Houseparents: A vignette

Being with a youngster in crisis means that the adult, too, is involved and may be affected as much as is the youngster himself. The author describes such a situation when a 14-year old has open heart surgery, and its impact on the worker and on the relationship between him and the youngster.The author and his wife are live-in house parents of Torresdale House, a group home for six dependent/neglected adolescent boys operated by St. Francis Vocational School.Clayton, fourteen, came to Torresdale House two years ago. His mother has always had poor health, both physically and mentally. His father left the family when the boy was born. When Clayton contacted his family, he was met with indifference. The boy was raised by a next door neighbor until she had problems of her own and he was placed at Torresdale House.Clayton came with a tendency to magnify everyday life experiences. He also had a habit of turning situations around so that he could derive self-pity—probably in order to reinforce a poor self-image and the idea that he is generally unlucky in life. Clayton has had bad moments at Torresdale House, like stealing 200 dollars from the budget money, but he is generally warm and sensitive. He is small for his age, and has had two medical problems: cysts growing at the tip of his nerve endings, and a heart strain caused by a tight, fleshy substance growing in his subaortic valve which is slowly causing this channel to close. He needed heart surgery.