Thanksgiving... and then some

I know I haven't blogged in a while. I should as I need it. It helps me purge out the old to make room for the new stuff going on. Well, things are going pretty good around the house. Penelope has her ups and downs but then who doesn't. But as we all know, kids with mental illness have different ups and downs than those without. I would say, even with her setbacks, she is doing pretty well considering its the holidays.
I actually wasn't looking forward to the 5 days Penelope was going to be off school. With how absolutely needy she has been, I was already worn out. So I decided to embrace her neediness. Put off those things that are making her neediness a problem and just spend some major quality time together. The only issue with that is that I am hosting Thanksgiving Dinner. If it was just my parents coming over, I wouldn't have been that stressed about it. But my Aunt on my Dad's side and her granddaughter was coming. We haven't had Thanksgiving with my Aunt in so many years. But recently, I think due to the crappy economy teaching us how to value non-monetary things more, like family. Her husband, my Uncle, had just passed away like a month earlier. Her two sons were having Thanksgiving with significant others' families. Would would have invited her anyway but that made it that much more important.
I had given Penelope a To Do List. I made sure to include some fun creative tasks on it like making place mats for everyone with a Thanksgiving theme. And making a welcome sign on her portable chalkboard. But I asked her to clean the windows on the balcony doors and side windows, move broken down moving boxes to the storage room and take out the garbage. It was like pulling teeth and I don't think that was a ton to ask for. My Dad had to run some errands and decided to stop by and take Penelope with him, knowing that she probably was making my life more difficult. I needed the help but it was probably for the best. She was excited her cousin was coming as they are the same age.... physical age.
The dinner was really good and it was great to see my Aunt. Penelope and her cousin got along great in the beginning.. but then things went down hill after that. My Aunt came to me after checking on the girls in Penelope's room. "Penelope has a real sad face on right now. I don't know what's wrong." I went to check. Basically Penelope was hoping that her cousin, who is very small for her age and in a lot of ways does look younger, would want to play dolls with her. Penelope had even pulled her wood blocks out. Her cousin kinda played with her but really just wanted to just hang out and listen to music. During dinner, Penelope pouted mostly. She didn't eat much and wasn't interested in talking to much. Her cousin noticed Penelope's attitude but really didn't know what was wrong or what to do so she just didn't acknowledge it. As soon as Penelope could get up from the table, "to go to the bathroom", she went off and hid in the office to play with the cats. I found her and tried to talk to her. She knows that most kids her age don't want to play with dolls anymore but she doesn't understand why her cousin just couldn't do it anyway. She was upset with her for not doing what she wanted her to. Fortunately she didn't make a big stink about it and we were able to get through the evening somewhat unscathed.
After my Aunt and cousin left, my parents stuck around for a little bit. I had some news for Penelope. I had talked to my twin brother earlier in the day and he wanted me to wish Penelope a Happy Thanksgiving. When I spoke to him, it floored me. To break the awkward moment, he said "It must be my happy pills.. haha." I said "No. You have a lot of love little brother." (I was born first so that's my rub) But I was stunned and a little emotional about it. I'm not taking it as forgiveness. I will take it as it is. I'm not saying I want forgiveness for Penelope. I don't know if it's a forgiveable act, what she did to his family. I hope that foregivness is something considered for his own betterment.
I told Penelope and she just looked down at the ground and said softly... "Wow.... okay.." She was showing her guilty feelings in her response. Which is good. It was hard for her to hear that he said that. It is hard for her to accept a little lienency from her Uncle. A little later that evening after tucking her into bed, she said "I can't believe he said that..." I said "He is a good person." She said "And I am a bad person." I said "No. You are a good person who did a bad thing. A very bad thing at that. But there is a difference. I believe that your Uncle just wants you to heal and get better." She said "I want to get better." I said "And you are. Don't you think so?" She said "No. I don't think I will ever get better." I sat down next to her and we had a good talk about the different ways she is getting better and feeling better. She agreed. She just wish it was easier and quicker. Don't we all.
