation’s disability rolls by millions before declining slightly in 2015 as older beneficiaries aged into retirement benefits, according to interviews with social workers, lawyers, school officials, academics and rural residents.

How to visualize the growth in disability in the United States? One way is to think of a map. Rural communities, where on average 9.1 percent of working-age people are on disability — nearly twice the urban rate and 40 percent higher than the national average — are in a brighter shade than cities. An even brighter hue then spreads from Appalachia into the Deep South and out into Missouri, where rates are higher yet, places economists have called “disability belts.” The brightest color of all can be found in 102 counties, mostly within these belts, where a Washington Post analysis of federal statistics estimates that, at minimum, about 1 in 6 working-age residents draw disability checks.

As the number of working-age Americans receiving disability rose from 7.7 million in 1996 to 13 million in 2015, so did the number of households with multiple family members on disability, climbing from an estimated 525,000 in 2000 to an estimated 850,000 in 2015, according to a Post analysis of census data. The analysis is probably an undercount.

A separate Post examination of census data found that households reporting at least one disabled adult are three times as likely to report having a disabled child, too, although most households affected by disability report only one disabled member. Multigenerational disability, The Post found, is far more common in poor families.

“I’ve been aware of it my whole professional life,” said Michael L. Price, a demographer who retired from the University of Louisville in 2013. “In eastern Kentucky and other rural areas, you’re more likely to have intergenerational households, not just two but three generations. You have grandparents, very young grandparents, living together with grandchildren or in close proximity. And families don’t separate, so it sets it up not only for the next generation, but for two generations, that ‘This is what’s there, this is what you’re dependent on.’ ”

Other experts, however, say the phenomenon has little to do with generational dependence. “I hesitate to use a term like ‘culture.’ It’s not a specific, measurable metric,” said Kathleen Romig, an analyst with the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, who studies disability in the United States. “Certain things like toxic stress or nutrition or preterm births or parental depression or genetics” offer a more revealing context for understanding generational disability.

And yet others say it’s about money.

Ruth Horn, director of social services in Buchanan County, Va., which has one of the country’s highest rates of disability, has spent decades working with profoundly poor families. Some parents, she said, don’t encourage their children academically, and even actively discourage them from doing well, because they view disability as a “source of income,” and think failure will help the family receive a check.

“It’s not a hard thing to limit a person,” Horn said, adding: “It’s generations deep.”

For this family in Pemiscot County, crowding around their dazed puppy, the momentum was beginning to waver. The boys, who started receiving benefits after their premature birth, had recently lost them as the government stepped up its periodic reviews, which rose from 925,000 in 2010 to 2.1 million in 2016. Now their grandmother and mother, certain the twins were autistic, were trying to convince the government that it had made a mistake.

They knew it wouldn’t be easy but hoped that a psychological assessment of the children, due any day now, would provide just the proof they needed. In their minds it had come down to this: Prove the boys were autistic, get the checks back and climb from crushing poverty into manageable poverty.

Kathy set the puppy down on the kitchen table, and it took a wobbly step, then another.

“I’m going to name you Miracle,” she said softly. “Because it’s a miracle you’re alive.”

Now came reality.

This month, reality was a $600 electricity bill that included late payments. An additional $350 for the mortgage, $45 for water, $300 for cellphones. Then $98 for cable television, $35 for Internet service, $315 for furniture bought on credit, $35 for car insurance and $60 for life insurance.

Kathy sat with a notepad that said “Live Like Your Life Depends On It” and did the math. Their monthly checks totaled $2,005 — $1,128 less than when the twins received benefits — and bills would consume all of it except $167. There wouldn’t be enough to whittle down her payday loans. Or to settle up with the school for her granddaughter’s cheerleading. Or to pay her lawyer for a divorce from her fourth husband.

“Short,” she sighed, and more and more she was feeling that way about everything in her life. Her daughter, Franny, born with a mild version of Down syndrome known as mosaic and an IQ of about 75, couldn’t help manage the house, so Kathy had to make all of the decisions, and sometimes she didn’t know whether they were the right ones. The twins kept misbehaving, and she didn’t know how to get them to stop, so she yelled at them. She took the family to McDonald’s because they liked it, even though she knew they couldn’t afford to eat out. She went through more pain pills than she needed, and every few weeks, when those pills ran low, like today, she returned to the doctor for more.

“Can I make a food list?” the twins’ older sister, Kaitlyn, 12, asked as they got ready to go to the pain clinic.

