Alcohol in the womb is a solvent and acts on the
baby’s developing brain like paint stripper acts on layers of old
paint on furniture: it dissolves brain cells, bubbles them away.
Thus, brain functions are missing.
1. FASD IS A PERMANENT BRAIN-BASED BIRTH DEFECT
- Jan Lutke advises: distinguish between non-compliance and
non-competence. There is a difference, and it is brain-based.
2. FASD IS A MULTI-SECTOR PROBLEM
- It is a school, police, social, legal, medical, family,
community, and national problem.
- It is a delusion to think one agency can solve this problem.
3. DO NOT RE-INVENT THE WHEEL
4. GO PAST JUDGMENT AND UNDERSTAND THE REASONS WHY PREGNANT
WOMEN DRINK ALCOHOL
- This is difficult and requires a heartfelt, clear-minded
knowledge of family violence, the history of close
relationships, poverty, lack of education, addiction, and an
understanding of how people cope with daily difficulty.
- FASD is not restricted to poor marginalized Canadians. Rich
stockbrokers have wives who binge-drink while pregnant. Young,
educated professional women binge-drink almost as a rite of
passage, often not knowing they are pregnant.
5. THERE IS GOOD NEWS: IT’S CALLED THE “EXTERNAL BRAIN”
- The “External Brain” as intended by Dr. Sterling Clarren
means appropriate supervision 24/7. Design appropriate
structures to create opportunities for the FASD person to be
successful. All the available drugs and therapy, all the jail
time, all the best intentions found in court orders, will not
generate new brain cells. These offenders will be the same every
time they come into the courtroom. They are not going to change.
It is our responsibility to create success for persons with FASD.
They need help from a walking, talking committee of
knowledgeable helpers.
- The “External Brain”, as a legal concept, is our duty of
care. It is our duty to accommodate FASD persons because we are
all to be equal before the law.
- Diane Malbin provides four practical suggestions:
- Match the brain before you to the task you set.
- Identify your assumptions.
- Adjust your expectations and stretch your definition of
success.
- Change their environment.
- These suggestions are easy to say aloud but difficult to
implement for four reasons:
- Each of us has a little voice inside that says: they
should not get away with this unacceptable behaviour.
- Each of us shares a social sense that an individual
could do better if the individual would just try harder.
- If we really knew how the brain worked, we would punish
differently. We would design our “teaching and corrections
industries” differently. Our knowledge of the human brain is
in its infancy. There is much we do not know. Many of our
brain-based assumptions in the criminal system are clearly
wrong. The McNaughten Rules (1853) work for you and I, not
FASD persons.
- Change is not easily accepted or even wanted, especially
in rigid systems like the legal or educational systems.
Most importantly: caregivers and others charged with dealing
with persons with FASD will experience near total exhaustion very
quickly—this includes police, teachers, lawyers, social workers, and
judges. Guard against dying inside yourself, the same way a
long-distance runner guards against fading too soon. There are
training tips and they involve physical, mental, emotional, and
spiritual fitness—take care of yourself. Like the monotonous
warnings on airlines, put on your air mask before helping others.
You are useless if dead, or unable to do your appointed task.
RESOURCES:
- Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder: Trying Differently Rather
Than Harder, Diane Malbin.
- Fetal Alcohol Syndrome and the Criminal Justice System:
Understanding the Offender with FAS (DVD and VHS), Dr. Julianne
Conry.
www.asantecentre.org
- The Challenge of Fetal Alcohol Syndrome: Overcoming
Secondary Disabilities, Ann Streissguth and Jonathan Kanter
(eds.)
- Fetal Alcohol Syndrome: A Guide for Families and
Communities, Ann Streissguth
- Beautiful Smiles, Gentle Spirits. Fetal Alcohol Spectrum
Disorder: A Misunderstood Problem, Margaret Michaud and Sacha
Michaud (eds.)
- Web Resources by Dr. Kathy Sulik, Ph.D., University of North Carolina (Embryologist).
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