Multigenerational Trauma

As it's summer, Penelope is staying with her grandparents again. Each year gets better and better as she gets older, gets farther in her healing, and takes more accountability in her life. Her RAD and PTSD will probably never allow for a smooth summer but the other challenge is my mother.
Unlike how I approach Penelope, with learning opportunities and faith that she will continue to grow and heal, Grandma is a lesson for me in patience and tolerance and evaluating if my actions will result in a positive outcome. In other words, I pick my battles and try to minimize the chaos the best I can. It is just really hard when it involves your child.
Last Tuesday, my mother had a dentist appointment late morning. My father had committed to my twin brother B, to drive him to a post surgical doctor's appointment. If Penelope was left home, she would have been home alone about 2 hours. She has done that many times this past year, no problem. But my mother insisted she go with her when it was time to leave.
You may think "What's the big deal? She should go." I'd agree under normal circumstances. But my mother insisted, telling Penelope she didn't trust her to stay home. She would take her to lunch afterward. Now if you know my Mom, this is really about her wanting to have someone to go out to eat with. She loves to do it and jumps at the chance whenever my Dad is preoccupied like that day. (He likes to keep a tight reign on the purse strings.)
You might still be saying, "It's still not a big deal. So she is putting Penelope down, saying she can't be trusted, as an excuse to make her eat lunch with her. Penelope gets a nice lunch out for her troubles." Again, I agree. Not a big fan of the apparent lie/put-down but could still tolerate it. But again, this is not a normal circumstance.
My mother's dental hygienist is my sister-in-law, the mother of Penelope's cousins she sexually abused. She didn't tell Penelope that was where they were going until they were halfway there. And my SIL didn't know either.
It's been 3 1/2 years since the incident and Penelope has been all but erased from their family. When the kids all about her, the conversation is redirected. My SIL has forgiven her in her heart, she knows of Penelope's past and mental health issues, but can't let her around her family. My brother B carries even more burden because he was in charge that night, and still has a ways before he will ever forgive her. The kids have not shown any signs of trauma other than missing their older cousin. Holidays and family gathering are always seperate or without Penelope and I. Well, I'm invited but how does that happen? Penelope is far from the same person and carries a ton of guilt on the issue.
With those facts, one would think that my mother would know better than to take Penelope to the dentist with her. There are two versions of what transpired in the car.
Penelope's version: Grandma told her where they were going. Penelope told Grandma that she can't go there. "I can't!"and became very upset. Penelope told her how upsetting it was for her to even go to their house with Papaw to let the dogs or when they were 5 states away on vacation. Grandma told her that they are almost there and she can either go in and sit in the lobby or stay in the car. Not to worry, her Aunt won't see her if she sits in the back of the lobby. Penelope choose to stay in the car and called me at work crying. She felt totally abandoned and unheard. She said grandma said "I've got dark secrets too, and I've learned to deal with them. You need to learn to deal with yours too."
Grandma's version: Penelope never said anything about having a problem. She didn't decide she was going to sit in the car until after they got there. ... That was the version on the day it happened after she learned Penelope called me and that I was going to call her to discuss. She had answered the phone "I don't want to talk to you." So I made a point to not talk too much about it, especially after getting those answers which I felt were complete fabrications. She was sticking to the reason for taking her at all was because she couldn't leave her at home, she didn't know how long she was going to be gone even though she didn't have any errands. But a soon as I realized they were in a restaurant, I knew the real reason why Penelope had to come along. It doesn't help that while Penelope was sitting in the car, my Dad had to drive B there to pick up his wallet from his wife. Penelope, based on my Mom's wishes, could have been sitting in the lobby when B walked in! Penelope would have flipped....out! I don't think B would have done anything except maybe walked out but not one of them needs to be put in that situation. B did end up seeing her sitting in the car on the way out. Penelope didn't know until my Mom told her after the fact. When Penelope told her grandmother she can't see Uncle B, it would be too upsetting, my mother told her "Well, he is my soon so I'm going to see him when I want" referring to the fact she got to see him when he picked up his wallet. Her argument doesn't make sense!
So the issue came back up this past Saturday and she had forgotten her original excuse of not trusting Penelope to stay home by herself and said it never occurred to her that it would be a problem. And if Penelope had said something like "Pull over, I'm getting out" she wouldn't have made her go. I told her that Penelope shouldn't have to go there before she is heard! She tried to claim again that Penelope didn't say anything until they were there and I said, "So you are saying Penelope never said "I can't go there, or explained how hard it was to be at their house with Papaw?" Her response was, "I don't remember, it's been a few days..she might have said something like that but I don't remember..." Ugh!!!!!!!! She continued to tell me what she had told Penelope about her dark secrets. Penelope had told me the dark secret my mother shared and hearing it, made me angry because in my opinion it's nothing compared to what Penelope did. Without going into details, my mother had said something hurtful about her own mother in earshot of her while she was laying in bed dying of cancer. She was a little younger than Penelope. Her Mom died a year or so later. My mother was near tears when she was tip-toing around it internally debating if she would share the details with me. But I already knew from Penelope telling me. I said "If it was something I had done to you, would you have forgiven me. She paused for a second (to put herself in her mother's shoes) and said she would, but didn't know if her Mom ever did. I asked her if she felt like her Mom want a forgiving person? She said she didn't know. The shame in her voice, you could tell how raw and real her self-hate is for what she did. It blew my mind because it was such a forgivable act. To have carried such a burden for over 50 years and feel like such a horrible person for it explains a great deal about her. I just can't imagine a mother not forgiving their child for it. She was a child, grieving her mother's illness, not understanding in a rational way what was going on. I told my mother I feel like she is holding on to the emotions of the child and not processing it as an adult. It's like remembering a scary dream and still feeling scared when you know rationally it's not real.
I know there are other traumas in my mother's childhood that she doesn't talk about that happened to her and to think thus is how she feels on the smaller things makes me feel very sad for her.

