K.C An RET Story for Middle School Students

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K.C.
Chapter I

I had to stay after school. Mr. H. waited for everyone else to leave the room. He paced back and forth across the front of the room. I hid my head in my arms and didn't look at him. But I could feel him pacing. I wondered what he was going to say to me this time. I have stayed in before, a lot, and usually he just makes me sit there a few minutes and then lets me go home.
He seemed pretty upset this time. He didn't start in talking, he just paced.
I looked at the clock for the fifth time.
"My gosh, I think the clock has stopped!" I thought.
He seemed pretty upset this time. I didn't think I would get off so easy. I peeked through my crossed arms to see if he looked as upset as his pacing sounded.
He paced a long time. I finally looked at him. I guess I wanted to get it over with.
He started to talk. "Kasey, do you know why you are here?"
I just shrugged. I guess I knew, but I didn't really know exactly what to say.
"Kasey, you have a really bad attitude."
I shrugged again, rolled my eyeballs back in my head and looked away.
"Kasey," he said in a slow, low voice, sort of like a groan.
"We need to talk. Will you talk with me?"
"Do I have a choice?" I chuckled.
"Yes, Kasey, you have a choice. I can't make you talk to me."
"OK, I guess we can talk. What do you want me to say?"
"I just want to help you...you seem to be so angry and,
well, you just seem like you are not really very happy."
Tears weld up in my eyes, but I didn't want him to see that I was going to cry,
so I rolled my eyes again and put my head down on my arms and shrugged.
"Kasey, I want to help you feel good.
Would you like to feel good?"
"I feel O.K. I'm happy."
"You just don't . . . seem happy--comfortable.
I'd just like to help you feel. . . better.
It's like you're up to bat and
all you have to do is step up to the plate,
and you are refusing to pick up the bat."
"Oh", I groaned and thought,
"I wish I could tell him how unhappy really am.
I wish I could tell him how much I would like to feel better,"
but all I could make myself to was shrug and look away.
"Kasey, if I just talk, and tell you some things,
can you just nod if I hit on something that you are thinking?"
I didn't look up. I couldn't look up or he would see my tears
and I couldn't let him know I was crying.
"Sometimes we think things in our mind,
that are really hard to say out loud because,
maybe we feel embarrassed Do you have those feelings?"
I nodded. I was thinking so many things, and I really was hoping he couldn't read my mind, because they weren't very nice things. I felt like I was screaming some of the thoughts out loud to drown out what he was saying.
"Kasey, you know, when we
think things about people around us,
about things that happen, about how we act,
the thoughts on the inside show on the outside.
That's called attitude."
"Attitude", I thought, "oh, great another great lecture about attitude.
If I have to listen to one more lecture about attitude. .
.I've been hearing this since second grade. . .'I just don't like your attitude.'"
Sometimes we
think a lot of thoughts
that upset us, and if we are not
listening to what we are thinking,
we don't even know what it is that is upsetting us."
"Do you understand?"
I nodded again. "Do I understand? cheeze,
what does he think I amstupid?
I've heard this so many times I could give the lecture."
"Well, when something happens that we don't like,
we might think,
'that's not fair',
`that shouldn't happen',
`things like that are awful'.
We think, `awful things shouldn't happen to me'.
`If I was not an awful person they wouldn't happen.'
"Do you ever think that?"
I nodded again, but didn't look up.
"This is not fair." I was thinking.
"I shouldn't have to listen to this garbage.
It is awful to have to stay in after school just for. . . just for whatever. .
if I was a decent kid this wouldn't always happen to me.
I must be a piece of junk."
"When we start thinking how awful the thing that happened is,"
he continued without waiting for my answer,
"and start thinking how awful we must be,
and maybe how worthless we are because of the awful
things that are happening,
