10-year old Ashlynn Conner commits suicide

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . November 14, 2011 . 5:40PM

This is my kneejerk reaction, so I don’t know if this will be a well-thought out post that elicits the response of “thank you and I appreciate what you wrote.” I am ok with this. Right now, I keep repeating to myself, and over and over, “This is not ok. This is not ok. This is not ok.” I’m angry and no, this is not ok.

My son, AJ, is 10 years old. He is in the fifth grade.

Ashlynn Conner was 10 years old and in the fifth grade. Ashlynn’s mother reported that, last Thursday, Ashlynn came home from school and asked to be placed in homeschool because other children called her fat, a slut and bullied her constantly. Ashlynn’s mother declined, as most mother’s I know would. Unlike most mothers I know, she did not press the issue further. The following morning, Ashlynn’s sister found her hanging from a scarf in her closet.

I’m about to get judgmental and self-righteously angry. If that kind of behavior bothers you or you want to play the “no blame” game where the lives of children are concerned because the people who knew her are being punished enough right now, you should probably stop reading.

Ashlynn’s mother, Stacy, notes that Ashlynn had come home crying from school two weeks ago because kids were taunting her. She states that she “thought her kids were strong kids” implying that kids that can’t handle bullying are weak and that her own daughter, who committed suicide, wasn’t strong because she couldn’t handle what was coming at her because Stacy’s “guidance” should have been stronger than the constant barrage of nastiness coming at her at school. I want to challenge that statement with perhaps her daughter didn’t feel supported in any environment.

Stacy noted that kids both at school and in their neighborhood bullied Ashlynn and called her ugly and she hopes that Ashlynn’s story will prevent other kids from being bullied. What stopped this mother from preventing her own child from being bullied? What allowed her to step back and let kids in the neighborhood and in her school overtake adult sensibilities and prevent her from protecting her child in her learning environment, at the very least? How does allowing the death of her child to protect others absolve her from how very little she did to protect her child?

I understand Stacy is hurting. Never, in anything she tells the press, did anything she say indicate to me that she took any measure to protect her child. It takes a lot for a child to come to a parent begging to be removed from a school environment. I don’t pretend I know what kind of child Ashlynn Conner was. I don’t know if she was a dramatic child who overemphasized everything, but I highly doubt that there were no signs that this child was struggling, especially considering her mother admitted to them. There are national laws preventing bullying in school systems. Where was this child’s teacher? Where was this child’s school staff? Where was the communication between them and the parent? You can try to justify to me that a teacher has 30 students, but not every teacher in this child’s day had no time to notice what was going on if she was being called “fat,” “ugly,” and a “slut.”

Someone explain this to me, because I don’t understand why no one is being called on the inattention to her cries for help or the inaction by any adult in the life of this 10-year old child. On a personal note, my son left his last school, on the last day of school, with his school tshirt covered in black marker thanks to two bullies in his class. I immediately contacted his principal and informed him that the teacher was notified and she did nothing. I also let him know that she’d been notified that these two children had continued to bully my son throughout the year and she’d promised me that she was “taking care of it.” I was aware of the school bullying policy and the national laws regarding bullying and that he was welcome to call me to discuss it. That teacher was not asked back to teach this year.

This year, my son started school and one of those two children was in his class and immediately started the same issues. I contacted the teacher and stated that I would like a conference with her regarding this. Within 30 minutes of school starting the following morning, both boys were in the guidance office and the issue was fixed. I can’t discuss why the other boy bullies, as it has to do with his own personal issues, but he does not bully my son or the other children at that school anymore. I stepped in when his guardian wouldn’t due to her inattention or unwillingness because I have to protect MY child.

Being an interactive parent is one of the most important parts of parenting. There is no excuse for not being an interactive parent. I have as many irons in the fire as anyone I know, and if you read this blog, you understand why. I am as involved in my son’s life as I can be, even on the days where I don’t get home until it’s time for him to go to bed.

Not every parent has the proper skills for parenting. To me, that is not a get out of jail free card when you fail your children. It does not mean that you use your story as a warning to other parents to absolve yourself. It means you buck up and take the punishment when you fail them so miserably that you’ve caused neglect through inaction or death through negligence. Where were the school counselors? Where was the mental health help here?

Absolutely, use Ashlynn Conner’s death as a warning to other parents, but don’t let this slip into just another story we forget next week. Use it to promote better policies and procedures in school. Force interaction between staff and parents. Use it to promote outreach to parents on protocol when their child is bullied and for the sake of all this is good, parents and teachers, bullying is ZERO TOLERANCE. Don’t toe the line with it. Little bullies grow up to be big bullies.