Steps toward forgiveness

Shortly after Thanksgiving, where once again our family has split celebrations because Penelope isn’t welcomed at my brother’s family’s house, my brother told our Mom not to buy him or his wife Christmas presents. B was trying to be considerate to the fact that money continues to be tight for them as they continue to help Penelope and I as well as deal with commission based work they do in this hard economy. B is always attempting to be considerate, and out of context, it seems like a very considerate thing to do.  But that wasn’t how it was taken.
Our family used to be big on giving presents to everyone in the family including eachother’s pets. We all like to give gifts.  As adult children, I think that we get more out of giving presents than receiving them. But for Mom, this is her language of love. You’ve heard of the 5 languages of love, right? Well, Mom perceives gifts as proof of love. So when someone stops buying gifts or says “don’t buy me a gift,” it’s a form of rejection. Between the economy going into a recession where everyone in our family’s income went down substantially, and holidays being emotionally charged time of the year for Penelope causing some major events, we have purposefully downsized Birthdays and holiday gatherings. Add on this from three years ago and lets just say our family has struggled to stay close which has caused resentment. My Mom grew up in a family that fell apart. She has one living sibling and hasn’t spoken to her in about 20 years. Her other sister, I never met and died when I was school aged.  She fears that’s going to happen to my brothers and I.
She knows that I don’t like George, Penelope’s Dad. And even though no one has ever thought it possible since we are twins, B and I are growing apart as well. We make a point to call each other once every few weeks, unless there is a reason to call sooner. I haven’t seen him or his family since the end of September. The problem is I can’t bring Penelope. I won’t just leave her home to go over there but if she is doing something that gives me a few hours, I will go. It’s just that it’s rare that it works out that way.
So, the context of, family growing apart, can’t have regular family gatherings anyway which just widens tat rift, perceived rejection of love, and this growing resentment, B telling Mom not to buy gifts and save their money right after Thanksgiving where we all couldn’t be together was setting off a bomb. She went off. I wasn’t there but I understand it was bad. Really bad. See, my Mom has turned into the Mother-In-Law she has never wanted to become. Her Mother-In-Law was hateful towards her. Has raised her hand to hit her. Has “disposed” of her dog while they were on vacation. Treated her like a servant. Mom talks about B’s wife Cathy like she is a bad mother and uncaring wife. She feels that B is controlled by Cathy and blames her for any opinion that B has that she doesn’t like. This includes keeping the families apart for holidays. Their kids are happy and well adjusted. They have never shown symptoms of trauma. They asked about her a lot, to a point that I was afraid her parents wouldn’t allow me around anymore because every time I saw my niece and nephew, they would interrogate me about her. They missed her a great deal. They were concerned for her because my brother and his wife told them that she had to go away until she learned how to play properly and was living in a special place (long term residential). I found out part of the reason they would interrogate me is because when they asked their parents, they wouldn’t answer and change the subject.
I’m not trying to justify my Mom’s feelings. But, I don’t like the way my brother and his wife handled it with their kids. If they were showing signs of trauma, It would make perfect sense as they would want their children to feel safe. But all their questions and behaviors have pointed in a different direction and the way they are handling it is confusing and throwing up flags for these kids instead of making it go away which is what their parents want. Their agreed upon tactic is "It never happened, Penelope doesn't exist." My Mom and I agree this is not the best way to handle this.
We are entitled to our opinions. But we are not entitled to hold grudges when all they are trying to do is protect their kids. And to make Cathy out to be this heartless person based on this is totally unfair. My Mom has also been punishing my brother in very passive aggressive ways, to the detriment of everyone involved. She hates Cathy, always finds reasons to not go over their house with the main reason “Cathy hates me and I feel unwelcomed.” When B complains that she never sees her grandchildren, she will say. “I see Penelope. Your kids don’t need me. I have to focus on Penelope’s needs.”  Yes, Penelope does need her but not to the extent this portrays. It’s an excuse, and a jab. And it doesn’t help the argument that Penelope has healed a great deal and is much more regulated. It makes Penelope sound like she is still very sick and requires a great deal of care.  A person one wouldn’t want around their children.
Well, it all hit the fan. It all came out. She went there. She blamed B for breaking up the family. (The father of two small children who carries a heavy burden of guilt for being the caretaker at the time of the assault.) And if that’s how he wants it, that’s fine. She won’t be buying them presents – no worries.  Whatever was said, B took it as she was done with him and was writing him off like she did her siblings and said as much. He was really upset. He never gets upset. He talked to his wife afterward, he wasn’t home but working when all this went down. Cathy was concerned and texted me to call him and talk him down. I happened to be on the phone with my Mom who seemed fine, a little sad but had a resolved tone to her voice. But she didn’t bring up the argument right away. When she did, she didn’t want to go into details (because she was wrong maybe?) but just said she was going to drink wine with dinner.. because she needed a drink. I didn’t pry. I called B right after I finished with Mom. He didn’t answer. So I called Cathy. She filled me in on what she knew but it sounded like B didn’t tell her everything, probably trying to spare her from the attack against her I’m sure my Mom made.
