In Search of Dibs - Reaction Paper

The Narcotics Anonymous meeting which I attended was named 7 Days of NA which was located on 1212 North Wolfe Street at an organization called Dee’s Place. Just as the Alcoholic Anonymous meeting previously attended, the location appeared to be in a covert and quiet place to hold a support group. We entered through the rear entrance, which seemed to be staged that way to secure participants identity. As before at the last support group I attended, I searched around the room to see again, a 12 steps guide posted on the wall, a relatively thick NA ‘Basic Text’ textbook on the desk of the facilitator and this

He was often punished when his brothers weren 't, even if they were doing the same thing. He was able to be adventurous but instead was stuck with guilt. Throughout his years he also faced the emotional toll of abuse in many ways. One way his mother did this was by no longer calling him by his name, and not referring to him as a human. Dave states in his book, “that death would be better than my prospects for any kind of happiness. I was nothing but an “it”.” Children and adolescents go through a stage where they are trying to figure out who they are. With an abusive mother who takes away your identity it would be really hard to figure out who you are and you would be confused on what roles to play. Erikson’s stages emphasize family and culture. Erikson noted that psychological conflicts, especially in childhood within families, affect people lifelong.

When I first started reading Dibs in Search of Self, I was not sure if I was going to really be able to get into the book. Once I started reading it, I found it to be interesting, informative, and enjoyable. I found myself being more and more interested after each chapter and found myself wanting to learn more about Dibs’ situation. There are so many aspects of this book that made me feel emotionally connected to it. I could not help but become interested in learning more about this child’s life and seeing how he changed throughout the course of the book. Along with the book being a great read, it was also interesting being able to read a book that related heavily to the topics that we have talked about in class. This book not only gives a real-life perspective about childhood psychopathology, but it also make you think about the difference factors that can influence a child’s overall development.

In this stage the child learns to feel comfortable with parents and trusts their care or develops a deep mistrust that makes them feel unsafe. Although Aileen’s mother did not leave her until age 3 she neglected them at a very young age and Aileen did not have a father to nurture her either.

Abandonment indicates a parent’s choice to have no part in his or her offspring’s life. This includes failure to support the child financially and emotionally, as well as failure to develop a relationship with his or her child. Sadly, parental abandonment leaves a child with doubt and uncertainty about the future. Throughout his or her life, this particular child could suffer from lasting questions of self-worth. In the opposite direction, the child could learn to resent his or her parents and remain incapable of trusting anyone. Regardless, intentional negligence of children leaves them with an unbearable pain that they must carry around for the rest of their lives. Child-care and the consequences

Whether you agree with Sigmund Freud, Alfred Adler, or Erik Erickson, theoretical approaches to human nature all agree that early childhood years play a major part of our conscious and unconscious decisions we make. For instance, even though both Wes Moore’s were brought up without a father in their home, the reality is that these absences meant something different to each of them. For Wes 1 his father died an unnecessary death due to lack of training of emergency personnel. He remembered his dad as being compassionate, loving, and kind. Wes 1 always knew that if given the choice, his father would have stood by him throughout his life. Wes 2, however, is left with negative fatherly feelings. In the three times they were together, his own father acted as though he didn’t recognize him. What’s worse is that Wes 2 knew that his dad didn’t want to know him, he chose to leave. That left not only a hole where there should have been a very important role model, it left rejection in its place. When Wes 1 was visiting Wes 2 in the jail and asked about the impact his father had on his life, the second Wes said, “Your father wasn’t there because he couldn’t be, my father wasn’t there because he chose not to be. We’re going to mourn their absence in different ways” (Moore page 3). Later in the chapter Wes 1 gets emotional thinking about how he misses his father. He was left,

In Chaim Potok’s “The Chosen”, Reb Saunders knowingly raises his son through emotional detachment in the form of his own silence towards Danny. Reb Saunders methods, although rather neglectful and harsh, serve Danny successful in the grand scheme of his own intellectual success and his tzaddik soul. Reb Saunders reflects on his own childhood and states “My father himself never talked to me, except when we studied together. He taught me with silence. He taught me to look into myself, to find my own strength, to walk around inside myself in company with my soul” (Potok 284), through this form of parenting, Reb Saunders learns to raise a strong fully willed child who recognizes others weaknesses with respect and mercy, without forgetting himself