Edit: Another 10 year old girl, this one from North Carolina, has hanged herself. Jasmine McClain hanged herself on Monday after being bullied badly in school and, apparently, on Facebook (it’s possible that the sheriff just noticed kids coming forward to comment on the abuse on Facebook). She had left her school for a while to escape the bullying, but returned a month ago. Her mother says she was “unaware that Jasmine was so tormented.” Again, in this situation, I have no idea how someone claims to be unaware after removing her child from school and only allowing her back last month. I’ve already backed my opinions up in the comments, though, so please read those if you would like to fricassee me for being upset with the mother in this case. If parents and school administration are not prompted at this point to take a hard stand about bullying TODAY, AT THIS INSTANT, then we as a society need to force the issue. ENOUGH. No one is allowed to claim ignorance about this anymore. No one is allowed to blame others. We must address this and it must happen now.

Also, I saw this while I was reading last night and I thought to myself, “If this is what our special needs kids are dealing with we need to flush out our schools completely and start over.”

Edit: 11/20/11 Excellent information on what a parent whose child is being bullied can do. I found this on Suicide Prevention Lifeline, which is an amazing website. Please go look around on there. They have warning signs, a pledge to stop bullying, and a few other things that are tied to this specific topic. Plus, they are a good site to have on hand with the rate of suicide in our country.

Edit: 12/16/11 Jerome Sattler, considered a founding father where school psychology is considered because he writes the books that are considered the “bibles” for the profession, has done a great public presentation on bullying/cyber bullying that I highly recommend. You can find it here at the psychology page for San Diego State University where he is a Psychology Professor.

And now for something serious…

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . January 22, 2010 . 9:06AM

There are many things in my life that I am passionate about that I don’t take the time to write about here. It isn’t that I don’t care enough, it’s that I understand and am aware that my passions are not the passions of everyone. And I also know that when people are strongly polarized, the reasons of one’s heart are often not enough to sway one another. However, there are times that not saying anything is akin to agreement and I feel like I cannot let this subject be one in which there is any doubt as to how I feel.

Those in my life that know me best know that I’m generally quite apathetic on most issues and due to my profession, I support people as to their decisions. With that said, I am adamantly pro-life for many personal reasons and many well thought out ones. As a humanist, a scientist, a mother, a woman, a friend, a social science major and someone who cares deeply for others…I can be nothing else.

My husband wrote a post today, on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade. I’m linking it here. My personal whys will remain unsaid… Sometimes it is better that way.

In Memoriam

Drinking and Driving

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . November 16, 2009 . 10:40AM

This is the post you don’t want to read if you are guilty. This is the post you don’t want to read if you don’t want to hear it. This is the post you don’t want to read if you think it’s just a soapbox.

This is the post that you should be reading regardless of all of those things because even if you don’t think it’s YOUR problem, it’s OUR problem and I’m seriously worn out by it. The only way to fix it is to pull together and collectively decide we’re done and that we are going to publicly shame and shun for this offense and quit letting people slide. The only way to help that is to create stronger messages. And, chances are, you know someone who has a problem with this and, chances are, you are shaking your head and getting ready to close the window on this post. Let me explain myself.

Before my 18th birthday, I’d lost several friends to drinking and driving. I’m not talking about people I’d heard of through the grapevine. I’m talking about living, breathing people. One was in the band with me. One could hug like you wouldn’t believe. One shyly told me in the 6th grade that he wouldn’t mind dating me at all (ah, 6th grad boys). One was the quiet guy in the corner that never said a word. Those are just a few. By my 21st birthday, the numbers went higher and higher.

Less than a month ago, I received word that a boy from my hometown was killed. He was adamantly against drinking and driving and involved in some of the same groups that opposed it that I was involved with in high school. This 19 year old was also the nephew of my junior high best friend, so I’d spent a lot of time with him in his younger years. He’d had many health issues and struggled so much just to have a normal life. What I remember most about him, at that age, were these gorgeous, huge eyes that stared at me, and a beautiful smile that wouldn’t quit.

By all accounts, this boy turned into a young man, was succeeding in life. The man who hit him survived. The family is devastated. Shouldn’t they be? Wouldn’t you be?

If it were AJ…I don’t know that I could be rational.

So, when does it stop being acceptable? When do we stop allowing our friends to drive when they insist they are ok to drive? When do we push the cabs on them or make sure there is a DD before we serve them? I’ve never had a problem being DD being that I’m not a big drinker. Surely, I’m not the only one out there? Many restaurants offer to pay for cabs. Many bars do as well. How many of you would turn down someone if they called asking for a ride? So why isn’t this happening?