Cathy and I ended up having a very good conversation. A healing one. I found out she had resentment on the way our family handled it. She felt like we were only out to protect Penelope but who was going to protect her kids or stand up for them?  Like we didn’t care about them. How could we side with Penelope and defend what she did? I told her that I hate she has been feeling like this for this long because her assumptions are wrong on this. I told her that the day the charges were dropped, I mourned. It felt like a funeral. I wanted Penelope to be held accountable for what she did to her kids. I love them very much. I didn't know what to do with this child. I was so angry with her. So much I really didn't know if I loved her anymore. Even though I knew she was sick. I contemplated handing her back to her father but I felt like it was a death sentence. Whatever chance at life would be gone. So there was a part of me holding out hope. A part that was relieved. I also didn’t trust the system to handle it properly. When your child goes into the legal system, you have no control or say on anything. Their life is in the judicial systems’ hands. Similar to handing over a child to a surgeon. You can’t protect them from any mistakes. You are helpless. You have no power over decisions made. And they did nothing to help us. I’d already learned how completely incompetent the mental health system is. And CPS referred me to a service agency that we ended up firing because they made things worse! We never defended her. It never got to that point. We didn’t even have the case file. The only defense we gave was to her attorney and it was that Penelope was sick. No child that isn’t damaged would ever do this. By this point in my explanation I was crying. So was Cathy. She said she always felt so bad for me to have to “put up” with all this. She said that in the beginning, she was so angry with Penelope. But after some real thought she really blamed George. She has forgiven Penelope. She forgave her a long time ago. She just has to protect her children. She is glad Penelope is doing so much better now. And it’s not like she never wants the kids to ever see each other again. She is just so scared that if her son would see Penelope, it could trigger something in him and hurt him. That is what she fears and she has to protect them. I totally get it. I don’t think it would happen but what do I know? But all I can say is WOW. She forgave Penelope. She forgave her.
Later that evening while I was making dinner in the kitchen, Penelope walked in. I told Penelope that I had been on the phone with her Aunt Cathy. I told her that we talk about her. That her Aunt Cathy has forgiven her…Penelope stood there stunned. Looking down. Shocked.. She said “Oh… wow…okay..” Then she walked off into the living room. I could tell she was just standing there.. Then she went past the kitchen headed towards her room and shut the door behind her. I gave her a moment then went in. She was sitting on her bed holding her head in her hands crying. She was embarrassed and wanted me to go away at first. I told her it was okay. She sobbed. She said “I can’t believe she forgives me. I never thought she’d ever forgive me… I don’t know if I deserve it.”  I hugged her and told her I understand. Just the fact that she is upset by this news shows how far she has come. But that someday I hope she forgives herself. Her cousins are happy and healthy kids. I think it was important for her to hear. She took it well, had the appropriate reaction, and didn't flake out afterwards.
That was about 2 ½ weeks ago. This week is exam week. Today was the last day and she had only 1 exam today. Last night, Penelope tells me that earlier in the day while she was waiting in the café before school (late start due to exam week), she was thinking about Harriet. She was thinking about how if Aunt Cathy can forgive her for what she did to her cousins, then she should be able to forgive Harriet for what she did. She shouldn’t hold a grudge against her. She doesn’t want to hold a grudge against her.  "How does that help anything.." She did bad things to her that were very hurtful but she should forgive her. At this point I am shocked and impressed by what she is saying. Excited really…but then..
She says how “People can change. People deserve second chances, right? I start talking about the difference between forgiving and forgetting… but Penelope interrupts to tell me “I want to see her.” Really?? She says “I want to tell her that I forgive her. I also want to tell her how I feel about what she has done. I want her to know how she has hurt me. But that I forgive her. I want her to know that you are my Mom now and that I call you Mom. I just went to get it all out there.."
She said  "After break is over.." I said "Not while you are in school. You will need time to recoup from the breakdown you WILL have." We both laughed. We know how she is. She said "How about Christmas? She can come for Christmas." I said "Oh no. Too much pressure on that day. It's too soon anyway." I’m thinking “Woah… we need to back this up a bit.” I said “Wow Penelope. I am impressed with where you are going with this. It’s a lot to think about. You’ve obviously put a bit of thought into it. I’m excited for you. I do have some concerns with some of what you said that we will need to talk about but right now I need to think about it. I need to make dinner. And you need to study. So, let’s table this. You’ve passed it over to me. Let me think about it, but you don’t think about it. Focus on your test and we will talk about it tomorrow.”
Tomorrow is today. I’m going to see how the conversation goes, but I don’t hear her being ready to see Harriet. But it’s a great first step. She has to be prepared for seeing Harriet in possibly worse appearance then before. Nothings changed about her. She has to know that Harriet no-showing, being late, needing to leave early can still happen. She has to not be still looking for proof of love which is something she constantly looked for growing up. Every little thing was a test, rightfully so. I can’t protect her 100% I know. But I’m not going to let any reunification efforts affect her and her struggles to do well. We will have to do baby-steps. Phone calls first. I still see anger there. To want to have that kind of conversation seemed a bit confrontational. It doesn’t help that a little over a week ago when we were deciding what to get George for Christmas, when I asked “Do you want to get Harriet anything?” her response was, “I don’t know….. Like what, a pack of cigarettes???” One of the things she hates is Harriet’s smoking. I said “All rightly then. I take that as a no. I was just asking.”