But I survived the 5 days Penelope was off school. It was a lot easier than I thought, since I embraced her neediness rather than allowing things to get in the way. We have reimplemented "Baby Time" from when we first started Attachment Therapy. Penelope has been using her baby bottle and her pacifier a lot lately from her previous stint of Baby Time. It's been almost two years. But she seems to need it and as we all know, you give them what they need (not necessarily what they want.) The idea with Baby Time is that the use of the pacifier and baby bottle and other baby items and mannerisms are saved for Baby Time (no other time), at which time she can have at it. If she wants, I will craddle her on my lap (the best I can a 5'3 13 year old.) I will read baby books to her, feed her, play with her. She can play with toys in the bathtub, suck on her pacifier.. whatever she wants. I just draw the line on diapers. But it worked the last time, to not have her act inappropriate in public and other times and designate it for a specific 30 - 45 minute period at the end of the day... and she "grew" out of it. Right now, with the holidays, she needs it again. I'm okay with that. If it helps her cope with her stressors in a more effective and appropriate way, I'm all for it. The idea behind it is that her trauma happened during this developmental time in her life so she didn't get these needs filled. She can't move passed this stage until those needs are filled.
Update on George and Harriet. I still feel like there is something George is hiding about Harriet. She hadn't communicated with me in over a month since where we left it - which is that she was going to set up a time to meet to discuss Penelope's sexual abuse and other events. She never set that time up. She did however email me yesterday saying "I know we are not getting along right now, but I need to know the address where to send Penelope's Christmas presents to." I found this interesting since I'm not sure that the issue was we weren't getting along. I guess she is pissed at me but I didn't stop her from doing anything. I don't know. I just feel like something is missing. I went online to see if she had posted any wierd facebook statuses or tweets. No facebook, but her tweets are stranger than ever. Her twitter persona is very Catholic Pro-Lifer. She picks arguements with people on twitter who are Pro-Choice. Usually she is very civil just very religious and pro-life. But she started tweeting how women need to keep their legs together and quit being sluts. But the wierdest one was the one where she is asking her followers (99% nuns and priests and very religious people) what to do about the fact that she wants to become a nun but is married to a devout Catholic. She says she just wants to evangilize God's word. Her extreme view has gotten more extreme. I'm not saying there is anything wrong with becoming a nun but from talking with Penelope's therapist, who has met Harriet on several occassions and knows her past, she feels Harriet has created this extreme persona to offset all the bad things in her life, but without acknowleding them. It's very unhealthy for her. Even more reason to keep Penelope away from Harriet.
George didn't take the plea bargain that the procescutor offered. He learned through the leader of his biker gang that there is an unwritten rule about bikers testifying against eachother, especially a rival gang. Something to do with the whole outlaw thing. You just don't help the police or something like that. Even though they have what they have on security video, a person has a right to face their accusor and the attorney's have talked and it was said no one is testifying. So he is hoping to get his charges dismissed. Not that it's still not costing him an arm and a leg. His bike never showed up. He said it was most likely in a chop shop within the hour. It was too custom for anything else. So he gets the insurance money for that. I have been having to take him to his weekly doctor's appointments for his back because the police still have his pickup truck. Last week, because of the holiday, my mom had to watch Penelope so I could take George to his appointment. But it took to long and I couldn't take him to get his hair cut because my mom had an appointment she had to get to. George through the biggest BIGGEST hissy fit that I was taking him home. "I told her that I had things to do....... Why did she make her appointment when I.....She knows I don't have any vehicle.... Doesn't she know how hard it is to be without a car...blah blah blah." I let him go on for a little bit and then said "And why is it you don't have your pickup truck?" (The police have it as evidence) He said "That's irrelevant." I said "I disagree with that so I don't want to hear about it. I took you to your doctor's appointment. If you don't like it. Tough Sh*t." He shut up. He just doesn't take any accountability for his situation. So he claims he didn't know that he was taking these guys to a fight. But he knew he was in an outlaw gang and he knew he was fleeing the scene of a crime with criminals in tow. "I'm just a victim here!" Whatever...