End of a long week

Friday I took Bear to his intake appointment at the local MHMR. Kitty's appointment was an hour later and I'd arranged with Grandma to bring her for it and pick up Bear. I was going to bring Kitty to Grandma's house when her appointment was done and then go to work. Needless to say that's not how it worked.

Fifteen minutes after Bear's appointment was supposed to start, the receptionist said they thought Kitty would be there too (I'd told them I might have to bring them both), and that they wanted them at the same time. I assumed that meant that they would be in the same room which I wasn't really happy with, but hey they slotted us in two weeks early so I can't complain. I called Grandma and asked her to bring Kitty.

Luckily, Grandma got lost (Ponito was her navigator!) and didn't get there until right at her original appointment time (good thing I'd asked them to come early!), because they'd planned on having two separate intake workers work with the kids which meant I either had to be in two places at once or one child had to do this on their own! Not a viable option. As it was, the worker had Kitty for about 10 minutes without me, and I think she realized the mistake. My kids know very little about their diagnoses and needs, and almost no idea why we were there (Bear knew it was to get a new psychiatrist for med management, but that's not even a big component of what they do so they wanted to get him other services).

Bear of course shut down as soon as we walked in, because they were asking him questions. He hates being asked questions. He mostly just said, "She can answer that." (That's my name by the way, She. Both of them call me that most of the time, especially when they're upset. They will clarify that they mean "my mom," if asked, and they call me Mom to my face, but put them in a therapy session and my name becomes "She" or "Her.")

I think it irritates Bear most when I'm there because he can't lie, or conveniently forget stuff. His life is absolutely perfect and he has absolutely no reason to be in... counseling, ARD meetings, meeting with intake workers.... He also knows that I will not allow him to run away (dissociate, distract the listener, pretend nothing's wrong, shift the blame to others, claim his labels are wrong...) and that I will hold him accountable - and it makes him mad.

In most cases, I cannot allow him to pretend there is nothing wrong, because it means he won't get the services he thinks he doesn't need. I've mostly reconciled myself to the fact that this means I will always be the bad guy. If he can't trust me enough to love me then at least I'm still fulfilling a purpose (advocating for him when he can't advocate for himself). Maybe someday he'll see that I do it because I care.

The caseworked asked him some questions that I could not answer, mostly about whether or not he is suicidal or taking drugs. I have no idea whether or not he answered them truthfully, but I doubt it. I think it's pretty much a given that Bear will get in to the program. Which means not only psychiatric care, but transition and independent living training (he's almost 17) and case management. I'm a little nervous about the case management - that's one reason we proceeded with adoption even though we weren't totally sure, because we wanted to get CPS (Child Protective Services) out of our lives. we've been burned by CPS, but hopefully they'll be trying to help him and not trying to prosecute us for BS that never happened.

Kitty's appointment was not as cut and dried. Basically she's fairly stable, we're able to handle the behaviors/issues she's exhibiting, she's not quite old enough to need independent living training (15, but only going to be a freshman in high school this year), she has a wonderful counselor and really all we need is med management. They don't provide only med management, so we'll see if they decide to make an exception in our case.

By the time we finished the kids' appointments it was almost 1pm. I took Kitty home to the other kids and Grandma, ate some lunch and fell asleep (I'm still having troubles with insomnia so the night before I hadn't gone to bed until 4ish). I didn't go to work at all which did not make Hubby happy.

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Saturday Bear had therapy and the therapist really seems to be digging in. He's not focused on Bear's past at all and doesn't seem to be trying to get Bear to do any Cognitive Behavioral Therapy changes (which I don't think would work for kid's with Bear's issues anyway). He seems to be focused on getting Bear to accept accountability for his feelings and behaviors. He kept Bear talking through his agitation instead of shutting down, so that's definitely a step in the right direction. Maybe this therapist will work out after all.

I've discovered that therapists who answer crisis calls and provide parental support are rare so apparently I've been expecting too much. Maybe the MHMR caseworker will be helpful in those areas. This therapist has always had one or both of us parents sitting in on Bear's sessions, with never a mention of individual therapy, which is good too. He mostly talks to Bear, but we can participate and contribute easily.

Hubby was teaching scuba this weekend so it was just Bear and I at therapy (Bob was stuck sitting in the lobby because she did not want to hang out with Grandma at an Art Class). Bear did get thoroughly agitated during the session, so between that and the MHMR session he was pretty much a grumpy pill all weekend. I got to tell him he was not allowed on the computer, because we had evidence that he'd gotten yet another e-mail account (he's only supposed to use the one we provided so we could check up on him). He denied it of course, but he'd made the mistake of printing out and leaving the confirmation stuff on the printer. I also thwarted his plans to hang out with a friend and get that friend to give him a back pack. To the extent of having Grandma take her phone off the hook so he couldn't speak to the kid after 9:30pm.

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I did not hear from our sales guy regarding any new clients bringing us money (in particular the big client we were hoping to hear from) so I have to assume they have not contacted us. This means I have no idea what will be happening to the company. Hubby has pretty much decided that no matter what happens with the potential big client he does not want to give up, so if anyone can continue to pull us through by sheer will power I guess he can (he's done it for 2 years now). I'm even more focused on/enmeshed in dealing with the kids now, and the economy doesn't really seem to be picking up any time soon, but God has surprised us before.