“When the food stamps come in,” Kathy said, knowing that wouldn’t happen for two weeks.

With Dale away with a relative, she loaded the rest of the family — Franny, William, Kaitlyn and Bella, 4 — into the their dented Ford Taurus and started the engine. Rubbing her right forearm, she drove out into a county of endless farmland, where the poverty rate is more than twice the national figure, life expectancy is seven years shorter than the national average and the disability rate is nearly three times what it is nationally.



Disability characterized her family’s story, too. Kathy’s father, an illiterate laborer, had gone on disability after damaging an arm while working on a manhole. Franny went on it next. Then Kathy, who had dropped out of high school and had her first child at 15, hurt her shoulder working at a gas pump hose factory. Several denials and applications later, and after the twins started collecting benefits, Kathy began receiving disability, too.

She looked in the rearview mirror. William was in the back seat, sleeping.

“Franny, what’s wrong with William?” she asked.

“You’re not hurting, are you, William?” Franny asked her son a little while later.

“He’s depressed, is what he is,” Kathy said, ascribing his mood to not being able to play video games.

There was a time when Kathy hadn’t given much thought to mental health. But after ADHD was diagnosed in the twins and they were medicated for issues at home and school — “always on the go,” one teacher recalled — she started looking into other behavioral disorders to better understand what was wrong. She became convinced that her grandsons also had bipolar disorder and obsessive compulsive disorder because they threw fits and wanted the dishes stacked just so. And when they placed toy cars in a straight line — a possible sign of autism, she had learned — she thought they were autistic. Then, to her, it wasn’t just the boys but also her adult children, her other grandchildren and herself. Everyone, it seemed, suffered from something.

“I tell you, there’s only one fork I eat with,” her daughter-in-law said one night over dinner. “And it’s got to be this one.”

“That’s autism,” Kathy said.

Kathy steered into Kennett, one of the biggest cities in the area with a population of 10,932, and passed the Social Security office. She thought of the dozens of times she had gone in there, appealing denials, or picking up papers for Franny, or contesting the government’s decision to remove the twins from disability, and felt frustrated again. How could they not see how disabled the boys were? How could they take what little they had? Couldn’t they understand that she was raising this family alone and that she needed more help — not less? A few days after William’s check was taken away, she created an online fundraiser. “I’m disabled and need help,” she wrote, but after receiving several comments from neighbors telling her to get a job, she took it down.

She pulled up to the pain clinic, past a slogan that said, “Where Life Just Gets Better,” and followed Franny and the kids inside. “Y’all be good now,” she whispered, settling the children beside a sign listing 26 possible side effects of narcotics before noticing a woman she knew.

“First time seeing you in here,” the woman said.

“Really? I come every month,” Kathy said.

“I do, too,” the woman said. “So, how you doing?”

There was a pause.

“Pretty good, I guess,” Kathy said, shrugging slightly. “Raising grandbabies.”

And then those grandbabies were alone, sitting beside warnings of “addiction” and “physical dependence,” quietly waiting for their grandmother and mother, who suffers pain from scoliosis, to return with fresh prescriptions.

Aew days later, it was Franny who quietly waited. It was a Sunday, and soon the family would leave for church, where anyone could get on stage and dance and sing, and this was the week Franny was sure she would marshal enough courage to perform a solo of “Amazing Grace.”

She was watching a YouTube video of herself singing when Kathy walked past and Franny put down her phone. She knew her mother didn’t like it when she sang or posted videos of herself online. She had heard Kathy tell her time and again that she shouldn’t sing, that people would laugh at her, that this is a cruel world, and even though she knew Kathy was only trying to protect her, and that she might be right, Franny still wanted to sing on stage at church.

“Church is at 10,” Franny told little Bella, who was running all over the house. “Let’s go fix your hair.”

She next called to William, playing video games, and pulled out the tangles in his blond curls.

Kathy had been telling Franny to do more around the house, so she’d been trying. She helped the children get ready for school. She cooked meals when they got home. She cleaned and did laundry. But this also meant mistakes. She had recently forgotten to schedule a dental checkup for her older daughter, who, out of frustration, snapped: “Mama, when are you going to make my dental appointment?” On another day, William yelled at her to “learn how to drive.” And when she forgot to secure Bella in a car seat, Kathy scolded her: “You’re a grown woman. You know better than that.”



But some days she wasn’t so sure she did. For as long as she could remember, what she couldn’t do had defined her far more than what she could. She grew up looking like other children but realized she was different when she wound up in special education classes and peers were making fun of her. Then came the rest: the decision to abandon her dream of going to college, the realization that she would never have a job, and the relationship with a man on disability, with whom she had twins she could already tell were beginning to traverse the same path she had.

