“Absent but not gone...”

Good morning, friends. A few nights ago a TV cop show had an episode in which a young boy returned home after a sleep-over to discover everything gone; all the furniture, dishes, clothing, and not the least of which was his parents. Police were called only after a neighbor complained that the kid was beating on the walls with his baseball bat. Later, on the local news, the episode was followed up with a story of a real kid whose parents abandoned him this way.  What’s wrong with this picture?

Last night in my dreams, Amazon Sage travelled to the bedside of the real boy whose parents abandoned him.  I can’t say she travelled to his home since his foster placement is still quite temporary and he feels anything but “at home.” His eyes stung from tears of hurt and rage. “How could my parents do this to me?” he whispers in a voice rough with emotion. “Now, I’m being treated like a criminal and I never did anything wrong in my life. If anything, I tried too hard to make their lives better after they had too much to drink or when my dad lost his job....”

She sees the clues and wants to reassure this boy that his parents are the real criminals. She wants to tell him that he’ll be okay, his life is not ruined due to their abandonment. Unfortunately, she’d be lying because what we do not know is that his parents abandoned him long before the day he returned to an empty house. We don’t need x-ray vision to see what his life may look like a few years from now, after being passed from one foster home to another; learning the hard way about the underside of life. This kid’s rage and hurt will not go away without some serious loving help. Now here’s the kicker; there are literally millions of kids at risk due to a different kind of abandonment by their parents. They may not have physically moved out, but they’ve certainly “checked out” where their kids are concerned.  

Parents who abandon their kids while still living at home will use every excuse in the book to explain away their nightly drinking, pot smoking, never-ending work day, or excessive internet use. Of course, they’ll never admit they are addicted to any of them but you know what I’m talking about. You have something important to tell them and blurt out your excitement, only to get a response that is so lame you know they are not really listening.  Maybe it’s the silently moving curser on their computer that gives them away. Maybe it’s the fixed-eyebrow raise and stupid grin that does it. Did you know that some parents don’t even pretend to listen? They don’t even issue a grunt of acknowledgement that you exist. Ouch!

You’ve heard all their excuses. Know how I know? It’s because over time, you’ve learned to use those same tired lies to fend off your little brother or sister. So hear this: Unless you stop this cycle now, your future kids will feel just as abandoned as you. So stop drawing pictures of the dark side and thinking about killing yourself. You can do something about this. Encourage, no insist, that your parents open their eyes and look around to see what they’re missing; a wonderful, smart person who’s made from their genetics! Hopefully, they’ll get it (you!) before it’s too late. Wake up, wake up, wake up....