“I think he just had a thought in his head and he just acted on it without even thinking about it.”

Note: There is language that is excluded in the transcript but not excluded in the audio.

This was specifically in my garden. I was pruning, um, confederate jasmine, um, was growing on our deck — and I lived with my parents — like on the railing. And it’s, it’s a vine type plant, so I would wrap it around, and it took about three years to get it to the size where it would wrap around the railing and it looked beautiful and I was pruning it one day and my cousin’s stepson came over um to help me — and we get along really good — and I said, “Will you help me? This is how we’re gonna do it” and blah, blah, blah. And this kid, he h- — he struggles with ADHD real bad. Um, I turned my back for two seconds and he cut through like a big mass of vines. And I was so angry, I was so angry. I didn’t know what to do. You know, I don’t know how to punish him because not my kid. And I thought my cousin was a little too hard on him anyways.

Um, so you know, the way to show him that I was displeased was to make him go home — was to say, “Okay, stop, you know, that wasn’t, that wasn’t okay. You didn’t even ask. I told you not to do that. Well, you know, go home. We’re not playing today.” Um, and I think he understood, you know, like, he can’t just do whatever he wants, whenever he wants. And it wasn’t like I screamed at him or hit him or anything. But, you know, he kind of learned a lesson that day like, “Oh, you know, I need to listen. I need to take time and listen and not let those intrusive thoughts kinda take over.” Um, and I’ll never forget that because he was totally different with me from then on. Like, it was like, finally, he understood like, “Oh, discipline happens. And I can’t just f*** around all the time.” Yeah, I don’t think he knew what — how much work I put into that plant. I think he just had a thought in his head and he just acted on it without even thinking about it.