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Gonna try to catch up on my blog reading now. I'm down to only 200 posts behind! If I usually read and comment on your blog it's not because I don't love you that you haven't heard from me lately! I'm just horribly behind. I really need to stop reading so many, or just hit "Mark All As Read," but it's like giving up friends!

Hugs and prayers,
Mary

Where did that come from?!

Finally received Kitty’s neurological test results, yea! They don’t have a summary so I’m having trouble interpreting everything (boo!), but I’ve got a call in to the therapist at the residential treatment center (RTC) that did the testing.

Monday I decided to try going back to work full-time (I’ve been home every day when they get home from school) to help Kitty regulate since her return from the RTC). She seemed calm, past any honeymoon stage, and we hoped it was her meds finally working. Tuesday night though we went to therapy and all the old issues were back (threatening youngest son, hating Grandma…). I kept staring at her wondering where this was coming from! It was as if the last 6 weeks hadn't happened. Well, there was a slight acknowledgement that what she was saying wasn't OK, but it didn't stop her. She obviously believed every word. So today I go back to being there after school.


We have been slowly taking Kitty off Lithium because of the side effects and the fact that it didn’t seem to be having any effect on her. If her behavior improves because I’m home, then we can assume it’s not the Lithium. If it continues to go downhill then we will have to assume she needs the external regulation, and decide what to do from here. I don’t actually do anything with her when I’m home (I sit on the couch and work on my laptop). It’s apparently just knowing I’m there and in charge that comforts her. Also, her little brother is able to stay home when Grandma goes to pick up the girls after their school gets out so our daughter has much less interaction with him, and Grandma doesn’t have to protect him from her – I will experiment later in the week with ways to see if that’s what’s causing the issues and how to fix it.




I also apparently need to be home for Bear too, even though he is never home. At therapy last week, we talked about how much Bear is isolating himself in his room and decided he needed to cut it out. Instead he's arranged to have after school activities every day.





We'd agreed that he could volunteer to lead PT (physical training for us non-military types) for the JROTC after school. It was a leadership position that we thought might be good for him, and we assumed it was fairly well supervised. Now we're realizing that just like at home, Bear assumes leadership means yelling at and telling others what to do, so that lovely behavior is being reinforced, and there doesn't appear to be any/much adult supervision at all. Plus, we assumed it would be one day a week, but agreed to two. Now he's also running a make-up day. So he's not getting home until sometime between 6 and 7 Tuesday through Thursday.





He's supposed to have mid day meds at 4pm. Obviously that's not happening and the other day he forgot his morning meds. When Grandma mentioned he wasn't getting chores done, he was rude to her. When I backed her up and mentioned one thing he hadn't done was make his bed, he angrily said that was my fault because he has no sheets! Excuse me?! How is it my fault? He's NEVER told me he needs new sheets.





Apparently his sheets are "messed up," and when pressed he admitted it was because he was falling asleep with gum in his mouth and it was falling out on the sheets. Have to say I think this is bull. I guess it's time to go search/ organize his room again. I know he's wearing the same 2-3 outfits over and over without washing them. He claims that is because he can't find any other clothes (he's incredibly picky). Occasionally he'll ask me to mend something, but he asks me at 9:15pm (bedtime is 9pm) and needs it done for the next day. So I'm assuming he's wearing them anyway. He layers so it's not like anyone would notice.



One possible reason for Kitty thinking it is OK for her to boss around Ponito is that she sees Bear bossing around everyone, and thinks this is her inalienable right. She would love to boss around Bob, but now that Bob is bigger than her I think she has given this up. I'm not sure how to intervene and let everyone know that Bear's behavior is not OK. When he did it in front of us we let him know in no uncertain terms that it was not OK, but there's not a lot we can do about the fact that he does it when we're not around. Even Bob "parents"/ bosses around Ponito, and he is standing up for himself. This is what makes Kitty think he's evil - he won't let her tell him what to do. He refuses to be her "dancing monkey" like she remembers her younger biosisters being.





To end this on a positive note. Ponito won an award last week at school for being conscientious, helpful, and going above and beyond in his volunteer duties helping kids get in and out of cars before and after school. Kitty won an award this morning for "Performing on Target" (gotta love the No Child Left Behind crud). Not that I'm not happy she won an award, but she didn't do anything! I don't have a picture of Kitty yet (forgot the camera as usual so a neighbor took pictures for us), but here's one of Ponito.

Breakthrough?

We were hoping that now that Kitty has friends at the new "school" that the meltdowns at home would decrease, but no such luck.

Got a call from the PDH's psychiatrist. She's been out of town for the last week and now the insurance company is pressuring her to make med changes (since obviously that's all that's wrong with Kitty. *sarcasm drip*). So she called me and started suggesting new meds?! I asked her if she'd discussed these with Kitty's psychiatrist (who Kitty can't see while she's in the PDH program, but has a lot more info about Kitty's past then I do and she has been in his care for over 2 years). Nope. She hadn't contacted him about Kitty at all. I mentioned that the psychiatric hospital had planned to change her meds until they discussed it with our psychiatrist, and changed their mind. I was fine with any changes she wanted to make - as long as she had discussed it with our psychiatrist first.

