Almost Lost: The True Story of an Anonymous Teenager's Life on the Streets

by Beatrice Sparks

  “There are many things you can do for them, dear Sammy.”

  Sammy grunted wearily.

  “There are many things we all could, and should, be doing. For instance there are remedial reading, writing, and arithmetic classes in many libraries around the country, including school libraries.”

  “Really?”

  “Really! And they are ever so important because according to the latest statistics between ten and thirteen percent of Americans are functionally illiterate. That means they read at, or below, a third grade level, or not at all.”

  Sammy’s eyes opened wide with shock, then he smiled. “Wow, imagine the excitement and adventure that would be brought into a person’s life if they were taught how to make thoughts and concepts out of squiggly lines.”

  “Imagine!”

  “Maybe Dr. Davidson could connect me with a kid who is behind and I could tutor him before or after school. Maybe I could even become a ‘big brother’ to a kid from a broken family.”

  “Isn’t it exciting to know that you can make a difference?”

  “And I will do something! I don’t understand how in the past I could have been given so much and have given so little in return!”

  “It doesn’t make sense to dwell on negatives either. So what positive thing are we going to do first?”

  “I dunno.”

  “Then I’ve been wasting my time, and your time and money.”

  “That’s not so! Mmmm…I guess…no! I think…no! I know each of us has to first help ourselves up to a good mental health plateau so we can then help others and hopefully, in time, our pos ’tudes will spread out like waves on a pond and the world will be engulfed by them.” Sammy shrugged and looked sad. “At least they’ll be able to engulf a few people. Some people are so far gone I don’t know about them.”

  “Want to talk about them for a minute?”

  “You mean like I was one of them at one time?”

  “I didn’t say that, you did.”

  “Well…let’s take Casey Millburn in my class. He’s a smart-ass if there ever was one. I’m not sure anyone, anywhere, anytime could ever help him. He’s a bully. He bosses everyone around. He thinks he’s been elected dictator of the universe since the gangs left. He lords it over everyone and pretends he’s always right, always best, always in charge, on top, the greatest of all great Moo Goo’s.”

  “Is there a possibility that he might have a low self-esteem problem?”

  “Cardboard Casey? Low self-esteem? Are you out of your mind?”

  “Clear your mind for a moment and think about this: Is it possible that Casey’s outrageous behavior might be because he has zero self-esteem?”

  “No way! If anything he’s got too much self-bloating self-esteem. What I think he needs is stiffer consequences when he gets out of hand. Mr. smart aleck, show-off, better-than-anyone-else tough guy needs a little humility knocked into him.”

  “But what if the arrogance, the bullying, the bragging aren’t signs of self-esteem?”

  “Well…”

  “What if Casey’s feelings of worth come only when he can convince himself that he’s better than someone else? What if the only way he can build up his own ego is by tearing someone else’s ego down, or by scaring them or by humiliating them?”

  Sammy chewed on his thumbnail for a few seconds. “Then I guess he would need some redirecting, repatterning, wouldn’t he?”

  “Can you imagine yourself as Casey? Close your eyes and try to put yourself in his place. He’s probably been programmed by negative conditioning, and it doesn’t matter at all whether it was environmental negative conditioning or parental negative conditioning or self-inflicted negative conditioning. They all come out of the same container.”

  “Man, now I’m seeing Casey from a completely different perspective. In fact I’m seeing him like he’s the old me! He’s probably feeling that he’s of no value or consequence, so why should he try to act good when he’s positive he’s no good! That’s really a haunting, hurtful place to be in.”

  “It sounds hurtful.”

  “He probably feels that there’s no way he can compete.”

  “Why can’t he compete?”

  “Because he, or society, or his parents have made him feel like he can’t! He feels useless, worthless.”

  “Unlovely, unlovable?”

  “Yeah. Like a failure, a bad kid.”

  “Is it possible that he can then justify himself by becoming the best bad kid around? That maybe even subconsciously, he tries to fill his ego needs through negativity, belittling, and hostility toward himself and others, and through crudeness, rudeness, loudness, and other socially unacceptable behaviors?”

  “Yep. You got it. We’re talking about Casey, plus probably me and all my sell-yourself-short mates of my olden days.”

  “Do you think maybe a better term than ‘low self-esteem’ might be ‘low self-respect’?”

  “Either way, attitude is everything. You long ago convinced me that people with self-respect and self-esteem don’t need to bully or cut to feel important.”

  “I agree with you, Sammy the Significant! Love and self-respect are this world’s greatest equalizers.”

  Sammy grinned. “Ever were! Ever will be!”

  We got up, stretched, had a drink, and ate some nuts and popcorn. “Want to take a little pop test?” I asked as I handed Sammy this sketch and a black felt-tipped pen.

  He grinned.

  After Sammy had drawn strange hair, glasses, a mustache, a huge frown, and some moles with hair sticking out of them on the above sketch, I handed him the drawing on the next page and asked him to do with it what he had done with the first sketch.

  “I can’t do that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it’s Jesus.”

  “So?”

  “It wouldn’t be showing the proper re…Oh, I get it now. You’re trying to graphically teach me the Respect Lesson, the ‘do unto others as…as…I would do unto Jesus.”