to protect ourselves from feeling so useless and awful,
we try to make the people around us look or feel really low so that when we compare ourselves to them, we don't look so bad... to ourselves. Is that how you feel sometimes?"
I peeked through my arms and nodded. I was curious how he could know just what I was thinking, when I couldn't have even put it into words by myself.
"I need to protect myself," my mind said.
"I hate myself and everyone else does too. . .
if I wasn't such a terrible kid, people would like me and I would have friends,
and I wouldn't have to stay after school all the time listening to this junk."
"Kasey, do you think you're the only one
that feels like that, that thinks that way?"
I nodded, raising my eyebrows in a question, thinking:
"I know I'm the only one. . .
nobody else gets in trouble for bad attitude.
Nobody else has to stay after school every day every year with every teacher in the whole school.
Nobody else has a bad attitude. ...and nobody likes me because I do,
and I don't even know what a bad attitude is.
I don't even know what I'm doing that makes people get so mad at me."
Mr. H went on almost as if I were not in the room,
"A lot of people feel that way.
A lot of people, in fact, most people,
even most adults talk to themselves. .
self talk. . . about what is going on around them.
People who are comfortable and happy with their lives
are the ones who have recognized the self talk
and make choices about what they are going to think about.
They have decided to
keep the thoughts that make them feel good, happy. . .
and they do that, they
make choices everyday, all day long.
I thought:
"I wish I had some choices,
I wish I could get out of here,
I wish I was deaf so I wouldn't have to listen to this,
I wish I could just disappear, just vanish,
. . .beam me up Scottie..." I thought wishing for a space time warp to hide in.
"They don't even have to think about it after
they get used to it. They just
screen out the angry thoughts,
the thoughts about how awful things are or how awful they are. Kasey
you can learn to do that.
Would you like to learn?"
"I don't think I can.
It sounds too hard. I don't thank I am that smart."
I said out loud, mostly to myself.
"Well, I think you are that smart, and I think
you can do it--if you really want to--
I can help you, but you have to
want to enough to work really hard at it.
You think about it and tell me tomorrow."
"So, can I go home now?"
I muttered into my arms on my desk.
I was thinking:
"This wasn't the usual lecture. What happened to the threats and the finger waving in my face while yelling at me about straighten up and fly right. . .like how can a kid like me even fly when I can't do anything else right.. .face it I'm just a looser and anything he has to say to me won't help me. . .I just want to get out of here."
"YES, Kasey, you can go now."
Mr. H. groaned.
I grabbed my backpack, as I stood up fast,
and the motion tipped the chair over backward.
I didn't even stop to put it up. . .
I just turned on my heel and stomped out the door dragging the back pack.
I just wanted to get away from . . . mostly from myself.
I had to take time to think about the things Mr. H had said
all evening. I thought about it through dinner.
I thought about it while I was doing my homework.
It would be great not to feel awful all the time.
It would be nice to feel happy, and feel like I belonged.
But it made me afraid to think of how my teacher knew exactly what I was thinking.
Could he read my mind?
Was it written on my forehead somehow?
What if he read my mind and knew
all the awful things I was thinking while he was talking to me!
What did he say about helping me feel better?
How could he possibly know how bad I felt?
Did he know I hate myself as much as everyone else hates me?" I wanted so badly to
believe that he could help me change my life,
that I could step up to the plate and hit a home run,
but if I tried and couldn't change, I would really feel stupid and worthless,
Then I thought of that stupid light bulb joke,
"How many shrinks does it take to change a light bulb?
Only one but it has to really want to change."
I went to sleep thinking about what it all meant.
I didn't even have a clue.