She'd said she'd call him that day (Bear had an appointment that evening so we knew she hadn't called), but she apparently did finally make the call this morning. We're going to be changing a lot of meds for Kitty. Wellbutrin for the depression (not supposed to make bipolar kids manic and decreases appetite so we might get rid of those extra 50lbs Kitty has put on since this Summer). She'll start that tomorrow morning. Early next week she'll start on Lithium for the bipolar and once that's in place we can start decreasing the extremely high dose of Trileptal Kitty is on - assuming it works of course. Then Adderall in place of the Concerta. Who knows?! Maybe this will help?!

We're still questioning whether or not the PDH is the right placement for Kitty. She is getting so much more aggravated during the day (stress is higher at this school because of the type of kids she comes into contact with), that she is coming home and taking it out on the family - much worse then when she was in public school. She is having a LOT more meltdowns at home. She has also started cussing a lot more (and not "naughty" words, but real cussing). Some of it could be the schedule change. Instead of leaving the house at 8am for school, she has to leave at 6:30am. That's a LOT less sleep, and with the added stress, she's probably not sleeping as well either.

She is often justifying her behavior with "I have issues" and "that's just the way I am." That does NOT make it acceptable behavior, but I'm not totally sure how to address it either.

Because of her PTSD (which is not really treatable by medication) once she is triggered into "Fight, Flight or Freeze" mode she is no longer rational and is reacting purely on instinct. If she were a small child and behaving like this (typical for those terrible twos!), I would just put her down for a nap, and try to eliminate whatever stress triggered the incident (food, tired, overwhelmed...). No long term consequences of course. The problem is, while at the time she is a small child emotionally... chronologically and in the eyes of the other kids (and later even herself) she is not a small child, and therefore should be held accountable for her actions. Every time she "gets away" with this type of behavior she sees it as permission to continue with it.

Because of the RAD (again, not treatable by medication), most of her issues are at home with her family of course, so all the extra therapy she's getting at the PDH is, I'm sure, helpful, but not with this issue. Once a week family therapy that's not conducted by someone who is very familiar with attachment disorders will not solve this "issue." I'm a little concerned that by admitting she has "issues" with family to this therapist that she will now reinforce her self-perception as someone who doesn't need/want a family. In other words it will become part of "who she is." Just like being a "girly girl" or "friendly."

In the 2 1/2 years we've had Kitty she HAS gotten attached to us. She does trust us not to hurt her (I think as evidenced by the fact that she will hit and scream at us - which she would never do with a stranger or Bear- aren't we lucky?!). She will occassionally admit that she loves me, sometimes will let me cuddle her and tell her that I love her, and will even sometimes that she loves Hubby, but it's rare. Most of the time though she denies that she wants to be part of the family, says she hates to be touched, and rages about how much everyone hates her. If we tell her we love her, the first word out of her mouth is "NO." Sometimes it's so hard to remember to tell her anyway. It's easy to convince someone you don't love them, but how do you convince them you do?! Just keep doing what we've been doing I guess.

Kitty has been in therapy more then half of her life. She knows and uses all the buzz words like, "I have anger management issues" or "I need to work on my behavior management." She knows what the therapists want to hear and she is EXCELLENT at changing the subject with tangents or other distractions.

I have no idea what our alternatives besides residential treatment would be, and I can't see residential treatment as being a good alternative for her. She is becoming more violent, but it seems to me that most of her issues are caused by her Complex PTSD (which being around agressive kids would aggravate even more, in addition to the fact that she's already afraid she's becoming "like her brother" - out of control and violent) and her RAD (which should alleviate significantly when she's not around the family as much, but certainly won't help her progress any).

Though keeping her at home is causing major problems too. Hubby is starting to feel like the warden again. Bear's PTSD is triggered by Kitty's meltdowns (last night he had to leave the house), and of course the other kids aren't getting a lot of attention (although they are not scared of Kitty like they were of Bear). I have to admit I'm highly frustrated because I feel a lot of pressure to "fix" everything. Mommy guilt makes me feel like there's a "right" way to handle situations or a "right" thing to say that would make it all better. My head knows that's impossible, but...

We had our second family therapy session today. Much of the session was just Hubby and I talking about our concerns to the therapist (who now reads this blog, "Hi, Mr. O!" - so I better watch what I say!). When Kitty did come in she started the session with this new quiet voice that I've only really heard her use with this therapist. He commented on the fact that he's never heard her use this voice before either.

Then, breakthrough! He started talking to her about an incident yesterday (she witnessed two girls coming to blows at the PDH) and what happened when she got home (meltdown with Grandma that involved cussing and yelling and then the same with Hubby and I that denegrated to hitting Hubby). The "real" Kitty started coming out. She talked about her hatred for our family, gave the therapist several "real life" examples of her vengeance issues (he'd been asking us about it), and generally showed him the side of her that only us as her family and a select few of her therapists get to see.

Not a very productive session, but for some reason I always feel a little better when other people see her acting like this, and how we respond (calmly). I often feel like "they" think it's all in our head or we are "provoking" it (by yelling at her or treating her badly). With Bear it was a lot easier because he was unable to control his behavior at all when he "lost it" so it wasn't always directed at us. Kitty puts up the charming, friendly facade that is so typical for RAD kids.