She looked at her phone again, pulling up a Facebook picture of another man she dated briefly.

“I found out he’s engaged to get married,” Franny said.

“God, he looks like his daddy,” Kathy said.

“Got him a pretty woman,” Franny said, flipping back to videos of herself singing.

Kathy, looking pained about the singing, asked, “What time is it, Franny?”

“9:47,” she said.

“Time to go.”

Franny picked up two bottles of soda for the church, walked out to the car, got in the back seat and, feeling the crunch of the car rolling across a gravel road, looked out the window. She saw that gravel road turn into another and another. She saw trailers, dirt-battered and deteriorating. She saw land as flat as it was empty, land that migrant workers traveled hundreds of miles to cultivate, reaping both that year’s watermelon harvest and jobs that few in the community were willing to do.

“Do you know your Bible verse?” Kathy asked of the homework for adult Bible class.

“No, I keep forgetting to read it,” Franny said and went back to looking out the window.

Most days it seemed to her that her disabilities were getting worse. Remembering even the most basic of things would make her head hurt, and sometimes she would wonder how she had ever been able to graduate high school. “Like my age is going backward,” Franny had said the day before as she struggled to recall that time in her life a decade ago, a time that seemed further and further away.

The church was down another gravel road, and after Franny got the kids out, she followed Kathy in, where people were already singing.

Franny took a seat at the front and listened as the preacher began his sermon: “We once had 60 people in this church, and I’ve seen it come down to 13 or 14.” She stood and, as the preacher’s face reddened, she held her arms out as wide as they would go, closed her eyes, tilted her head back, and said, “Thank you, Jesus, thank you, Jesus, thank you, Jesus, thank you, Jesus.”

Most of the congregants then approached the stage, and so did Franny. Together, they began a song, and when it was done, everyone went back to their seats. Except for Franny. She stared out across the church at the mostly empty chairs. Stationary farm equipment glinted outside a back window.

A moment passed. She tucked a hand behind her back. Another moment passed. She shifted her weight from one side to the other.

Then she took a breath and, exhaling slowly, came down the stairs and returned to her seat. There would be no solo this Sunday, either.

At home a little while later, she went off by herself. She took out her phone. Standing outside in the wind, she sang “Amazing Grace” and, without comment, posted the video to Facebook.

William and Dale were playing video games before school.

“Turn it down, William,” Kathy said, looking at Dale’s fourth-grade quiz scores with a cup of coffee. “He got a 60 on this one. He got a 67 on that one. Bad grades.”

“Here’s the other page,” said Franny, looking at a score of 75 on a spelling quiz, and Kathy glanced at the boys standing beneath photos of them playing Little League Baseball.

Dale yelled at the television, mashing buttons.

William yelled at the television, twisting his controller.

“Turn it down!” Kathy said, going back to her coffee.



A car pulled into the driveway.

“Jason’s here,” Franny called, and in walked Jason Ryan, a tall, curly-haired therapist who drives all over the county counseling distressed families, stopping here every week to discuss the twins’ outbursts and suggest parenting techniques.

The boys didn’t look up from their game.

“So how’s school going?” Ryan asked, bringing over a chair.

“Good,” Dale said. “I only have one D.”

“Here’s some of Dale’s work that he brought home yesterday,” Kathy said.

Ryan smiled. “Look at that!” he said. “That’s almost a C, buddy. He almost got a C on it, so he can do better than a C. And look at this spelling!”

A wail came from a bedroom, and Bella stumbled into Franny’s arms, red-faced.

“I don’t think she feels good,” Franny said.

“She’s just being a brat,” Kathy said, feeling the girl’s forehead. “She ain’t running a fever.”

“I know, but she looks a little bit .?.?.” Ryan said.

“Are you drunk this morning?” Kathy asked Bella teasingly after she toppled over.

“You might try some juice,” Ryan said. “Get her hydrated. She seems a little foggy in the head.” Then he turned his attention back to the twins.

“Dale, you remember for a little while you were feeling real sad after school and crying?” Ryan asked. “Now how long has it been since that happened?”

“None!” Dale said.

“How long?”

“None!”

“There’s one thing I can say,” Kathy said, watching the boys play, “is that these games keep an autistic child functioning.”

“It’s an environment they can control,” Ryan said.