I didn’t get to post this the day I wrote it. It’s been a few days since I started this post. We still haven’t had the conversation. Not fully. I’ve learned she bombed one of her exams, and has an F in another one of her classes. Her anxiety level and moodiness had been off the charts ever since she said something, even after her last final was over. That evening, I tried to bring it up since her exams were over and she said she wasn’t in the mood to talk about it, and just bringing it up and making her think about it dropped her mood. That whole Saturday she was still hyper-moody.  She spent the evening with her best friend, who was suppose to go on vacation with us this upcoming weekend, but decided at some point she didn’t want to go. “I don’t want to do anything on Winter Break. I want to veg in front of the TV.” My parents, Penelope and I are going to a state park about an hour away for a long weekend. We rented a cabin. We had room for one more. Oh well. We will still have fun. But I was concerned for their friendship with this new news. After dropping her friend at home that night and driving back I told Penelope, “I know you don’t want to talk about and I’m not going to talk about it right now, but I want you to know that I’ve decided you are not going to see Harriet right now. I don’t want you worrying about that. I see how anxious you’ve been the past couple of days. You are not ready yet. But I think what you said and what you’ve been thinking about is a huge towards healing your heart. We will be taking baby steps though, so emotionally it’s not such a roller coaster, okay? We will start with phone calls.” She said “That sounds good.” Her anxiety was noticeably better that evening and into the Christmas holidays. Her focus was on her family, helping me get the house ready for Christmas morning, helping Grandma by wrapping Papaw’s presents she dropped off. Grandma had hand surgery. 

I'll post later about Christmas. It went well, even considering how George was. Which I'll share. Penelope did well, but still needs to improve her confidence to draw boundaries with her Dad. At least she knows where the boundaries are. She's getting there. George is the same as always though. But we hold little hope for change there.

Family Disconnection

My last post was pretty long and I know that’s a bit of a faux pas in blogging. That’s why I should blog more often. But I’ve never been one to be short with my posts.


The majority of the last one was about the visits with George and how Penelope has been coping with them, which was most important to get down. My challenges have been separate from Penelope, as of late. Connected, but not caused by her. She has been, for the most part, pleasant to be around. We have our moments - where I have to remind myself to be patient with her and then call her nasty names after we are separate. Okay, I’ve only done that twice. Some of these moments don’t resemble the moments in the past that remind me of her mental illness and draw out that part of me that just wants to ring her neck. I’d rather have those moments even though I think I handle the other ones better.