So now what? What are our options?

1. We can put her back in public school where at least there was less stress at school. She will continue to fall apart, but it probably won't be as fast.

2. We can stick it out with the PDH and hope that the med changes will take effect quickly.

3. We can move her to residential treatment and hope that the neurological assessments make a big difference (and she won't be home while they make med changes which would be easier on the family).

4. ???!!! I've thought about an attachment intensive, but she has so many other issues that would make that so complicated. And more importantly (unfortunately) this would cost a lot of money and time that we just don't have. I haven't found a local therapist willing to do an intensive. Most of the few I can find on the internet are in Colorado (not just a hop, skip and a jump from here!). I do have family in CO, but the other 3 kids need us too. Not to mention that she is now 14 so attachment therapy at this age is VERY difficult. Of course emotionally/ developmentally she is only about 4-5 years old so maybe that helps.

Purplewalls - thanks for the suggestion regarding TinkerBear. I am strongly considering it! Say hi to the ladies at the C&C board for me. In my 3 computer change this year I managed to lose my user name and password and I can't get it to e-mail it to me. *sigh* Will keep working on it! Do you know if the user name is an e-mail addy or a name? That would narrow down the choices some.

Marythemom

Confident but Stressed

We met Kitty's new therapist at the partial day hospitalization program (gosh that's long. I'm going to call it the PDH). He seems nice, but is not as experienced as we'd hoped and has almost no experience with RAD. He is a licensed professional counselor intern!



Family therapy was about 1/2 an hour of us summarizing Kitty and how she came to be at the PDH before Kitty came in the room. At one point the therapist commented that we weren't the typical parents he usually gets. While we did seem a little stressed we were also "confident."



I told him a little about my background: Bachelors in Psychology with a focus on child abuse and neglect, Masters in Social Work with a focus on Mental Health, worked in a residential treatment center, did homestudies for a foster care agency, worked with mentally ill adults - half of whom were homeless and "self-medicating" with illegal substances, taught behavior management to teachers of 0-5 year olds... none of it really helped a bit though. With the arrival of Bear and Kitty we got a crash course in RAD, PTSD, the juvenile justice system, IEPS and lived with it 24/7, plus, our experience with Bear and the trials of getting through his dealings with the police, school, aggression, intimidation and manipulation, cutting, running away and finally residential treatment.

He asked if Hubby had the same background as I do. Hubby laughed and said he was just an engineer, but I told him Hubby was not "just" an engineer. He's an incredibly empathetic, warm man.

Basically the therapist said that we should continue with Kitty's attachment therapist since we would only have family therapy once a week and that wouldn't be long enough to really address any issues.

Kitty spoke the whole time in a soft almost babyish voice. The therapist commented on it and asked us if that was typical because that wasn't the way she'd behaved in therapy with him. We assured him it was not, unless she'd just had a major meltdown or right before bedtime. Hubby and I think it was because she didn't want the therapist to know how she really talks to us. She's been reprimanded for it before by others (school administrators, therapists...). Doesn't make any change to her behavior unless she's still trying to charm the person (pretty much everybody but therapists and of course us).

He asked Kitty why she was there. She mentioned the suicidal threats. He asked her what she wanted from family therapy, she told him, "Nothing." She says she can take care of her issues by herself. She doesn't want a family, and therefore doesn't need family therapy.

Kitty had mentioned a skit she'd done with the other kids in group. The assignment was to act out how her family acts. She put "Bear" in the garage (he does spend a lot of time there or in his bedroom - he is RAD too), she put "Bob" in her room reading a book (pretty accurate, Bob is my sedentary child), "Ponito" was playing with a friend across the street (again pretty accurate), "Hubby" was upstairs on his computer (he does tend to hide when he's stressed and stare at his computer trying to figure out how we're going to survive), and "I" was in my cubby (this was the one I disagreed with, I haven't been in my cubby in months, but I do watch TV and work on my laptop when I'm not making dinner (that's how I hide).

So that evening I focused on interaction with the family, particularly with Kitty. She spent most of the evening in the back yard. When she came into the family room Bob and Ponito were playing a game and invited her to join in, but she refused. Within minutes she was headed back outside. Hubby told her she had to stay in the room with us for at least 10 minutes. I think it was the longest 10 minutes of her life. She sure made it the longest 10 hours of our lives.

Seriously. I feel guilty that we don't spend a lot of time together, but I also have to acknowledge that these guys are teenagers and they don't want to spend a lot of time with their parents. Even the healthy ones.

No visit :-(

Kitty's visiting hours are 12 to 1 and 5 to 7pm. Wednesday and Thursday we had appointments at the hospital so saw her at times other than visiting hours. Friday though we had therapy appointments across town during her visiting times so didn't get to see her or talk to her. She was very upset by this.

Kitty called the house to talk to us in the evening, but we of course weren't there. She got hold of Bear. I don't know what she said to him, but he was pretty upset by it. He claimed she asked a lot of questions that he couldn't answer (being asked questions bothers him a lot anyway). One of them I know was when she would be released. Bear has been repeating often that Kitty is not ready to come home and should not be released.