“Mommy,” Dale suddenly yelled. “Mommy didn’t get me noodles this morning like I asked her to!”

“You didn’t ask me for ramen noodles,” Franny said.

“I did!” he said, glancing at the clock. “And it’s too late.”

“Go fix them, Dale!” Kathy said. “You’ve got time to eat them.”



He went to the kitchen, plopped a brick of ramen noodles into a bowl with a little water and put it in the microwave.

“Are we still eating those late at night?” Ryan asked, knowing Dale eats noodles drowned in hot sauce for all meals and sometimes wakes up with stomach pain. “We’re not supposed to be eating this late at night.”

“I still do,” Dale said. “And I’ve never had no problems. Been taking ranitidine for it.”

“Ranitidine is not for the stomach,” Kaitlyn said. “The stomach medicine I take is promethazine.”

“Ranitidine is for heartburn and stuff,” Kathy said.

“Well, it still helps me,” Dale said.

Ryan, trying to hide his exasperation, said, “Kathy, is he eating so much hot sauce late at night?” And then about William, who sometimes wouldn’t eat: “Have you tried offering him little amounts of food?”

“ ‘I’m not hungry,’ ” Kathy said, repeating what her grandson would say. “He’s a weird child.”

“He is unique,” Ryan said, correcting her. “Unique.”

“I don’t know if the autism center is going to diagnose them,” she said as Ryan packed up to go. “But we know what’s wrong.”

What was wrong:

“He has ADHD, ADD. He is bipolar. He has autism. He’s, um, let’s see. He has an anger disorder. Impulse-control disorder. And he’s got disruptive-mood disorder.”

Kathy was sitting at home beside an aquarium without any fish, Franny was mopping the floor and a Social Security representative was on the line, listening to Kathy trying to prove that the twins should be on disability.

“Anything else?”

“OCD. But that isn’t a disability.”

“Has he been seen by a doctor or hospital or clinic in the last couple of years for his disabilities?” came another question.

The twins had been examined by psychiatrists and counselors, social workers and educators, usually to conflicting conclusions. One counselor in 2015 wrote that the boys had “possible autism” and “severe mood swings.” Another assessment: “Interaction skills .?.?. not obviously impaired at a level one would typically associate with a child with an Autistic Spectrum Disorder.” And another: “Significant difficulties” and “developmental disorders.” And another: “The symptoms and behaviors in which [the children] presented were not at the same level” as Kathy and Franny had reported. And another: “Asperger’s syndrome.” At one point, Dale was removed from special education, and a school official later had this to say: “To my knowledge, they seem like normal boys.”

Kathy, hunched over, brought a hand to her forehead. “We’re finished, okay?” the representative was telling her. “All right, then, thank you,” she said, hanging up, and then it was quiet once more. She looked out the window, appearing shaken by two hours of questions intended to discern whether the twins met the requirements for a child disability benefit: an impairment or combination that resulted in “marked and severe functional limitations.”

She didn’t know, not yet, that later that month an autism specialist would tell her and Franny that the twins’ limitations weren’t that severe. They had ADHD and a disruptive mood disorder — but not autism. She didn’t know she would drive home venting the whole way. “I asked God to give us the right diagnoses,” she would say. “I don’t feel like I got the right diagnoses.” She didn’t know that they’d probably never get the checks back, that the family would now be composed of two generations on disability rather than three, and that she would arrive home feeling more alone than ever.



On this day, as she hung up the phone, she knew only that the kids would soon be home from school. They tumbled inside hours later, and before long, the twins were again screaming, the dogs were again barking, and Bella was stabbing a wall with a five-inch knife that she had somehow gotten a hold of.

The boys turned on the television for another video game.

“Put it on two players,” William said. “Put it on two players.”

“No,” Dale said.

“Mommy, he won’t put it on two players!” William said.

“It won’t go on two players!” Franny said.

Kathy sighed loudly. She went into another room and turned on an afternoon soap opera, and even as the boys argued, and Bella cried, and they started chanting for ice cream, she didn’t return. Her television was turned up so loudly that she couldn’t hear any of it.

Jennifer Jenkins contributed to this report.

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Friday, June 2, 2017 11:07 PM

6STRINGJOKER


That's the story that Wish just posted.

I still want to know why they have $300/mo. cell phone bills and $100/mo. cable TV bills and have the nerve to whine about how bad they got it.

Cancel the cell phones and get obama phones or the magic jack and cut the cable TV cord and they have enough money to pay their very low mortgage payment and the water bill right there. They're also easily getting $600+ a month in food stamps.

