The Ginger-Haired
Lad - A Parody
by Joanna Jordan
Once upon a
time there was a middle-aged woman and a middle-aged
man. They lived together in a mid-terraced house
in middle England. They didn’t have any
children. They approached an adoption agency, who
were eager to off-load their most challenging and
disturbed children on the naïve and ill-prepared.
One day, their
adoption worker presented them with a 7 year old
ginger-haired lad who had been moved around the
care system since he was two. The middle-aged man
and woman were delighted with their son. At first,
the ginger-haired lad seemed delighted with his
new parents, but soon his previous anxieties and
fears of rejection returned. He ran out of the
front door and down the garden path shouting,
“Run, run, as fast as you can. You
can’t catch me, I’m the ginger-haired
lad.”
The middle-aged
man and woman ran after him, but they
couldn’t catch him, so they rang Social
Services. A Social Worker was assigned to the boy,
and arranged to meet with the family to conduct
an initial assessment. The lad had been through
this process several times before, and knew it
would take an age, so he said, “I have run
away from a middle-aged woman and a middle-aged
man, and I can run away from you I can. Run, run,
as fast as you can. You can’t catch me,
I’m the ginger-haired lad.”
The Social
Worker couldn’t catch him, and she was
worried about his deviant behaviour, so she
called a Youth Crime Prevention Officer. The
Youth Crime Prevention Officer took the ginger-haired
lad out for an ice-cream ice-breaker. The ginger-haired
lad sat very politely and ate his, but as soon as
it was finished he said, “I have run away
from a middle-aged woman, a middle-aged man, and
a Social Worker and I can run away from you I can.
Run, run, as fast as you can. You can’t
catch me, I’m the ginger-haired lad.”
The Youth
Crime Prevention Officer knew that dealing with
runaways was outside of his remit, so he called a
psychiatrist from CAMHS. The psychiatrist took
the ginger-haired lad to hospital. He felt an in-depth
study via a residential stay would be most
helpful. The psychiatric ward was on the ground
floor, and so the ginger-haired lad leaped
through the window shouting, “I have run
away from a middle-aged woman, a middle-aged man,
a Social Worker and a Youth Crime Prevention
Officer and I can run away from you I can. Run,
run, as fast as you can. You can’t catch me
. . .”
The
psychiatrist referred the ginger-haired lad to a
therapist. The therapist was extremely fit and
active and so was able to jog alongside rather
than chase the ginger-haired lad. As they jogged,
the therapist encouraged the boy to talk about
himself and his feelings. The process took a long
time, but eventually the ginger-haired lad could
look back at his old self and declare, “Oh,
I’m a quarter gone!” A little time
later, “I’m half gone already.”
Then, “I’m three quarters gone,”
and then the old ginger-haired lad was all gone.
The therapist was able to withdraw, leaving the
ginger-aired boy with his parents. And they all
lived happily ever after.
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