The thing that’s been on my mind the most lately is my deteriorating relationship with my twin brother. I need to start with the fact that I had decided to make 2012 a year to put some focus on me. To take better care of me. The first quarter of the year is almost over and I’m not where I should be but any progress, is progress right? I’m not going to feel guilty about it.

Anyway, one of those pieces is to try to have some fun. My list of friends is pretty short/non-existent. I could re-kindle some old friendships from before Penelope, before I dropped off the face of the earth, but then I think how I’d have to explain everything and their potential lack of understanding, and the awkwardness of it along with the awkwardness of how much I’ve changed and our paths have drifted so far apart. I’m not the high energy go-getter I used to be. I don’t do happy hours, or go on weekend trips, or have Sunday afternoon lunches with the girls anymore. I tried to keep up that part of my life after Penelope came to live with me, but I had so much on my mind, so emotionally raw with what was going on at home, I couldn’t contribute to the conversation or the fun anymore. I felt like a tag along, a empty vessel that was using up space at the lunch table we sat at. That’s the best I can explain it really. It wasn’t a pleasant feeling so I just distanced myself from them.

I have two friends. I don’t talk to them very much and they are not strong friendships really. One is Alice, who was the Volunteer Coordinator for the non-profit that Penelope did community service at – playing card games with mentally ill/previously homeless residents. She introduced me to, my now client, Chelsea. Alice is probably one of the most interesting people I’ve ever met. She is very involved in politics and knows EVERYBODY. She is a bit older than me but I tend to gravitate towards people older than me. Chelsea is my age and we don’t have much in common but we get along very well. Since Chelsea is my age, and my only “friends” my age are my twin brother and his wife, I thought to have a dinner party/game night or something like that with them. I didn’t want to tie it down to anything in particular. Just a get together. Chelsea is married so I told her to bring her husband. I told my brother that he could invite a couple of their friends that I’ve met that seem nice. After three attempts over about two months of trying to get this thing to happen, I gave up. My brother had cancelled on me at the last minute all three times. If he didn’t come, his wife wasn’t going to come and neither of them came, then their friends wouldn’t come, and that just left Chelsea and her husband and me embarrassed so I kept postponing it. After the 3rd attempt and failure I gave up. His reasoning was either work, too tired from work or he forgot about some other thing he had already committed to. In a conversation with my mother, I told her I wasn’t going to try to reschedule it this time. It was too embarrassing. This made her mad enough I guess that she called my brother at some point and told him as much. She confronted him about why he was blowing me off. You have to understand that when my Mom gets mad about something, she tends to mix in other things that make her mad and make it about her and how she feels about it. I don’t say that in a slam against her, it’s just something that I’ve learned about her that I have to pick through when I’m trying to understand an issue she is having. It had been about a week since my last cancelled get together, and she called me to tell me about this fight she had with him and how ticked off she was. She went on about how much she loves her grandchildren and would be there for them more if it wasn’t for his daughter-in-law. She never wants her around. She doesn’t want any of us around. She just wants him all to herself etc. etc. She goes on and tells me how when she asked him if the reason he has been cancelling is because of Penelope, that he said yes. She said “I asked him why are you not close to your sister anymore and he said ‘Because she still has Penelope’.” Then she went on to say how mad that makes her and that she will always be there for Penelope and I and that yes she is there more for Penelope than his kids but that’s because Penelope needs her more than his kids do…. I’m stunned at this point as she continues to ramble on about herself and just skim over what she said. So I said “Hold on. What did he say?” She said “He said he doesn’t want to be around you anymore because you still have Penelope.” My whole body went numb. “Because you still have Penelope…..” I said “Are you sure that’s what he said? I mean, are you sure he didn’t mean something else like because I have Penelope, it’s hard to get together? (understanding that he or his wife do not want to see her or have her around their kids)” She said “No. I asked him and he said that wasn’t it…. But don’t worry.. You know how he is. It’s not him, it’s his wife. She’s the one….” I don’t remember much after that. I was floored. Both by the revelation and by the delivery! I told her that I had to go. I was, at least planning on, going to sleep.