If I had been living the "high life" like they were the last two years I'd be worried about paying my bills now too.




I'm betting there's nothing wrong with those kids either. I hope it works out for them in the long run, but this could be one of the best things that ever happened to them.

I'm sick of hearing about kids so young being pumped up on pills to modify their behavior because their parents just can't deal.

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Friday, June 2, 2017 11:33 PM

1KIKI

Goodbye, kind world (George Monbiot) - In common with all those generations which have contemplated catastrophe, we appear to be incapable of understanding what confronts us.


I was reading this wondering, when did everything go downhill and snowball into such mess? I think it was when the daughter was born with mosaic Downs syndrome. That would certainly be hard enough to manage with as few resources as the grandmother has. And then the daughter had children.

No one in that family seems like they have enough going for them to lift just themselves up, let alone the rest of the family. The only person who might be in a position to know how to turn things around is the grandma. I sympathize with her. If she's in as much pain as I am, and as low in energy as I am, she can't do much. Physical limitations can be, well ... limiting. So even if she knew what to do to make things better, she doesn't seem to have the steam to get it done.

I don't see an answer for them except to have an outside force take charge. But who would that be?

As for the kids, it seems like their diet is bad, their lives are chaotic, and there's no one to teach them good coping skills. I think it's only after you improve their situation that you can make a diagnosis. They might just be reacting to their situation.

Originally posted by G: "I coined the slogan "We Suck!"© many years ago." G is an avowed Putin-loving, pro-Russian, anti-American troll.
You have a very treasonous view of how justice in the US should work, THUGGER. In fact, you have many other treasonous views as well. You hate the election process and want to void it.

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Friday, June 2, 2017 11:47 PM

1KIKI

Goodbye, kind world (George Monbiot) - In common with all those generations which have contemplated catastrophe, we appear to be incapable of understanding what confronts us.


I've read about this before, though. It was a thing especially for rural families to get their children diagnosed as ADD/ ADHD. The implications in that article was that it was considered a clever way to get more government assistance.

Originally posted by G: "I coined the slogan "We Suck!"© many years ago." G is an avowed Putin-loving, pro-Russian, anti-American troll.
You have a very treasonous view of how justice in the US should work, THUGGER. In fact, you have many other treasonous views as well. You hate the election process and want to void it.

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Saturday, June 3, 2017 12:21 AM

WISHIMAY


Reminds me of the crazy fool down the street. Her BF got fired for drinking on the job... again, now they are back to sitting around living off her disability and punching each others lights out... AGAIN. Church lady down the street organized some people and they cleaned up the junk in the yard... which will come in handy when he eventually kills her and sets the house on fire.

But, ain't that America...

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Saturday, June 3, 2017 1:29 AM

6STRINGJOKER


Quote:
Originally posted by 1kiki:
I've read about this before, though. It was a thing especially for rural families to get their children diagnosed as ADD/ ADHD. The implications in that article was that it was considered a clever way to get more government assistance.


That doesn't surprise me, and if they were doing it out of necessity and didn't list all of the money they waste every month on BS, I could even sympathize with somebody in their position doing that.

It only becomes EVIL when they actually feed those pills to the kids after lying about it.

You'll never get a straight answer out of anybody involved on that question though.


I think if they really don't have disabilities than whoever wrote the scripts for those kids in the first place should lose their license to practice.

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Saturday, June 3, 2017 1:33 AM

6STRINGJOKER


Quote:
Originally posted by Wishimay:
... which will come in handy when he eventually kills her and sets the house on fire.


My money is on her killing him in his sleep and setting the house on fire.

You've come a long way, baby.

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Saturday, June 3, 2017 2:12 AM

1KIKI

Goodbye, kind world (George Monbiot) - In common with all those generations which have contemplated catastrophe, we appear to be incapable of understanding what confronts us.



Quote:
I think if they really don't have disabilities than whoever wrote the scripts for those kids in the first place should lose their license to practice.
But it could be anything that's given rise to actual ADD/ ADHD, maybe even in utero lead poisoning.

One of my professional magazines listed how MANY people come into Atlanta (major modern city) ERs with acute lead poisoning, from moonshine. (It's those slopped-together stills with lead solder that does it.) Talk about regional medicine! Anyway, a woman doesn't even need to be actively drinking moonshine while pregnant, because once the lead is in her bones, it comes back out during pregnancy and poisons the fetus.

It could be chaos and stress that poison the fetus, which aren't genetic but are definitely heritable.