    Humans have come to a conclusion that all lives are different, but all go through many hardships and tragedies. The impact from a slight difference can vary to be very vast to very small, such a slight difference, however, can change a person’s life as a whole. In the book, The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates by Wes Moore there is a difference that can be identified between the author’s life and that of the other Wes. This difference, though can be very critical and is ultimately able to lead to a path of triumph or failure for an individual. The lack of involvement a mother has for their child can fundamentally deprive them from succeeding, and parent involvement has the opportunity to

“Hell!” the operator’s cigarette moved in his lips. “We got these cases, nine or ten at night. Got so many, starting a few years ago, we had the special machines built,” is a quote from the book that shows a bit of mature language that not be okay for some children. Another quote from the book gives an example of the same thing, “I’m afraid of children my own age. They kill each other. Did it always used to be that way? My uncle says no. Six of my friends have been shot in the last year alone. Ten of them died in car wrecks.” Those are not even the worst parts of the book. I believe some components would definitely be not okay with some parents.

It is easy to blame a child’s upbringing when something goes wrong in their teenage and adult life. However, both Wes Moore’s had a similar childhood yet still ended up with different fates. For example, both of them had absent fathers and were raised by a single parent One of them describes their situation perfectly by telling the other. “Your father wasn’t there because he couldn’t be, my father wasn’t there because he chose not to be “ (Moore 3). A situation where the father is absent is commonly blamed for a misguided life but it is later evident that although there was no father, one of the Wes Moore’s was able to thrive in a positive manner. Since there was a lack of fatherhood, both of them lacked role models, specifically ones that would lead to live positive lives. One Wes Moore chose to retaliate by almost stabbing a neighborhood kid because “it was a pride issue”(Moore 32) and

The life of a parent is a difficult journey. To be an acceptable parent, the parent must complete different tasks such as being employed therefore providing needs of children. Oftentimes, society judges a parent on their ability to provide for their children. For example, if the father determines to abuse his daughter, society will rebuke him. However, it only takes a child to show their love towards their parents for society to accept that he is able to provide for that child’s needs. In the book The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls, the relationship between Jeannette and her father projects throughout the book due to the attachment they have towards one another. Despite the destruction her father have placed in her life, Jeannette continuously

Parents are the kid’s first teacher. Through their direct interactions or the example they set as a role models, they highly influence all their kids’ development stages from infancy to adulthood. However, parenting is not an easy duty. It is, actually, challenging and can even be overwhelming for single parenting, especially for those in certain disadvantaged social and economic life conditions, like Joy and Mary, the mother of the two Wes Moore, in the book “The other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates”. Both Joy and Mary were struggling to raise their kids alone in a challenging social environment. Even though the two mothers seem to have many similarities in some ways like their social class and ethnic group, their life conditions, and their

In the short story “Harrison Bergeron,” the authors makes it where everyone is equal. The mentally retarded were together and the wise was together, it doesn’t matter if you were in between. The author should’ve made it where kids could see that it was ok to be themselves to show good leadership and teach our youth. Our authors should set a good role for children to understand instead of making it seem like they should be like other people.

Dave’s mother, Catherine, would decorate the family’s home for each holiday and enjoyed cooking different meals for the family. His dad was often away for days at a time due to work, yet loved his family. However, things started drastically changing with his mother. She begun to drink heavily, and became short tempered. Dave quotes himself as the most difficult of his siblings, and believed this to be the reason his mother singled him out to be abused whenever he was “bad.” At first Dave’s father protected him from the abuse, but eventually he begun to ignore the abuse. Dave’s punishments initially consisted of slaps, pushes, head slamming and making him repeat “I’m a bad boy!” The abuse only worsened, as Dave grew older Catherine begun withholding food from Dave, isolating him from his brothers, forcing him to eat feces and poisonous substances, and made him wear the same outfit for 3 years. She furthered his abuse by calling him “the boy” or “it,” instead of his given name and ordering the other boys to abuse Dave.

As children we look up to our parents as role models, it is universal that we have the need to have them in our lives, to feel loved by them. They are the people who should be responsible for our upbringing and in molding the way we are to be as adults. The role of a parent is not just providing food and shelter but also providing a good example. Unfortunately, this does not always happen. There are parents who for one reason or another are not there for their children, parents who do not set the right example to their kids. In the story "Reunion" by John Cheever we see a perfect example of how a father does not step up to his role as a parent and the effect it has on his son. We see the need of