Still Searching?

I had an email yesterday from our area adoption agency asking if we were still "searching" for another child to adopt because they had a 9 year old boy that needed a home. I don't think there is anyone who would feel like our life is "stable" enough yet to invite yet another "damaged" child into our home with the hopes of loving him enough that he might be able to heal... but for some reason that didn't stop me from at least considering the idea... After all, we do currently have two empty bedrooms..  I think I really do have some kind of Savior Complex. I just can't stand the idea of children out there in need if I have time, energy and space to help... but fortunately, the logical part of my brain kicked in in time and I was able to share with this worker my concerns that our family just might have too much on its plate emotionally right now with Cheyanne's current MH crisis, Lynn's ongoing challenges,  Donald's mission return scheduled for this summer, our 'failed' attempt at the adoption of our Texas boy (who is still looking for an adoptive home...) and now new baby Enoch and the joys and challenges of new grandparenthood. So, I guess we have dodged that life changing event for now.. but why can't I get the thought out of my head?

Medical Crisis vs. Mental Health Crisis

We have a family in our church community struggling with the crisis of a child with a brain tumor. It is a horrible hand to have to play - scary, exhausting, all-encompassing. As we try to love and support our friends through this challenge, it occured to me just how much more "acceptable"  it is in our society to rally around individuals experiencing a  medical issue as compared to a mental health issue. It is easy to create Facebook support pages, send treats and gifts of love and healing and caring to the Boston Childrens Hospital. Everyone understands and everyone wants to help. Nobody knows how to respond to our family (and others like us) who are working hard to support a child with a serious mental health issue. Sending flowers and treats to the Brattleboro Retreat or Devereux is just not something that is done. Visiting is often impossible or at least very challenging because nobody knows just what state of mind the patient is going to be in when the visit day arrives. Other church families are tentative about allowing their children to contact our teen because they don't want them exposed to suicidal ideation and cutting. It is so much more isolating.. and really, sadly, still a source of discrimination in 21st Century America. I wouldn't change anything about the level of support we are able to offer our friend's child during her medical crisis. If honest though, I do have to admit that I wish there was a similar level of support and positive energy that could be generated for our struggling child.

Code Blue

It has been a really different kind of summer. Cheyann has not done at all well in her facility and has been up and down since she entered in early June. Late night calls to share current behavioral crises happen at least weekly and I feel really helpless much of the time. Her self harm behaviors have become more dangerous - they had to call a Code Blue on her last week because she tied a shirt around her neck so tightly she stopped breathing -  and more frequent, happening at least weekly. Nobody on her team feels like the place she is in is the right place for her, and all agree that it is doing more harm than good, but systems are slow-moving beasts and we are all forced into wait mode. The quiet is actually somewhat unsettling... and not at all something I am used to. On the plus side, I have been able to get in a lot of reading, some kayaking and some traveling. On the minus side, I have been forced to do way too much thinking about what might have been.. and fighting off the hopelessness I know she is drowning in...

Juxtapose that next to the excitement of Melissa's graduation, our trip out west, and the countdown to new, first grandbaby... and it is no wonder that I am exhausted. What an emotional roller coaster.

And in the meantime.. the middles of the oreo cookie continue to just plog along. Donald's mission trip is going well - also ups and downs  but altogether well, and Lynn has been very busy with normalized kid stuff.. which is refreshing for her and is helping her to heal.

We just have to keep on keeping on.. and wait for the system-beast to shift.

What Could Have Been

Tonight, most of Cheyann's classmates are enjoying the company of each other at a Dude Ranch - the culminating field trip of their middle school years commemorating all of their many memories together. Cheyann, on the other hand, is spending this weekend on a locked down adolescent psychiatric unit eerily reminiscent of One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest. While her classmates are pondering which bathing suit to wear white water rafting, she is wondering what item on her floor she can convert to a sharp, while her classmates worry about sunburns, she is worrying about how best to spin her life story in order to get the Docs to sign off on her level. While her classmates cope with sore muscles unused to horseback riding, she is coping with badly scarred limbs and an extremely bruised heart. I want to be laughing and chatting by the campfire with the other 8th grade parents, reliving fond memories and sharing the excitement of upcoming high school adventures, not wandering through the bowels of a rundown building trying to find my daughter to deliver a bag of her clothes with no ties or elastics..and maybe a few packs of gum. The contrast is wide, and my heart is aching for what this night could have been. I know that the journey we are on is a different one, but just this once, I yearn for the well-traveled path...and the campfire.