Attachment therapist (AT) therapy

Our first appointment was with the attachment therapist. She has been working with Kitty for over two years. We talked about ways I can help Kitty when she is feeling that someone is taking things away from her or that we love the biokids more than her.

Kitty is chronologically almost 14 (her birthday is Monday), but of course because of her issues and trauma she is developmentally only about 4 years old (when she's not in a meltdown of course). She'd gotten up to about age 6, but has been regressing a lot lately. Of course the biokids are much "older" and have many more responsibilities and privileges. Kitty feels this is incredibly unfair (as do the biokids -for different reasons of course).

Kitty is always telling me that the difference in the way we treat the children means I love them more than her. I anguish over trying to explain it to her without making her think I am putting her down. I find myself trying not to treat the other children special in any way and keep things "fair." Which of course is NOT fair.

The AT gave me some insight into my feelings and some words to use... the gist of which was a lot of sympathy and reassurance. "That doesn't feel fair does it?! " She also suggested I lighten up a little. For example, I haven't been allowing Kitty to watch a lot of movies because they trigger issues. She suggested I start allowing them, but only with me there to help regulate her. To stop the movie if she is getting upset and help her calm. To sit with her, possibly even in my lap.

We talked about some alternatives to help Kitty. One thing I suggested to reduce her stress level was to pull Kitty from school and homeschool for the rest of the school year. Hubby thinks Kitty will make me insane (OK, more so than I already am!). The AT thought there are a lot of advantages to his plan, including reducing Kitty's stress and reestablishing the bond with me. We'll need this to be the recommendation of the psychiatric hospital though or the school will not allow the homebound tutoring we'll need. Plus this way we can blame it on the hospital to avoid Kitty's resentment about being pulled from school being directed toward me/us. We haven't been able to get hold of anyone at the hospital to request this though.

We also talked about Reiki and tapping. The AT is very interested in Reiki (and has plans to become trained in it). She thinks it would be wonderful for me, Bob, and other members of the family, but is concerned about using it with Kitty as it involves laying down (might cause issues for Kitty), but more importantly she is afraid that it will help Kitty open up. Just like EMDR seemed to have opened a big can of worms for Kitty (that she is still unable to process), we're afraid that Reiki would do the same thing. I did go ahead and pick up a book about it at the Half Price Bookstore tonight.

Therapy and more therapy

After meeting the psychiatrist the first day Kitty was there, we found out from Kitty that the hospital hadn't given Kitty her night meds (despite repeated reminders/requests on our part). We even had the meds in their prescription bottles there. So she ended up not sleeping well the first night. Very frustrating.

Kitty is on a dose of Trileptal (3000mg if that means anything to you) that was so high they called us, the pharmacy, and her psychiatrist to confirm it. The hospital psychiatrist informed us that they were going to reduce her Trileptal to a dose that is appropriate for her age and size, and were thinking about adding or changing her to Abilify. After much discussion between her regular psychiatrist and the hospital's psychiatrist we were informed that they decided to make no med changes.


Of course she is doing well in the hospital. The social worker/therapist said she will probably be released this weekend. Most likely tomorrow. We now know that insurance rarely pays for more than 4 days so we weren't surprised (this time). We've heard nothing since, but last time we got a call at about 9am informing us we needed to pick her up by noon. We're assuming it will be the same this time.

Yesterday we had "family" therapy. We basically explained a little about what brought Kitty there again (it's only been 3 months), and what we guessed she'd been saying in therapy (She's afraid her sister because she can beat her up, her little brother is spoiled rotten, we love the bio kids more...). Let's just say we hit it on the head exactly (and then we clarified the distortions in Kitty's thinking). The therapist ended up saying what a great job we were doing (nice to hear, but frustrating because that's what all therapists say when they don't really know what to do with our kids.).

The therapist asked what we wanted to accomplish with this session. Truthfully we don't have a lot of expectations from hospitalization anymore so we just told her we wanted to try to get Kitty to understand that she needed therapy. She brought Kitty in. Kitty hugged Hubby and I (yea!) and then asked if this meant she wasn't going to get snack. (sigh! That's my baby!). (The therapist reassured her she would). Kitty was sleepy and distracted most of the time. Not completely dissociated, but close.

The therapist did most of the talking. She pretty much told Kitty she needed therapy and that she needed to participate in therapy. I was actually fairly impressed with the therapist's handling of Kitty. Kitty of course agreed with everything the therapist said. As soon as the therapist appeared to be done, Kitty got up, hugged me, stumbled over Hubby and hugged him on the way past, walked out of the door and shut it.

Apparently we were dismissed. The therapist seemed a little surprised, but this was the second day in a row that she'd done this to us so Hubby and I just looked at each other and laughed a little. (that's our girl!)

Today Hubby and I went to therapy with the attachment therapist at 11am and then at 5:30pm saw the EMDR therapist (who isn't seeing Kitty anymore, but is still very involved with the family and is starting work with Bear). More on that next post. Hubby is finally ready to sleep.

SUV therapy

Tried a new therapy technique with Kitty today. No EMDR therapy for her! Hubby and I went instead, and she was told she's not going to be allowed to go. The therapist is hoping that she'll feel like she's missing out, and start wanting to go. I'm not holding my breath on that one. Might work on Bear who can't stand other people talking about him, but doubt Kitty will care.