Chapter II

When I went to school in the morning Mr. H didn't look at me funny or ask me any questions, or anything embarrassing like that. I stayed in my seat and did my work.
Someone whispered, "Kasey must have really gotten it last night!"
I rolled my eyeballs and gave him my dirtiest look.
Other than that, I guess I was being pretty quiet.
Break came and I expected Mr. H. to question me about my decision, I paused, but then afraid he might ask, I pushed my way out the door and got really busy playing ball; but he didn't say a word. He called on me just like the other kids, but not about what we had talked about. I didn't get my name on the board once and I just kept my head down working. I kept wishing I could disappear.I kept glancing up to see if he was looking at me. I kept wondering if he could read my mind. .if he knew what I was thinking. . .
maybe I wouldn't even have to talk to him, I could just think and he would know what I was thinking and could tell me what I needed to know.
By the end of the day I wanted so bad to talk about it with Mr. H. that I thought the bell would never ring I knew by then, he was really going to leave it up to me. I had to make the choice and I had to tell him if I wanted to talk. Even if he could read my mind, I guessed he wasn't going to make it that easy. I slipped a note onto his desk,
"I want to talk." and I didn't move when the bell rang.
I was really scared, but I had to find out if he was reading my mind or what.


Chapter III

I didn't cry this time. I didn't look away.
I just looked right at Mr. H and tried to
Listen to what he had to teach me.
It was hard work like he had promised.
It was hard work for him too, but we worked together.
Sometimes I got really mad.
Sometimes I told him I just couldn't change,
I was just me and nothing I could do to change that.
But mostly I tried to listen, and talk and work.
My friends kidded me about staying after school all the time.
They asked if I was in big trouble. I just shrugged and ignored them.
I couldn't explain to them what I was learning,
I couldn't tell them I was trying to change my attitude.
They just wouldn't even understand. So I didn't tell them anything.
Mr. H. called my parents and explained to them why I was staying after school so much. They didn't really understand, but they said it was O.K. if I wanted to talk.
Mom asked me a couple of times what we talked abut, but I just said, "oh, just stuff."
Now that I've changed my attitude I can tell you what we talked about,
but I know now that even if you don't understand,
and even if you laugh about it, or at me,
your laughing or puzzled looks don't matter.
I don't depend on your opinion of me to
know that I am O.K.
That was one of the first things Mr. H. explained to me. He said:
"Kasey, generally people think about themselves
and other people in two basic ways, O.K. or not O.K.
When people feel good about themselves and other people,
they think they are O.K. and other people are O.K_"
We say this attitude is `I'm OK , you're O.K.`
there are a lot of books for grown ups about being OK."
I guess there are a lot of people that don't feel OK.
"Those are the people that have a bad attitude.
Attitude is the way you think about things,
And if you think you are not OK or other people are not OK,
You think things like how awful other people are or how awful you are and you think a lot of things that make you feel angry, or afraid or that you are not worth much to yourself or others.
When you start thinking things like that . . . it shows.
It shows in your looks and in your body language.
Other people feel your attitude and want to stay away from you.
So then I knew how he read my mind. I wasn't so different from other kids, even people, who were upset and angry a lot. What was a surprise to me was that when I looked around at the kids in my class in my school, I realized I got angry and upset a whole lot more than most of them. I hadn't ever thought about it, but if I had I would have probably thought everyone got mad about the same much.
So we worked on my attitude. To do this I began to write in a journal. In the journal I would write down all the things that made me feel upset.
Well, actually I learned that the things I wrote down were not the things that upset me.
Mr. H. explained:
"it is not what you're thinking about the things that happened that upset you."
In other words, he told me, that
"You chose to upset yourself by thinking upsetting thoughts
about the things that happened. .
Do you know what I mean?
Let me show you:
If he gave a pop quiz and I hadn't read the chapter and couldn't answer the questions,
I would get really angry. But he told me that it wasn't the pop quiz that really made me angry. It was what I thought about the pop quiz. So I wrote down in my journal:
"I missed 6 questions out of ten on the pop quiz. Feeling: I got angry and acted really dumb."
Mr. H. looked at my journal. He told me:
"Write the things I was thinking about before you got angry."
I said, "I didn't think anything. . .
I just flunked the stupid test and it made me angry."
He chuckled. I didn't think it was very funny. But his smile made me feel O.K., so
I continued to listen.
"I thought about how stupid I must be to miss so many questions."
"Anything else?" he asked.
"I thought I wasn't much good if I was that stupid."
"Anything. . .?"
"Yes, I thought, `no wonder no one likes me, I'm just a crud.`"
"So you ended up feeling like no one should like you
because you missed some questions on a pop quiz?"