I didn’t sleep of course. I was devastated. I was full of all kinds of mixed feelings. Part of me was mad, but part of me understood even. I was afraid this was going to happen. I have been tip-toeing around this possible outcome. Making a point to not push my feelings about Penelope on him, or even discuss her to any extent. He asked me to do that a while ago. To not even say her name. My mom told me she purposefully talks about her with him and says her name because she thinks it’s wrong he asks us to. But I don’t agree. I don’t think we should tell him how to think about this. No one has the right, especially me. I picked her over him. I didn’t want it to come to that type of thinking, but it is what it is. Back when it happened, one of the extreme emotions I was having was anger. I told myself “I’m not going to let HER get between us (my brother and I).” I was so scared of loosing my twin brother in this. This decision I made to take Penelope in and help her.. was it worth losing my relationship with my twin brother over? Even with all that anger, I couldn’t answer that. So I made a point to not let it become a question or issue. I thought we had worked through it where we agreed not to let it ruin our relationship. But that was easier said than done. Over the first year following, we had a few arguments. You have to remember that the court proceedings dragged out a good 8 months. Each time there was a court hearing, it all came back up. He thought I was trying to get her off with no consequences. He felt she should be locked up in a mental institution. I had to tell him that wasn’t one of the possible consequences. They felt like, and still do I guess, feel like there really is no hope for her. Even though over time my anger subsided and I was able to look at the situation with more clarity, I felt like they had the right to his own feelings. I just prayed that whatever the consequence the courts handed down were not going to be permanently on her record or cause her more trauma. When her case was dismissed due to her lack of competence to stand trial, I grieved again. I knew that it didn’t give my brother and his wife justice, nor provided any help for her. Of course there was a part of me that was relieved too, because it could have been a worse conclusion too. I didn’t like not having the control over what happens to her and I didn’t trust the system to do it appropriately because of what we had experienced through the trial.

I always wondered how much he was going to blame me for what happened. Shouldn’t I have known? I have my own guilt from it of course. I really thought that was the issue to be worried about. Not that I still have her. That I made a choice. I thought he wouldn’t put that on me. Consider it a choice between her and him. That’s where most of my hurt is.. that he doesn’t care enough about me to not consider it a choice. To make it a choice by doing this. To have wanted me to give up on her. But then again, who am I to tell him how to think.

Charges Dismissed

So yesterday was the big court day that was going to let us know what direction we were going with this trial. There were three main options. 1) Penelope found competent and the trail move forward, 2) Penelope found non-competent again and the charges dismissed, or 3) Penelope found non-competent, my brother show up for the proceedings and announce his wishes that Penelope be prosecuted. She was found non-competent and my brother told our Dad that he would not be going to the hearing simply because he doesn't want to be in the same room as Penelope. He never wants to see her again.




Some might think I would be jumping for joy. If you know the story, you would understand why I am not. Yesterday was a very emotional day for me and not a happy one. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad the charges are dismissed. Not because I think she doesn't deserve to be charged, but because the system doesn't work in a way that would punish Penelope in a way that would help her. It's been 9 months since the offense, and we still hadn't even got to the charges yet. Penelope, and the whole family including my brother and his family have been in this monthly cycle of starting to heal and then a monthly hearing comes up and the wound is re-opened. It's going to take a long time for these wounds to heal, if they ever do. Our family is broken. I don't necessarily agree with my brother about where Penelope is mentally. But I do not judge him or think less of him for having the opinion he has.




Yesterday was a day of mourning in my eyes and heart. It was the funeral, the event that marks the demise of our family - as it was. It has been dying for a while now. But there was hope for recovery. George isn't permitted to see Penelope but that is temporary. Once there were a great deal of healing, the family would be reunited - not perfect by any means. What's been done has been done, but healing. We are suppose to forgive George for what he did to Penelope - I struggle with this everyday. Because I struggle with that, I can't think less of how my twin brother stuggles with forgiveness for Penelope. I also am feeling so much sadness for my brother and all his conflicted emotions he is dealing with and how it hurts his heart. Family is so important to him and now his is so damaged. And he carries around so much guilt, so much regret and hate and an overall feeling of being a failure. He failed as a father and a husband. Too much burden to carry. We try to have a good relationship still but it's hard. Penelope needs me so much and with my hours, everybit counts for her. I try to see my niece and nephew but it's so hard. Even with this, we still try. We try to talk at least once a week but what do we talk about? I don't talk to George unless it's necessary. He calls me more than anything and ususally it's to complain about his insurance, workers' comp claim, or wrongful termination suit. I really don't care. My poor parents. They are both so done with Penelope and I. Mostly Penelope. They love her very much but my Mom has never been good with her. She either yells and lectures her or buys her things. She even has resorted to paying her to be good. My father tries and usually does well, but his level of frustration with her is reaching it's limit. Part of it is that he gets mad at my mom for not helping out more with picking her up from school and taking her to appointments. She will flat out say "I don't want to." Then he vents in front of Penelope and yesterday, the day of court for her, he made a comment that was about my mom but also let her know how much of a burden she is. When she is being difficult, he makes comments to me like "This isn't working. We are going to have to find a long term solution for her." I ask him "What's that suppose to mean?" He says "I don't know..." What he means is he is done and is ready to either pack her up for her dad's or find a residential facility. It can get bad but the littler things trigger that reaction for him too now. His tolerance is about gone. I know that he is looking forward us to move out. Trust me, I am too. I don't want to be such a burden on them. But I also need my parents, especially my dad - for the long haul and this is too in their face for them. I'm losing them too.