Got several calls from home during the therapy session. Kitty had a low grade fever and was complaining that her side hurt. Rather than listen to her whine and complain all night, I told Grandma to tell her no worries, she could stay home with me and eat leftovers while everyone else went out to dinner as planned. She started wailing and sobbing. Bear and Bob begged me to let her go. Wish I thought it was because they wanted to help her, but I suspect it was because they didn't want to listen to her. I said she could only go if she was healthy and not complaining, and then the miracle occurred! She was HEALED! She stopped crying and started laughing.

We were late to the buffet restaurant and by the time I got there, Kitty had already gorged herself. She did come running up to hug me, and bad mommy that I am, I told her I didn't want one because her face and hands were coated with ranch dressing (she likes a sprinkle of salad on her dressing). She promised to be careful and I got a hug, luckily I wasn't dry clean only today because her shirt was coated too. *sigh*

I don't know what to do about Kitty's recent gorging. She'd had a plate of ranch dressing with a little salad, 4 pieces of pizza, a plate of fried popcorn shrimp, and at least 2 rolls, that I know of before I got there. I watched her slam down 4-5 glasses of water because she "hadn't drunk anything all day." I finally told her she could have more, but she was done with carbs and protein. She needed veggies! She got a serving of sweet potatoes with marshmallow, a small piece of pineapple (which she decided tasted awful - I'd had some and it tasted fine) and a piece of watermelon. She was ready to go back for more pizza, nachos, and some sausage, but I told her she was done.

She started begging for dessert. Rather than tell her no, we asked what she'd eaten today - trying to show her how unbalanced her diet was (we've talked to her before about how dissociated she is from her body). She'd apparently forgotten to put her main lunch (a can of soup) in her lunch bag. Hubby had made sure she'd taken her lunch bag (she often forgets), but of course didn't realize it was empty. A teacher gave her some lunch money (we've asked the school to call us, but she doesn't always tell them because she wants to eat what her friends have - yesterday lunch was a mooched bag of chips, because she'd forgotten her lunch again). Today's lunch was a sandwich and a doughnut.

I told her she could have a dessert, but it needed to be no larger than a ping pong ball (I demonstrated with my hands). She had a minor meltdown, and ended up arguing so long that she never actually got a dessert. This infuriated her!

We borrowed Grandma's car because Hubby is teaching scuba this weekend, and needed to be at the dive shop super early. Bob wanted to ride with me, but I didn't want Kitty riding with Hubby, and Bob decided to ride with Hubby rather than go with Kitty and I.

Kitty lit into me about what a bad parent I am, and how mean I was to her. I decided I was going to stay and work on this rather than drive home. Kitty threatened to get out of the car so I engaged the child safety locks. Kitty had rolled down the window and was holding the car door locked - making this difficult. She managed to disengage the child safety locks before I could even get back in the car. *sigh* When she threatened again I just told her this was a bad part of town (true) and that I didn't recommend that choice.

I wish I could say the right words came to me, but they didn't. Kitty wailed about how horrible and mean we are and that we are not her real family. She wanted to go back to Nebraska. I sympathized that family's are scary to a person with her past, but of course she claimed she's not scared of us, she just hates us.

I reminded her that she had no way to get to Nebraska. She mentioned she could steal my car and drive - I poked holes in that option. She kicked the chair and yelled at me, but didn't escalate out of control. I hate that I can tell her over and over that I love her, but she doesn't believe me. Doesn't want to believe me. She just wants to make it all go away, and that tears at my heart - but wishing won't make it happen. I also wish I could just make it all go away too. I wish I could just open her heart, set it to Trust and Love, and just wait to hear those words I've been longing to hear from Kitty, "I love you, Mom. I love being part of this family." I know I may never hear them, but Kitty is not the only one who has a dream.

We talked about eating (she hated me for telling her what to eat, and she was going to starve herself skinny so she wouldn't be like biomom. School has been showing plays about bulimia so she's talked about that a lot (thanks public school!) - she's hoping it will get her put in the hospital to get away from us.

It was a long convoluted argument with many rabbit holes. I think 2 things might have gotten through.

One, I got a chance to say, I wish I'd always been her mom, because I wish I could have kept her safe (had evil step-father thrown in jail the first time he EVER tried to hurt MY child).

Two, real family doesn't have to be related by blood. I asked Kitty if Hubby and I loved each other - luckily she did say yes. Aren't Hubby and I a family even though we're not related by blood? Yes again!

The half brother of one of Kitty's half sisters died when he was only 16. Lately Kitty has been obsessed with him (he died violently and was good to Kitty when he was alive). She told me that in some of her many walks around the back yard talking to herself that she is often talking to him. I told her I do that too, but I'm talking to God. She said this boy watches over her, but she doesn't know why he sent her to this horrible family (us). I agreed that sometimes I wish I could ask God why he does things. I gave her some examples of times when God did something and at the time I had no idea why, but later, sometimes years later, I figured out why and it was always part of his great plan. I mentioned that if this boy is watching over her then he must be like a guardian angel. Guardian angels talk to God. What if the Guardian angel boy told God, my friend is hurting and needs a family, and God chose us for her because he knew I needed her to be my little girl? That seemed to resonate within her.

Then I reminded her that the boy was NOT blood related and yet she still loved him!