Or it could be poor diet that causes later neurological issues.

Or some combination, or something else.

What I think is that if children are neurologically compromised, then NOT getting them help is just as wrong as forcing normal kids to take meds. I don't think I even have an opinion on how much is fraud and lazy medical practice, and how much is a legitimate, if convenient, necessity.

I do have to object to Wish's characterization of the story. Wish's neighbors sound like video game trolls, chewing raw haunch, clobbering each other with the bones, and snarling and farting around the fire. In the particular WaPo story, the only person who might change things is the grandma, and she seems legitimately overwhelmed by circumstances. Yes, she could do some belt-tightening. I just think she's so pressed day to day, she'll never come to the idea.


Originally posted by G: "I coined the slogan "We Suck!"© many years ago." G is an avowed Putin-loving, pro-Russian, anti-American troll.
You have a very treasonous view of how justice in the US should work, THUGGER. In fact, you have many other treasonous views as well. You hate the election process and want to void it,

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Sunday, June 4, 2017 3:47 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


I really don't know what to make of this story.

It's extremely easy to be overwhelmed, especially by family medical misfortune. I know that things kind of "fall apart" here despite the fact that we have a decent income to help us deal with adversity ... hubby and I both work demanding jobs, but he's chronically sick and dear daughter is disabled, and as I get older and older I find myself with less and less energy, and less and less capable to push myself to do the things I need to do to keep the family going from day to day.

But what to make of multi-generational disabilities, especially because they're most common in very poor counties? Does poverty in some way cause disabilities? Do disability payments represent an easy way out, and is the screening and investigation so poor that it can't separate real from hoped-for diagnoses?

The biggest problem that this family had was letting Franny have children. I know another family where that happened, it was an ongoing crisis.



-----------

"Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor"- William Blake
THUGR, JONESING FOR WWIII
All those guns 1kiki, are pointed towards your beloved Russia. All those cyber capabilities, pointed right at Russia. Thanks Putin, and get ready to duck.
I'll accept your apology any time, THUGR. But I know you're not man enough to give me one


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Sunday, June 4, 2017 11:02 AM

WISHIMAY


Quote:
Originally posted by 1kiki:


I do have to object to Wish's characterization of the story. Wish's neighbors sound like video game trolls, chewing raw haunch, clobbering each other with the bones, and snarling and farting around the fire.



Personality Disorder coupled with Alcoholism and other health issues. She had 4 kids and her ex left and wouldn't pay child support and she couldn't feed them so she dropped them on his lap and hitchhiked away.

I don't see a damn bit of difference.


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Sunday, June 4, 2017 12:28 PM

1KIKI

Goodbye, kind world (George Monbiot) - In common with all those generations which have contemplated catastrophe, we appear to be incapable of understanding what confronts us.


The grandma is still there doing her best? That seems like an important point of difference.

Originally posted by G: "I coined the slogan "We Suck!"© many years ago." G is an avowed Putin-loving, pro-Russian, anti-American troll.
You have a very treasonous view of how justice in the US should work, THUGGER. In fact, you have many other treasonous views as well. You hate the election process and want to void it.

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Sunday, June 4, 2017 1:05 PM

WISHIMAY


Have you ever had 4 kids and nothing to feed them, when the father is two blocks away and has all the money, power, and food??

I don't like the woman, but I can't blame her. I'm sure if she stayed he would've just played that power trip game forever. They survived, and it's not like she dropped them off with a murderer or something. BTW, this was before they reformed the child support system where if you didn't pay you could go to jail. What kind of job could she have gotten to support 4 kids with no education and health issues? She didn't even have a vehicle, he took it...

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Sunday, June 4, 2017 1:10 PM

WISHIMAY


The common thread here is people making bad decisions. But people with mental problems do that.

And we're back to: Is it right to blame people for things they do when their heads don't work right to know that what they are doing isn't the best choice?

The answer is always Yes... AND NO. We still have to get along in this world, and even making the right choice guarantees NOTHING.
Shit happens.

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Sunday, June 4, 2017 1:31 PM

1KIKI

Goodbye, kind world (George Monbiot) - In common with all those generations which have contemplated catastrophe, we appear to be incapable of understanding what confronts us.


Quote:
The common thread here is people making bad decisions. But people with mental problems do that.
Except the grandma made the right decisions. But having a child with mosaic Downs syndrome wasn't a bad decision caused by mental illness, it was a tragic event that could have happened to anyone. And that looks like it's the first downward pivot in her life. Now she may or may not have been able to manage, especially as she grew older.