Summer is Almost Over

I have so much on my mind. It preoccupies me.


1) Summer is almost over. School is suppose to start in a month. But my house is in foreclosure and we are living with my parents - in a different school district, let alone state. Penelope doesn't even know. I will need to tell her, but then I don't even know what we are going to do. We have the option of paying out of town tuition but with what money? Is that the best thing anyway? She is a different child (again) this year and most certainly will end up in the special classroom with the mentally handicapped children because of her special behavioral needs. I can't allow that.

2)I've come to the conclusion that until I get Penelope and I out of my parents' house, she isn't going to improve behaviorally or emotionally. Actually she could continue to get worse. We've had some significant fits of rage that I haven't seen for a while. Besides being hard to handle on a personal level, it's also makes Penelope feel shame, sadness and desperation afterwards. I believe that if we are back on our own again, with my parents coming to us for support, things will improve. Even though her actions speak louder than her words, my mother SAYS she wants us to stay living with them. It sounds good on paper, but in reality.. not so much.

It's hard to deal with because I work, what feels like, constantly - keeping me away from Penelope and any say in what goes on during the day. Besides working 60+ hours a week, with an hour drive both ways, fitting in one to two therapy sessions a week for Penelope, I feel like I'm never home. When I worked a regular 40 hour a week, it was still tough but I'd be home by 6pm, Penelope and I would have our routine and it was easier to keep her "head on" with this routine. Now, she is home with her grandparents - wakes up whenever and just plays by herself all day. Plays and plays all day. Whenever there isn't going to be someone home to watch her, they will take her with them to run whatever errand they are running. But mostly she just sits in her play room or in our bedroom and plays. Sounds nice right? Not for a girl like Penelope. One of two things will happen. 1) She gets lonely and bored. She tries to recruit one of her grandparents to play with her. Papaw will play cards and sometimes take her to the pool. At least he tries. Between him and my mom, they should be able to fill this task from our Family Meeting "One fun thing a day." But Grandma is too busy. I've heard Penelope ask her to take her to the pool or do something with her and she always comes up with excuses why it's not a good idea. It's too hot, it may rain, expecting a phone call, etc. It's all excuses because she herself doesn't want to go. Or, 2) Penelope goes off into "la la land" and gets stuck there. That is currently where she is. She is stuck around 4 or 5 years old. All she wants to do is play-pertend. She only wants to eat her meals in her playroom. I don't allow that so she only eats a little so she can go play. But during the meal it's one word answers and the cold shoulder. I can usually get her to warm up, unless the day has consisted of warring with Grandma.


3) I honestly think things would be 100% better IF MY MOTHER would step up. I try not to get mad at her and just set my expectations low coming to a realization that it's not part of who she is to be able to do this. But it's sooooo hard. She tries to make these committments and promises on how she will work with Penelope, not yell at her all the time, not engage in battles with her, quit buying her things to get her to like her, and do fun things with her. It's not like I don't give her examples of how to approach the different situations, but she feels like she knows better because she has been a mom longer than me etc. etc. She will sometimes try to do it my way but then doesn't have the patience or will-power not to let her emotions take over and lash out at Penelope for the littliest things.

The other night I fell asleep before Penelope and around 12:30 she went downstairs to get a drink of water. My mom was down there watching TV. She immediatly snapped at Penelope "What are you doing out of bed??" to which Penelope snapped back "I'm thirsty and I am getting a drink of water!" My mother than said "You are very rude and I will not talk to you, do not talk to me!" Penelope came upstairs and woke me up to tell me that Grandma was being mean to her and told her she won't talk to her. I knew something had happened but told Penelope that it is best right now to go to bed and will will address it in the morning. Ironically, my mother brought it up shortly after I woke up. She wanted to discuss it, and she told me exactly what I wrote (so that wasn't a spinned version from Penelope). When she realized, from my expression, that she handled it wrong she announced to Penelope and I that from now on when Penelope is rude she is going to put a big fake smile on and say "THAT'S NICE..." which from prior conversations I've had with her, it is how she tells someone to F off if she doesn't like what they say. So she is going to apply this to Penelope now. When I nicely mentioned I didn't think that was best.. Penelope was there so I was trying to be non-critical, she just said that she didn't know what else to do. We've talked about this but it just escapes her. Not that I tolerate Penelope talking like that to Grandma but she sees my critisism of her and not Penelope. I have to approach Penelope differently. I can be more direct with Grandma - or maybe not I guess. Penelope's one therapist told my mom part of their problem is they are too alike. No kidding.