Security Guard?

Honestly, how many other parents out there, when their teenagers'  school is cancelled for the day (and their own is not) have to spend 30 minutes in "lock-down" mode before heading for work??? I KNOW they are going to break into the bedroom in all that unsupervised down-time.. so what can I tolerate knowing they are going to take, and what do I need to put in the lock box along with the matches, meds, and other more dangerous items,  because it's disappearance will just infuriate me beyond repair?  Don't forget to change the combination.. hide the Wii remote because they are not responsible with their Netflix choices, leave out some snax in the hopes that there might be something remaining in the fridge for dinner, and oh.. better make it a "bring an item along to work day" for that particular thing because that's the only place it is a surety that it will not be taken... Exhausting on all levels. I know there are probably some of you out there who  upon reading this will  determine that if things are really this bad then my 13 and 14 year old daughters should never be left home unsupervised and I should just stop being selfish and take the day off myself.. Well. Maybe so, but then call me a bad mom because I am just not willing to sacrifice the needs of the 6 clients who need my time as well just so I can play security guard to the two we "need" me at home. I'm just not going to do it..

"Driving the Ship"

Things continue to be progressing in a much more positive direction now that I have decided to take back the control of my my challenging child. We recently met with an area high school we had been considering sending her to next year, and I was surprised at how quickly and easily I was able to come to the decision that NO.. this was not the place for her. After doing some research I was able to find an unexpected avenue,  and I think we have successfully found her a landing spot and an alternative high school program that should be just right for her. Of course, every day is not a good day, but all is better overall and I can tell that as she feels more "held" and that the adults in her life feel like they are "in charge and in control"  -  she is much better able to regulate. We are moving in the right direction.

Taking Back the Reins

I had an epiphany over the weekend, and it looked something like this: My family was fast becoming something out of my control, and it was time for me to take back the reins. The feeling began back in December when Cheyann had the episode that brought her to her needed first residential stay. We had already been working with many professionals and agencies, and this only brought in more. I think we have this idea in our society that if one "helper" is good, then more must be better, but I have come to discover personally that this just isn't so, and for Cheyann, it was a disaster and directly resulted in January being a month of high chaos. I could share so many details but I really don't want to re-live it all. Suffice it to say that if the Department of Children and Families is called in and they tell you directly to protect yourself from the Agency personnel in your life.. it's a good sign that things are out-of-whack. I re-evaluated. I prayed. I studied a bit more and I re-wrote Cheyann's plan - cutting out a great many services and strategies that I believe were, in the end, just making things worse. It was liberating, and for now, it is working. I think that for this child who is flashing us some Borderline Personality tendencies - the overall message that she so needed to hear from us right now was: "we are your parents and we are in control."  Everyone else can either be on board with the plan, or not. I am ok with either right now.

Somebody Else's Crazy Life

And so.. one of those things I never thought would really ever happen in our family happened. Cheyann had a major mental health crisis involving scissors, knives, running away, crisis, police and rescue intervention landing her, by the end of it all, in an emergency bed in a residential treatment facility. Looking back now, the whole situation was just plain surreal. More than once I felt like I was in a movie watching somebody else's crazy life. The 10 days she was there felt a lot like the time I spent 15 years ago at the Boston Children's Hospital as my son Donald underwent open heart surgery. There was a sense of living in a tunnel.. day-to-day and one step at a time. Unreal. She made it home in time for the holidays and we actually navigated those relatively well - with the help of my oldest, Melissa, who we flew home for the holidays with her husband. So.. did it all help? Hmm.. I guess I'm not sure yet. As January moves along I am seeing some signs of concern and I worry.