“Yes. I guess that is what I thought about.
I think I thought some other things too,
like `It was really awful that you gave the test when I hadn't studied`,
and `I was really stupid not to study when you gave us the assignment`, and
`it was really awful that you gave us an assignment when there was a game that night',
and, oh, I guess I thought a lot of awful things about you,
and about myself and about school and . . .
How could I think so many things in such a short time?
I thought I just messed up the test and got mad!"
Then when I played in the baseball game after school I struck out.
I threw the bat and got a penalty for the team.
I stamped back to the dugout and was really angry.
I wouldn't let anyone talk to me, and when they did I yelled and told them how stupid they were and said things like it was their fault we were loosing the game.
When I wrote it in my journal I said:
"We lost the game and it made me really mad."
Mr. H. helped me re write it to say:
"We lost the game, and here are the things that I thought about
that made me feel so upset:
I struck out! I couldn't even hit the stupid ball.
The stupid pitcher couldn't even throw it straight.
I should be able to hit it anyway.
I bet everyone hates me because I struck out.
If I was any good I wouldn't make mistakes. . .
if I was any good I wouldn't miss the ball.
I'm a real dork.!
I have no business playing on the dumb team anyway.
I'm sure everyone hates me now.
I don't think I have any friends.
They probably all wish I wasn't even here to play.
I wish I wasn't here to play.
I wish I could just get hit by a big truck and disappear.
I am sure a useless kid."
I felt foolish writing all those things,
and I was embarrassed to admit that I had thought them,
but Mr. H. said,
When I
write my thoughts down
and admit to myself what I think,
it's all part of the work of getting to
feel better about myself.
We talked about each thought, and he called them irrational beliefs.
Irrational beliefs are things we think about ourselves that we believe might be true, but other people probably don't think so.
So Mr. H. said, "Do you think everyone thinks this about you?
I said, "only when I strike out."
He asked me,
"Is that what you think about the other kids
when they make a mistake?"
I said, "no."
and he asked if maybe they might not think like that about me either.
I said, "probably not. . .but when I am angry. . "
"When you choose to be angry. . ." Mr. H corrected.
"Yea, when I choose to be angry, and think angry thoughts,
those are the thoughts I choose to help me be more angry."
As I went to sleep night after night I would
Take the time to think about choosing my thoughts and choosing my feelings,
And I started to understand that I didn't have to dislike myself,
I could like myself even if I made mistakes...
even if I couldn't do everything right.

Chapter IV

Then he taught me a kind of short hand way to write it down.
[A] stands for action.
That's the thing that happens first.
[B] stands for Belief.
That's how I think about what happened.
Things that I believe about what happen
are what cause me to feel
[C] the consequences.
Consequences are the things
that are caused by the things that happen,
but when we talk about feelings, I began to learn that the
consequences are really caused by the beliefs.
In other words:
What I believe (B) about what happened (A)
actually causes
[C]--consequences or feelings.
So after a lot of practice, I began to be able to
just write down what happened and label them A,B,C;
and each time I wrote it I would
understand the ideas better and better and begin to
know that it was what I was thinking that made me feel upset
and not the things that happened around me.
One night I dreamed that Billy called me a green dinosaur,
And in the dream it made me turn into a green dinosaur. . .
I saw the green spreading, and I kept saying,
"I believe it's true,
I believe its true,"
and the green kept getting greener
and the dinosaur that I was turning into kept getting bigger and then
I began to shout "stop" and I woke myself up
and said out loud to my pillow,
"I choose not to believe Billy!"
And in my mind I could see the green fading and the dinosaur shrinking away, and could picture myself smiling.
I knew then it was true:
What I believe about what happens is what makes me feel upset.
I went back to sleep smiling, hoping to dream more about it.
So every day we would do that over and over,
about everything I got mad about in class or after school or at home. .
pretty soon I could
write down a feeling and the thoughts that caused them
without even talking with Mr. H.
I continued to keep my journal for a while,
and pretty soon, I discovered I no longer needed to
write down each time it happened. I just would
realize when I was starting to get upset, and I would
begin to listen to my self-talk.
Then I started learning to be able to
choose which thoughts I wanted to listen to.
I learned how to
push the other thoughts away,
the not O.K. thoughts, and just
listen to the comfortable OK thoughts.
I learned to relax deeply and go to sleep at night saying
[A]--action,[B]--beliefs--[C] --consequences, feelings, emotions.
It is what I B believe
about the A action that makes me
C feel the way I feel.
I can choose what I think and do.
I might not like how I feel but I can choose how I think and act.
. . and one night I sat up in bed and said out loud,
"If I can choose how I think and act,
I can choose how I feel.
I'm in charge of how I feel. . .
I'm up to bat. . .and I can choose the score.
When things happened at school, or Brandon called me a whimp,
I took a breath, said to myself,
"[A]: Brandon called me a whimp,
[B] I don't believe I' a whimp,
[C] I feel O.K.."
and that all took about a half a second,
and I would just go on playing or doing what I chose to do.
I saw one kid turn to Brandon and say, "Nobody calls me a whimp"
And I started thinking,
[A]: Brandon called him a whimp,
[B].he believes he must be a whimp, and that being a whimp makes him no good and that he has to protect himself from being no good, and
[C] he got angry and took a punch at Brandon."
I laughed, I could not believe anymore that anyone would believe they were no good just because someone called him a whimp.!