  “Do you believe that?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then maybe we’d better start trying a little harder to live what we believe, right?”

  “Right! And with your help and Mom’s and Dr. D.’s, I think I can…NO! I know I not only can have more respect for myself, but I can help teach others to have more respect for themselves! Dr. D. is an ideal example of the respect thing.”

  “From what you’ve told me about him, I’m sure he is. It’s too bad all kids don’t have a few Dr. Davidsons in their lives.”

  “Oh, another thing I wanted to tell you about that Dr. D. and I have in common. When he was about four and a half and whining and bawling and lying on the floor and banging his head because he wanted to go outside and play, his grandma and mom found an old piano for him to take his frustrations out on. It was so out of tune that now every time we talk about it, he starts laughing. A lot of the strings were broken, so he’d have to hum the note that was silent if it was part the melody line. Anyway he said sometime he’ll come over to my house and we’ll have a piano duet jam since we can both play by ear as well as read music. Doesn’t he sound like the dandiest dude of dudedom?”

  “That he does! And I think I’m almost as glad as you are that he came to your school before you came back.”

  “I hate to think what might have happened to me if he hadn’t.”

  “Then don’t!”

  “Don’t what?”

  “Don’t think about negative things. Have you ever considered that you may not be able to keep an occasional disease-carrying fly out of your house, but you don’t have to prop the door open so he and all his dirty, disease-carrying friends are invited in to swarm on your food and produce and reproduce till they—”

  “Your allegory comes in loud and clear to me. But I still think it’s a bummer that being smart and trying to learn is allowed to bring on abuse in some schools. Actually it was in mine to a degree before Dr. D. I remember lots of times I didn’t do
my best because I didn’t want to be labeled ‘computer head’ or ‘boodie brain.’ Some of the kids would taunt that if your brain was too big for your ‘boodie,’ they’d have to whittle both down a bit. Or they’d say you were bringing up the learning curve so high it was making it hard on them, so they’d have to make it hard on you in return, which they did to a couple of kids. It was kind of gruesome seeing kids beat up right outside the schoolyard just because they were bright.”

  “Didn’t anyone go to the principal?”

  “No one dared. We’d all heard there was a snitch in the office.”

  “How did Dr. Davidson change things?”

  “I heard he got rid of a lot of teachers and office staff and even some kitchen and custodial people, and that he really had to fight to do it.”

  “Good for him! And for you! Now how about we…”

  “I’m reading your body language…do a little more stirring around in my head.”

  “Right. You don’t know how wonderful it is working with someone like you where we are sort of in harmony in our thinking. People who aren’t ready for change only compound their negative thoughts and attitudes and bring more discord and dissonance into their lives.”

  “Don’t include me in that group, lady. I am out! Out! Out! I want the old light and happiness and…I guess you could call it MENTAL FREEDOM from the black, squeezing-out-all-beautiful-and-good-things-in-reality, mental monsters. The blackness really does seem to have a life of its own, you know.”

  “Therefore, poetic Sammy, I hope you’ve learned to be very, very compassionate toward any others you meet who might be suffering through their own menacing, monster depressions.”

  “Suffering through depression is a good way to put it! I broke a couple of ribs skiing, and my arm Roller Blading, and I was in a car accident with my Uncle Milton, and in the drive-by shooting, but nothing ever hurt like the blackness inside my head and heart and soul. It’s like…if you haven’t ever been there I hope you never, never, ever have to go.”

  “All of us feel the colorless, emptiness of depression to one degree or another, at one point or another in our lives, Solemn Sammy, but usually those feelings are temporary and can be borne. Those of you who ‘feed your problems,’ knowingly or unknowingly, have a greater, blacker, sometimes permanent, or recurring, debilitating weight.”

  Sammy tried to smile, but it was difficult. “At least I’m facing up to it now and scrambling my way out of the dung dungeon. I should get credit for that, shouldn’t I?”

  “You deserve and get all the credit in the world, all the stars in the sky.”

  “Why doesn’t everyone else just do it, too?”

  “Some people have a physical chemical imbalance that sucks them down into a state so restricting that they find it difficult to eat, think, work, study, sometimes even to take care of their personal needs. They are imprisoned in their own kind of dark solitary confinement.”

  “You mean they really can’t get out?”

  “Usually they can, once they start taking antidepressant drugs, tranquilizers, or whatever medication is needed for their particular problems.”

  “I don’t understand how that works.”

  “It’s not simple. Let me explain a little about Prozac. It is not a euphoriant or a sedative, and it doesn’t have many of the side effects most of the drugs introduced in the late 1950s have.”

  “And?”

  “Okay, you want-to-know-it-all person, let me get my file. All right, Prozac comes in a little capsule containing about thirty-nine quintillion molecules of something called fluoxetine hydrochloride, which migrates to the brain when ingested. In the brain the molecules attach to nerve cells and prevent them from picking up serotonin, a neurotransmitter that passes electrical impulses from cell to cell.