So in a way she got therapy after all. Almost an hour in the parking lot and about 15 minutes driving home, but I pray that it was worth it. I do not expect instant, forever changes, but maybe a couple of chinks in her armor?

Eating her emotions

Chores Friday included cleaning the playroom. Grandma hasn't been able to get the kids to do much of anything so has pretty much told them to dust and vacuum - and they don't really do that.
After talking to the insurance company, calming Kitty down (she was convinced the other kids were laughing at her), I decided to address the fact that the kids were playing in the playroom instead of cleaning it.
Bob was picking up miniscule pieces of stuff in slow motion. Kitty was laying around watching her and claiming to be taking a break because she was tired and/or ill.
I tried just supervising, but that didn't help. I threatened to throw away all the stuff I had to clean up. A bit of an effect on Bob, Kitty started whining that she was sick.

So I started picking up trash and throwing it away. Then I started picking up toys and putting them in the trash pile near Kitty (so she could pull them out if she wanted to). She still got overwhelmed and had a meltdown. I explained that I deliberately put the toys near her so she didn't have to get up off her tuckus. She still got upset.

The neighbor who is a teacher at the private school brought by Bob's Texas History workbooks so she could review all weekend.

We realized we were late to Kitty's therapy appointment. During which she spent the whole time complaining she was hungry and had nothing to talk about (typical lately, an obvious distraction as well). After therapy and on the way home we talked about how her feelings are related to eating.

Kitty has always blocked her feelings. She doesn't listen to her body. She even encourages people to pinch her arms to show them that she has no feelings there. She "plays" roughly and has no idea how to handle it when it increases beyond her comfort level. She was "play fighting" with a boy and accidentally hit him in the nose - giving him a nose bleed. Everyone agreed it was an accident, but she has no idea how to prevent it from happening again.

She is not ticklish and appears to have no idea if food is literally dripping off her face. Like Bear she has high psychosomatic illnesses. (Commented on by the psychologist giving the results of her school assessment).

After an hour of complaining that she was starving during therapy, I mentioned to Kitty that she was probably dissociating/ distracting herself from her emotions (she denied this of course). We talked about how she used to take medications that kept her from being hungry, and we kept telling her to go ahead and eat. Now she is probably on a med that is doing the opposite. I asked her to try to be aware of how much she is eating (lately more than a starving teenage boy and craving more!). We talked about how she spent so many years denying her emotions.

The subject changed to why Bear is angry at Biomom. I tried to explain that Bear's heart was damaged because Biomom wasn't able to parent him well. Now Bear doesn't feel safe trusting anyone with his heart. So he pushes people away so no one can ever get close to his heart. I also added a little about how his early childhood was different from hers (biomom's abusive men tended to beat him up). We talked a little about how hard it must have been for biomom, having four kids, aging out of the foster care system, running away from her problems (pointed out that Kitty and Bear do this too)... I also touched on how the chemicals in Bear's body were messed up, and that in residential treatment they found medications that helped him, but he still had a lot of things to work through before he was safe to come home (Bear was able to come home from RTC when his bipolar disorder received proper treatment).

Hardest part for me to remember, is to always respect the relationships (no matter how tempting it is to put down or criticize the biofamily). I always speak of son (and biofamily) with love, but honesty, and try to explain why he might have done the things he did. We talk about the things he did that made him unsafe to be around, but how much we love him anyway.

Mostly we emphasize keeping everyone safe.

Phhbbt!

So Wednesday night we took Kitty to the psychiatrist. I asked him about possible bipolar disorder (Bear has it) as her moods are swinging hard. It's so confusing because it could be hormones, starting school, biomom giving birth, but who knows! She is so angry and defiant sometimes, but it's just out of the blue lately. We had moved past this, but maybe it's just time to revisit it. *sigh*

So the psychiatrist said we have to get her tested by a psychologist. No worries, I called the one who saw her a little over a year ago. He doesn't take our insurance. I called the insurance company to find someone who does. They couldn't find us in the system! They would say, "Oh here you are!" and then say it would be the account through my husband's former employer, or they found Kitty, but under her birth name, or they found Hubby, but couldn't access his account. My favorite part? They switched us to another person who was very nice. She said she'd found Kitty, but for some reason she wasn't associated with any account and they had her last name wrong. She is fixing it for me, but it will take 5-7 business days to get it correct and be able to tell me what our benefits are! *sigh* I love insurance!

So after getting off the phone with the insurance person it was time for Bear's therapy. We started with the "Pumpkin Patch incident" and the Ipod borrowing incident. As usual, he was telling the truth and someone else "misunderstood." The therapist got Bear to admit that he lies, steals and is sneaky, and that he should not expect us to have a lot of trust.

Hubby approached the knife issue in an interesting manner. He said, that following the conversation we just had, he knew it was going to be very difficult for Bear to tell the truth. That he wanted Bear to stop and think before he answered Hubby's questions and be sure it was the truth. He then asked if Bear felt threatened and unsafe by anyone in the last few months. Bear said he felt threatened by some kids at school and that he always made sure he was near a teacher. Well, we know he has PTSD. Hubby worked his way around to dicussing what Bear was doing about it - whether or not he had any weapons (at this point I'm sure Bear knew he was busted) so he admitted to the knife, but claimed he gave it away (but the boy may not have heard him say he could keep it). Basically he tld the truth, largely, but I sincerely doubt it was completely.

