Story Archive

The Privilege of Youth by Dave Pelzer

The missing chapter in the story of Dave Pelzer's life is positive, yes, positive. Given his childhood of horrific abuse by his mentally ill mother, I expected his teen years to be much more traumatic. Instead, they were quite normal for a skinny, geek in foster care attending a public high school full of bullies.

Every day I programmed myself to keep my head down and my mouth shut. I realized there were different cliques of kids -- the tough boys sporting black vinyl jackets, the cool kids with their BMX bikes, the sport jocks, the kids with brains, the makeup queens with strawberry lip gloss and tiny tube-tops, and the seemingly perfect china doll-like girls strutting in Jordache hip-hugger pants and rabbit-fur jackets. Passing through the hallways as others lined up to get to their next class, I felt lucky if one of the roaming sharks didn't find me.

For the most part, even when I kept to myself, my predators would locate me. I was picked on at the bus stop before school, during school recess, on the bus after school; or whenever I'd skip the bus to avoid confrontation I was jumped on the walk home. As before when I lived at my mother's house, I never fought back, never raised a hand, or possessed the common sense to run away. I took my licks until the bullies grew tired, the chants from the crowds subsided, or my assailants took pity on me. As much as I wanted to strike back with superhuman force, I knew I had the defensive capabilities of a scarecrow. (25)

... For the most part, I was terrified of high school. To me, high school was the major leagues. Everything seemed so intensified -- the lessons in class, the monumental amount of homework, the pressure of who belonged to what social cliques -- while all the time I tried to glide by from class to class while hugging the shadows. (36)

How sad for him and for all of the others who suffer in public high schools where cliques dominate and bullies rule.

Dave realized that work was a place he belonged where he could earn money and be responsible for his own future, a future with food.

... I earned a whopping $2.65 an hour. No one gave it to me and no one could take it from me. I earned it. ... My efforts counted where it mattered. I told myself I was responsible. In the working world, I belonged. It didn't matter if I stuttered, what clothes or shoes I wore, or what friends I had or didn't have. At work I was a real person. I belonged. (35)

Vocational education and job-training can help kids emotionally as well as academically.

Dave was fortunate at Duinsmoore Way to find a community of families whom he adopted. He found fathers, mothers, and brothers. With their help, he survived his teen years, earned his GED, and joined the Air Force. Each of these successes took several attempts, but Dave did not use his his troubles as an excuse to fail. When his friend Paul was complaining about his "miserable life," Dave replies:

... The same shit happens to me. The exact same thing and I thought, ya know, I was the only one. But it ain't so. And when I get picked on, and I don't mean teased or harassed, I mean I get slaughtered every day. In junior high I must have gone through four or five dozen pairs of glasses. I got creamed 'cause I was the new kid, the 'foster kid,' who didn't fit in, had four eyes, was too skinny, too geeky, I stuttered, I mumbled, said the wrong thing at the wrong time. I never stood up for myself and when I did, I wasn't supposed to. I didn't have the cool clothes or any real friends, and I can't tell you how alone I felt. Every single day. (169)

And when his friend David excuses Hitler's "sick shit" because he had been abused as a child, Dave refutes:

..... I don't buy that. It may have been true, but it's just an excuse. That doesn't give him the right to do what he did. I'm not trying to run anyone down, but I can't tell you, David, how many foster kids I have been with or these tough guys I see in Juve'e Hall who use whatever happened to them as an excuse for anything they've done, or how they think they can, like, milk it for the rest of their lives. Just because of some shit from their past. It's like if they hate so much, maybe they figure no one will ever hurt them again. But like I said, I think they hate so hard for so long that they forget what made them that way. I don't know how I feel about what all my mom did to me. I just know I don't want to end up like her or my dad. That's why I gotta maintain my focus. ... (105)

And Dave continues to write and speak about resilience and personal responsibility in his new books: Help Yourself and Help Yourself for Teens: Real-Life Advice for Real-Life Challenges.