  “With less serotonin being picked up by the nerve cells, more of it remains in the brain, delivering small jolts of electricity from nerve to nerve, in a way sort of stimulating the voltage in the patient’s head. Science doesn’t, at this moment, understand precisely how this works, but the patient begins to find his/her way back into the light and freedom that once was his/hers. There are a few people who may need medication for the rest of their lives.”

  “I guess I’m pretty lucky to be me, aren’t I?”

  “Any way you look at it you’re lucky to be you!”

  “You think some of the people needing medical fixes could make the comeback without it?”

  “By changing their attitudinal sets, their concepts about handling stress levels, and other things, many people certainly could improve their overall lifestyles and make their lives less complicated and threatening. Also by incorporating positive light therapy, positive exercise therapy, positive eating therapy, and all around enthusiastic, optimistic, reality therapy, they could help their bodies become more balanced in all areas, including chemically.”

  “That sounds like work!”

  “It is work! But isn’t anything worth having worth working for? And doesn’t work seem like challenging fun if one has the proper attitude?”

  “I didn’t know you had to work at being happy.”

  “You don’t! After you get into a pattern of putting the ingredients that cause happiness and balance into your life.”

  “How am I doing in that area?”

  “Would you like to take home a little quiz to evaluate where you are?”

  “Homework from a shrink?”

  “From this one, yes! To me homework is imperative to change! At mental health seminars and conferences I sometimes hear about people who have gone to therapists for five, ten, or more years. They feel better when they are at the therapist’s and may feel better for a while after they’ve left, but if they aren’t doing some things themselves to make changes in their lives, change is not going to happen!”

  “You’re soooo right. Remember when I first came into your office? I didn’t want to listen to or look at anything you had to offer. It was like you were spreading a fantastic emotional feast before me and I was totally mentally anorexic. No way would I have anything to do with it!”

  “And there was no way in the world, at that time, that I could have forced you to!”

  “Sorry about that.”

  “What has changed since then?”

  “First of all MY ’TUDE! I now not only want to talk and listen, I want to pick your brains.”

  “You’re saying you’ve seen the positive always-looking-for-the-good Light of Life that can shine within you even during the darkest storm on the darkest night.”

  “Yep. I think this time for sure I’ve conquered the darkness demons through my own kind of positive bright-white-light therapy. I’m making it a permanent part of myself, and I’m prepared to face a minor depression here and there because my special light will always be turned on in my heart or head or somewhere.”

  “That’s deeply wonderful and mature, Sammy. NOW you understand one of the greatest principles of life.”

  “What?”

  “That darkness cannot be taken into a lighted room or a lighted mind!”

  “Are you telling me I’m finally getting my screwed-up self unscrewed?”

  “I am! And you’re getting there fast!”

  “Wow! I’m solidly stoked!”

  “You should be! That’s why I’m giving you the SELF-EVALUATION ROAD MAP QUIZ to take home and work on.”

  “Road map?”

  “You want to know if you’re on the road to good mental health or mental illness, don’t you?”

  “It sounds scary.”

  “No way! Not for you! Answer the questions truthfully and thoughtfully in the first box. Every week answer them again in the second box, then the third box. When the boxes are full, erase all but the first answer and start over. You’ll be delightfully surprised at how fast you’ll grow and change once you become aware of what you are doing, or not doing, that can be detrimental to your mental health.”

  “I think I’m beginning to learn that
in the future I will be mainly responsible for making both my good luck and my bad luck.”

  “And that it’s not as much ‘luck’ in life as it is ATTITUDE! Have you ever heard the saying, ‘IT’S YOUR ATTITUDE THAT DETERMINES YOUR ALTITUDE’?”

  I handed him the quiz.

  “That makes sense to me. See you.”

  SELF-EVALUATION

  ROAD MAP TO MENTAL ILLNESS

  Where do you want to go?

  Where are you going?

  Answer questions with a number from 0 to 10: 10 being often, 0 being never.

  DESTINATION: WEEKS

  MENTAL ILLNESS: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

  1. I have low self-esteem

  2. I am hostile

  3. I am melancholy (sad)

  4. I seem detached from myself, others, life

  5. I am negative

  6. I am pessimistic

  7. I can’t trust people or things

  8. I am fearful

  9. I am irritable

  10. I am not motivated

  11. I am critical

  12. I am unappreciative

  13. I am indecisive

  14. I often feel inferior

  15. I feel guilty

  16. I feel unlovable

  17. I do not respect myself

  18. I feel hopeless

  19. I feel helpless

  20. I feel I am a burden

  21. I am impulsive (I want what I want now!)

  22. I am obsessive (I give my control to whatever)

  23. I am loud, crude, and rude

  24. I worry about my health

  25. I blame others

  26. I have suicidal impulses

  27. I hate—I’m angry

  Check your answers and YOU DECIDE if you are on the MENTAL ILLNESS ROAD. Do you want to change roads? Can anyone else change roads for you? Should you change roads? Would you be happier and mentally and physically healthier if you did? Are you going to change roads? If so, when? Is there a better time than now?

  Retake the test in a week. You’ll be surprised how much you’ll have changed for the better.

  However, only you can make the change!

  SELF-EVALUATION