But then, her daughter had children. At that second downward pivot, this downward free-fall was inevitable.

I don't know how that could have been prevented. I don't know about conservatorship laws in the state. I don't know about whether or not the daughter could have been sterilized or at least treated with long-term implantable birth control. But those options don't seem to have been put on the table.

And so she had multiple children. And that inevitably sank everyone into poverty and chaos, with no apparent way out.

Originally posted by G: "I coined the slogan "We Suck!"© many years ago." G is an avowed Putin-loving, pro-Russian, anti-American troll.
You have a very treasonous view of how justice in the US should work, THUGGER. In fact, you have many other treasonous views as well. You hate the election process and want to void it.

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Sunday, June 4, 2017 4:39 PM

WISHIMAY


Quote:
Originally posted by 1kiki:
Except the grandma made the right decisions.


I don't think you can really say that based on one article. For all we know she may have drug or alcohol problems, and we know she's been married 4 times, so something is going wrong there. I am not unsympathetic to her plight, but you can tell from the article she doesn't have the best IQ either. I'm saying I think she also has natural impediments, just like the idiot down the street. Can't blame them for being born wonky, but...still have to try. I think she stopped trying a long, long, time ago. Hoping there is something wrong with your grandkids so you can make money from them is morally defunct at the very least.

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Monday, June 5, 2017 12:11 AM

6STRINGJOKER


I actually agree with Wish. Wow.

Especially that last sentence.

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Monday, June 5, 2017 3:07 AM

1KIKI

Goodbye, kind world (George Monbiot) - In common with all those generations which have contemplated catastrophe, we appear to be incapable of understanding what confronts us.


Quote:
Originally posted by 1kiki:
Except the grandma made the right decisions.
Quote:
Originally posted by Wishimay:
I don't think you can really say that based on one article.
Then it's also true you can't say she made wrong ones based on one article.
Quote:
For all we know she may have drug or alcohol problems, and we know she's been married 4 times, so something is going wrong there.
The article indicates she was working full time until a job injury disabled her. Whatever you imagine is wrong with her, her lifetime history is of being responsible and reliable up to that point.
And I can tell you young people - whatever injuries and illnesses, pains and disabilities you think you have now (unless some magic medicine comes along), they will only multiply by many factors as you age. There's the loss of human growth hormone, which shrinks your muscles, thins your skin, and keeps your body from repairing itself.
I believe that people can carry injuries for decades as HGH keeps them in repair, but once levels drops, those injuries reappear like cracks that got painted over. And with the reappearance comes chronic pain. And with chronic pain, comes deep fatigue.
The things you could manage when you're younger become insurmountable as you get older.
She's older, she's injured, she's in pain. You have to be realistic about what you can expect just on those limitations alone.
Quote:
I am not unsympathetic to her plight, but you can tell from the article she doesn't have the best IQ either.
Even bright people can be worn down by age, pain, fatigue, and stress.
Quote:
I'm saying I think she also has natural impediments, just like the idiot down the street. Can't blame them for being born wonky, but...still have to try. I think she stopped trying a long, long, time ago. Hoping there is something wrong with your grandkids so you can make money from them is morally defunct at the very least.
I think her grandkids are beyond what she knows how to deal with.
I'm met kids that sound very much like her grandchildren. They're baffling to deal with because their actions and responses are extreme and often veer rapidly into destructive and dangerous territory. It's hard to know if it's something internal that's driving them, or external, or a combination. She seems desperate to find a handle on why they are the way they are, and get some help. it's not all about money.


Anyway, you and Jack post with what I think of as the easy arrogance of the young. Your bodies haven't failed yet in permanent, life-altering ways, especially in terms of pain and energy. Don't worry grasshoppers - if you live long enough, you'll get there, too.

Then you can come back and explain how deficient the grandma is.

Originally posted by G: "I coined the slogan "We Suck!"© many years ago." G is an avowed Putin-loving, pro-Russian, anti-American troll.
You have a very treasonous view of how justice in the US should work, THUGGER. In fact, you have many other treasonous views as well. You hate the election process and want to void it.

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Monday, June 5, 2017 6:05 PM

WISHIMAY


Quote:
Originally posted by 1kiki:



Anyway, you and Jack post with what I think of as the easy arrogance of the young. Your bodies haven't failed yet in permanent, life-altering ways, especially in terms of pain and energy. Don't worry grasshoppers - if you live long enough, you'll get there, too.

Then you can come back and explain how deficient the grandma is.