Chapter V

I kept working with Mr. H. and he taught me a way to
push away the not OK thoughts.
I pictured in my mind a path that went into a beautiful forest.
At the back of the forest was a cliff and when I had a thought I didn't choose to keep,
I could picture that forest and that cliff, and push the thoughts through the forest and over the cliff into a bottomless canyon so I did not allow them to come back.
"Garbage thoughts are like copping out and blaming others for things that happened.
Over generalizations, using words like everyone, no one, never, always...about things that just happened sometimes, just even once in a while."
Other garbage thoughts come when I demand that everything be the way I want it to be,
or that people should do what I want,
or that the world should be different
just because I don't like it the way it is.
"Catastrophising," Mr. H. said,
"is the most common garbage of all because we
start thinking about how terrible things that happen are.
Everything becomes a disaster, everything is horrible and we say, "I'll die if that happens."
Mr. H. used another special word, "paranoia", to describe how we sometimes might think people are doing things just to be mean,
or even to us or at us,
like when we say he was looking at me, or saying that about me,
when someone just does or says something.
Anyway, at first I have to
picture the cliff over and over again
and practice pushing the same not O.K. thoughts over the cliff
a bunch of times every day. For a few weeks I had to continue to
work very hard writing in my journal and talking with Mr. H,
but then, it seemed to begin to happen by itself...
and mostly I didn't even have to
listen to what I was thinking, because I was
starting to develop a new habit
of only thinking the OK thoughts. . .
Thoughts about the things that made me like myself
and I began to feel comfortable around other people.
I learned that I could
feel OK about myself and about other people,
even if they didn't always do the things I wanted them to.
I learned some new ways of thinking.
First I broke the habit of calling
everything and everyone dumb, stupid, dang,
and the other slang words I used to describe just about everything. When I decided to
stop using just those slang words,
my world seemed more pleasant and I liked being in it more.
Then I started pitching the cop outs,
Discarding the demanding , and generalizations
over the cliff.
Then I began to work on all the catastrophe words I used,
And filtered the paranoid statements.
Over they went,
into the bottomless pit.
I learned to stop thinking that everything I did, every mistake I made,
meant that I was a bad kid. I had to
really work hard to learn that
the things that I do or say isn't me,
and don't make me a good or bad person.
I am a person, and
I am valuable and lovable and capable.
When I make mistakes I can learn from them, and
by learning I become stronger and more capable.
The more time I spent in
practice dumping the garbage thoughts
and learning to
replace them with pleasant happy thoughts,
the happier I became.
The more I began to
think of myself as lovable and capable,
the less I thought about disappearing or about other people not liking me.



Chapter VII

I feel happy and comfortable around my family, I laugh at their joking
and it is fun to be with them.
I joke with my friends and laugh at myself when I make mistakes.
My work in school is better and my attitude is great.
When I decided it was time to tell my friends
what I had been doing, I realized that I had more friends to tell.
And I didn't even have to tell them,
because they knew that I was different from what I had been;
they could tell I had a better attitude,
and they liked being around me a lot more.
I like me a lot more too.
So that's when I decided I would tell you about it.



The End

RET is as simple as ABC

ABC Model of cognitive therapy
[A] stands for action.
That's the thing that happens first.
[B] stands for Belief.
That's how I think about what happened.
Things that I believe about what happen
are what cause me to feel
[C] the consequences.
Consequences are the events
that are caused by the things that happen.
I began to learn that the
consequences are really caused by the beliefs.
In other words:
What I believe (B) about what happened (A)
actually causes
[C]--consequences or feelings. How you end up feeling after going through A and B.