Understand Or Not?

I spent yesterday afternoon trying to explain to a case manager how manipulating and comprehending work with a FASD/RAD/developmentally disabled kid.

There are many times when the kid simply  does not understand, just because she is not intelligent enough to do so.  For example she does know what a $5.00 bill is, however she has no idea what you can buy with that amount of money.There are also things that are to abstract for her such as telling time. She can read to numbers on a digital clock, but does not understand what 1:15 pm means in relation to the days events.

There are other times that she does understand and she chooses not to listen because that is just what a teenager does and when it is a teenager with RAD they amp it up to a level 1,000 times greater then the average teenager. Lets just say that the kid is very defiant.  For example she knows that she is not supposed to draw on the wall, but she does it just because she can. She also knows that you use toothpaste to brush your teeth, but if she thinks no one is watching she will not use it. The average kid grows out of these behaviors and becomes responsible for their own hygiene, money, meals, health care, education, etc as a young adult, however that is not going to happen in this situation. The kid will ALWAYS require cues and supervision in order to function in an appropriate manner.

There are also times when you really do not know if the kid does not understand or if she is just trying to rattle everyone around her. She can lie and look very convincing. She knows how to use tears when she needs to and she can suck unsuspecting bystanders into her drama.

Just why were we having this conversation? Well, it goes like this if the person does not have the ability to  understand they get service points and if they are just manipulating they do not.  We have a situation here where we have both so that cuts down on service points.  Things get a bit messy when people do not fit neatly into a standard set of expectations.