Seriously, you desperately need some Alzheimer's meds. If you can't remember that I developed arthritis at 24, have a severe sulfite intolerance, a connective tissue disorder, and that I get hit by a semi recently, or at least ONE of those things you need to see a doctor.

I was still having to make dinner two days after I got hit.

TWO DAYS.

You don't get to give up when you have people that depend on you, pain, energy, or otherwise.

You do everything in your power to get them the things they NEED.

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Monday, June 5, 2017 6:31 PM

6STRINGJOKER


1kiki has a point about age Wish.

By the time your as old as grandma in the story, your daughter is going to probably be around your age. I know she has some issues, but if I remember right they're nowhere near as severe as the mother of the two boys in this story. I know you have some problems, but you at least have a working brain.

You are able to do now what "mom" in the story cannot do for herself or the children because of her damaged brain. You are able to do now what "grandma" can't do so good anymore because she's old. In most situations it wouldn't even be expected of her.

I don't envy that shit show at all.

I still think they need to cancel all of the cell phones and their cable TV though. Right there they'd be saving each month almost what they lost in disability benefits for one of the kids.


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Monday, June 5, 2017 6:39 PM

1KIKI

Goodbye, kind world (George Monbiot) - In common with all those generations which have contemplated catastrophe, we appear to be incapable of understanding what confronts us.


Quote:
If you can't remember that I developed arthritis at 24, have a severe sulfite intolerance, a connective tissue disorder, and that I get hit by a semi recently, or at least ONE of those things you need to see a doctor.
I had my first back injury in my early 20's, my second in my mid 30's and my third in my mid 40's. And I was able to do Ok despite the pain until my mid 50's when the pain hit levels I could never have imagined in my younger years - and at the same time my physical, mental and emotional stamina dropped.

I didn't say you were pain-free, Wish, just that when you're younger, you don't hurt as much and your stamina is higher.

So I'll repeat myself, in the hopes that you'll understand you're not the only person in pain, with illnesses and disabilities.

When you're older, things get WORSE. Pain increases, illnesses return, new ones show up. Energy levels, strength, and stamina go down. At a certain point, even daily activities become an endurance test. And, it doesn't quit. Pain and fatigue go on for days ... weeks ... years. You go from having plans and schedules, to pushing yourself every blessed step, to cutting back to the minimum, to just trying to outlast the day so that you can finally, blissfully, oh sweet jesus lie down. What used to be a really bad day becomes a new way of being.

You're not there Wish. Some day you will be, but not today.

Originally posted by G: "I coined the slogan "We Suck!"© many years ago." G is an avowed Putin-loving, pro-Russian, anti-American troll.
You have a very treasonous view of how justice in the US should work, THUGGER. In fact, you have many other treasonous views as well. You hate the election process and want to void it.

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Tuesday, June 6, 2017 7:52 PM

WISHIMAY


Quote:
Originally posted by 1kiki:


You're not there Wish. Some day you will be, but not today.




I'm not playing this game with you. You don't know what you are talking about. I'd be thrilled if I just had an injury to contend with. I've had health problems since minute one. I slept every spare minute of my teens away. Youth means NOTHING in my case. Don't play pious with me, lady.


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Tuesday, June 6, 2017 9:00 PM

6STRINGJOKER


Give it 20 years and I bet you're going to look back at today with fond memories.

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Wednesday, June 7, 2017 12:08 AM

1KIKI

Goodbye, kind world (George Monbiot) - In common with all those generations which have contemplated catastrophe, we appear to be incapable of understanding what confronts us.


Quote:
I'd be thrilled if I just had an injury
or six
Quote:
to contend with. I've had health problems since minute one.
Well, I haven't mentioned my allergies to just about everything, or the asthma that leaves me gasping for air, and so on. What would be the point in that?

I'm not competing with you over who has it worse, even though you seem bound and determined to compete with me. And I'm not trying to diminish what you go through, even though you seem bound and determined to diminish what I go through.

I AM pointing out that you seem to have blinded yourself to the fact that other people also suffer. And it could affect their lives and the lives of others in entirely destructive ways. And that it may be entirely beyond that person's capacity to overcome.

And also, I agree with Jack. With time, you'll look on these as the good old days.

Originally posted by G: "I coined the slogan "We Suck!"© many years ago." G is an avowed Putin-loving, pro-Russian, anti-American troll.
You have a very treasonous view of how justice in the US should work, THUGGER. In fact, you have many other treasonous views as well. You hate the election process and want to void it.

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