Why is it, when we find out someone has committed this offense, that we write it off as just another mistake? Is it not, and I’m going to say something extreme here, so please brace yourself, techincally attempted assault, at the very least? Attempted harm to another person? Suicide is illegal. At the very least, attempted harm to oneself? Attempted murder? What makes this any different from someone who actively goes after another person? Or someone who is going after multiple people wielding a weapon weighing over a ton? I’m aware they are charged with DUI, but it doesn’t feel like enough. Especially when many people are allowed to slide after multiple DUI’s for reasons such as knowing the judge in a small town.

Yes, I KNOW they think they are fine to drive and who are you to tell them they aren’t? They are impaired. It’s what alcohol does and why people like it so much. If it didn’t make people feel uninhibited, they wouldn’t drink it. Some people are fine to drive. Some people aren’t.

When do we stop giving them a free pass?

Scientist clones girls dna to bring her back from the dead

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . June 11, 2009 . 2:53PM

After careful consideration, I have decided to write this post. It’s been sitting in my queue for a long time, believe it or not, and I had to debate with myself as to whether or not I could write it in a way that would benefit anyone reading it. I had to debate whether or not I could write it in a way that wouldn’t be soul-destroying for myself. There are no easy answers in regards to what I’m about to talk about, but it’s news and it is what it is.

A fertility doctor, located in the Middle East, by the name of Panayiotis Zavros, took the blood from a dead child and claims that he created cloned embryos of her and implanted them in the wombs of four different women. The Daily Mail article notes that Zavros has made these claims before and has said that the first human clone could be conceived within the next year. You can read the article to get more information on his process and procedure. In essence, Cady, the girl’s mother, gave the doctor the blood in order to give Cady a “biological presence” in the world.

Ok, deep breath here.

As a mom, there are many things I know. The first being that if anything ever happened to my child, I would be crushed beyond belief and that I would do just about anything to get him back. Likely, I wouldn’t be thinking rationally and I might have the same irrational thought that by cloning my child and having his physical DNA in the world, my son would be “back.” However, here’s the other thing I know: we are products of both our genetics and our experiences. Whatever child came into this word would be genetically Cady, but experientially, she would not be the same child. She wouldn’t. And that child would not be born to Cady’s “real mom” and therefore, that biological presence wouldn’t be hers either. She would lose the very things that make motherhood what it is: That sense of possessiveness and joy as that individual goes out into the world with what you have helped give them to grow and learn.

Would I want him back? Of course I would. Would I want someone else to have my A.J.? Not a chance. Would he really be my A.J.? No. He really wouldn’t.

The ethical questions swirl: Should human cloning be allowed? Should human embryos be used? Should children be “resurrected” by use of their blood or adult skin cells at the whims of their grieving parents? Should doctors be allowed to perform these procedures? Is this particular doctor taking advantage of parents who are not yet done mourning the loss of their daughter? There are some that believe Zavros should be jailed for his tampering with human DNA.

What do you believe?

Animal experimentation on dogs leads to fluorescent puppies

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . June 6, 2009 . 5:50PM

Once upon a time, in a land far, far away, there was a Poky Little Puppy. This was a very mischievous puppy and he couldn’t seem to stay in his yard. Every day, his mother would call for him and tell him that dinner was ready and that he needed to come in, and every day, that little puppy would be out wandering the world. He would dawdle into the house whenever his poky little legs felt like it and would be very, very sad that he was so slow to come home because his little tummy would rumble. There’s a moral to that story. But that’s not this story.

In this story, the poky little puppy wandered to another land, far, far away. A place where puppies aren’t safe. A place called South Korea. And in this place, the Poky little puppy had his DNA cloned and merged with genes similar to those of a sea anemone, which is an underwater creature. This was done by a scientist who said that he was was doing it to produce a puppy that, because of a long lifespan, might help cure human illness. However, what this merging did was TURN THE PUPPY INTO A GLOWSTICK!!!!

For comparison: The glowstick

The puppy:

Byeong-Chun Lee, the South Korean researcher, is not the first to make animals glow. The question here is why? What is the purpose of making them light up like a Christmas tree? Besides wasting money and time on other efforts, you know like those pesky things such as cancer and AIDS. Instead, some of our top researchers are focusing on making animals glow. It can’t be good for the animals and I fail to see how it’s worth our time and money.

Please, enlighten me?