So the question was why hadn't he told us. Well that was because we weren't around enough of course and never listen to him! When he tried to talk to me I "didn't listen" and "spend too much time on the computer." Hubby was "always working" and never does anything with him. The therapist said this was a recurring theme in their sessions. Bear said his foster brothers had never talked to him and his foster dad was always too busy (this is funny because he always says he wanted Hubby to go hunting and fishing with him like foster dad always did!). Bear said the reason he wanted to be adopted was to have a family that would spend time with him. He started crying and talking about how he wanted to spend time with us.

Am I a horrible person that it didn't really move me? The therapist asked, again, how much time I spend on the computer. I told him I usually go on the computer about the time I put the littles to bed (about 8:30) - this is less time than I used to spend, in fact I deliberately started putting it off until then after the last time I got fussed at by the therapist (before, I would get on as soon as I was done with dinner because the kids were all just sitting around watching TV). Bear tends to corner me in my computer cubby about 5 minutes before bedtime and talk for about 10 minutes after bedtime.

Today, Hubby and I talked with Bear and the therapist about how he always wants to talk on his schedule instead of ours. He didn't think it was fair that we only wanted to talk when it was convenient for us! Impasse. I mentioned that I'm available for hours before bedtime, but he's off doing something else. The therapist said he needs to join in the activities - helping with dinner? And that bedtime is a vulnerable time and I needed to stay off the computer until after Bear goes to bed.

So tonight I come downstairs from tucking in the littles, and Bear and Hubby are watching ESPN - not interesting to me (or really to Hubby, but they're together). So I got on my computer. 10 minutes later Bear hunts me down in my study - the boy has the attention span of a gnat. We talk for about 5 minutes about whaat he wants to do with his day off tomorrow, and then he decides to go to bed early. I don't want to sit around waiting for him to have time to talk to me. I don't want him to feel totally ignored either. Not sure how to handle this.

Now the really fun part. I'm getting on my computer later so it's later when I get done with my e-mail, blog reading, forum reading, and blog writing. Now I get to go upstairs and take a bath. Lets hope it's not after midnight again. Maybe if I get more sleep I won't actually need the mood stabilizer!

Sweet dreams!

Mary

New baby

Well Bear and Kitty's mom had her baby. She sent me pictures of the baby and one of the kids' younger sisters. First time she's communicated with me since she told me she was disappointed the baby was going to be another girl because she wanted to give Bear a little brother. I felt like she's been treating me like a foster parent and had gotten sick of it. So I told her that I had given Bear a little brother, and a sister for Kitty to play with. I told her I just wanted her to know that the children had a family who loved them and siblings to play with and they were happy. That was in May.

I showed the pictures to Kitty in therapy tonight. She was interested in the picture of her older sisters and how much the 10 year old looks like her. She commented on how the girls have lost their baby fat and are slim like Kitty now. She thinks the baby has her nose, we talked about whether or not that meant Kitty probably has the same nose that biomom does. There were no pictures of biomom, but you could see someone's hand in one of the baby pictures. Kitty thinks she recognizes biomom's fingernails. We then had an in-depth discussion about fingernails and stinky feet. Therapy's not all therapeutic!

At one point in the conversation, Kitty pointed to each of the girls, including the new baby and said you are going to adopt her, and her, and her. This is so hard to watch.

We also talked about the book that Kitty is reading called "The Stuff Stars are Made Of." This is a library book she got with Grandma. The back gives no clue what the story is about so I can't complain to Mom, but... The book is about a girl and her younger brother who are left with the Grandmother and the Mom just takes off. The grandmother is very old and the girl is basically raising the brother, even enrolls him in school herself. One day the boy doesn't get off the bus, and the girl calls the school pretending to be the mother as usual. The school starts asking questions because the Mother picked up the boy at school for a doctor appointment. At the point in the story where Kitty is, the boy hasn't been home for 3 days. The girl has talked to the biodad who she's never met because he's in jail. When he gets out on patrol (parole, but Kitty has trouble with her reading!), he goes looking for the boy.

Kitty tells the therapist about the book and comments how it is similar to biomom. Biomom often left them in the care of others. She insists that the book is not upsetting her at all. *sigh* I don't know how much to protect them, or even how to protect them both at this point.

Kitty confessed that she sleeps better and gets up fine when she goes to sleep at midnight, which she claims to do often. *heavy sigh*

I sent an e-mail to biomom thanking her for the pictures and asking if the baby is OK since she appears to be in an incubator or something medical. Kitty wants to start sending e-mails to her little sisters. I told her it was OK as long as she understood that I needed to be able to review biomom's e-mails first because in the past she has blamed the kids for their removal from the home. Kitty says she knows now that it is not her fault she was put in foster care and it doesn't matter to her if biomom says it. I'm totally torn. Kitty wants the new baby to know who she is, and she wants to communicate to her sister's more often. Since up until now that means only talking to them when they are with the grandparents (2-3 times a year) she misses them a lot.

I think this therapy session was tougher on me than Kitty. Maybe I should insist on EMDR paddles for me too!

Mary