But its not just how she interacts with Penelope, it's even just helping out around the place. I've been cleaning their house on Sundays trying to get the place in shape. Some of the rooms haven't been clean in months. There are empty clothes boxes from Christmas around the area the Christmas tree sat this past Christmas. My dad does laundry and dishes and spends a couple of hours a month cleaning main rooms just to be able to function but my mom doesn't do anything but make messes. My dad has given up to an extent. He is definitly the type to just give in them make a huge fight about it, not that he doesn't complain. He does get on his nerves. But I told him, I can't live like this. So on Sundays I clean. Every Sunday, since it's the only day I'm ususally off, I re-clean the rooms I thoroughly cleaned the Sundays before, and then add a room or two, depending on how bad the rooms I have to reclean are. I have been through everyroom except my parents bedroom and master bathroom. And they are, and were, the worst rooms in the house. It WILL be hit this weekend. Maybe she will see the light if her own room is clean. I don't know. The thing is, after I clean every Sunday, there is no attempt, NONE, the keep it straighten up. Everyday I come home and I can map out what happened all day. I will re-clean the kitchen, but because I can't cook dinner in a dirty kitchen. And if I don't cook dinner, we don't eat until 9:30 at night.

I'm not a clean freak, trust me. It's taken some growing up for me to get to a point where I see the value in keeping a clean house - especially with Penelope with me. A clean, relatively organized house, helps me keep a clean relatively organized head. It helps me stay calm in the thick of it with Penelope, plus I think it has a similar effect on Penelope. But most importantly it helps her from becoming too overwelmed when it's time to do chores (or what I call "chore therapy"). I tried to explain this to my mother in hoping that she would help keep the place clean for Penelope, if not for her controlling clean freak daughter. But her response was "She won't even keep the litter boxes clean, how do you expect her to do chores?" Hmm.. I'm all about lowering expectations for Penelope.

I know that I am rambling but I think the bigger message here is the thinking behind these little nothing events? I can't even ask my mother to do normal daily family contribution stuff let alone ask her to help with Penelope. And she wants us to live there? Right now, it's better than the alternative. But I need to find a better alternative soon but it's just not good enough.

4) The court process is dragging on and on and on. Even my twin brother is sick of the whole thing and just wants it over so they don't have to continue to think about it all the time. He has other things on his mind like finding a decent paying job so they don't have to sell their house. I'm not saying he no longer wants Penelope punished and perferably locked up, but it's been almost 8 months since the incident and there isn't an end in sight. Penelope went to begin her Restoration Classes again, but this time it's suppose to be one on one. But when she got there they didn't know anything about the one on one. Fortunetly they didn't require her to participate. I did call the Probation Officer on Monday and she let me know that it's not a problem Penelope didn't participate and I should be expecting a call to set up the one on one. I also told her that my brother still hasn't received a call from the prosecutor's office. She recommended that he come to the next court hearing. I told my dad that, and based on his conversations, he doesn't think my brother will go. But I left him the message that it was recommended if he still doesn't hear anything - if he wants to be heard. I just want it over, so Penelope can focus on getting better. I have mixed feelings about the entire thing and sometimes I feel ashamed I'm still upset with her or don't want her punished for hurting my brother's kids. But I also feel like we wouldn't be in this situation if certain things didn't happen so it's hard to want to hold her 100% accountable. But I also don't feel like I can argue with anyone who does.

5) I went to Penelope's therapy appointment last week. I was expecting to talk about Penelope. She was really having a hard time and had an incident that really worried me. I had called ahead when we ran into a lot of traffic and were running late and they found it good news that I was coming. Usually I don't go but I didn't learn why it was so good that I was coming until I got there. There was some administrator there waiting for me. She wanted to talk to me before we went in (even though we were late). She proceeded to tell me that they have changed their billing and that Medicaid no longer covers neurofeedback. That it was $100/hour and that I can call their office to set up a payment plan. But that my current balance is around $7,000 (what??) and that I need to get that down or they will discontinue services. What what WHAT? She has had health insurance. She said it's a lot of co-pays. Okay, let's say that I still owe about $4,000 on the two week intensive. That leave $3,000. Let's say that my co-pay is $30, which the insurance did change about 1 year ago and the co-pay was $20. But let's say it's $30. That's 100 visits. 100 weeks. There are weeks we skipped because of holidays and their vacations. That would be as if we NEVER paid. Then the whole billing thing. I know a little bit about medical billing. In order to be able to bill more, healthcare professionals have "specialized." That's why you see so many boutique clinics these days versus going to a generalist for everything. They can charge more. But insurance companies are a bit savy and they prevent certain billing codes to be on the same invoice, deeming it a duplicate billing because one code incompasses a service that is also being billed seperately. For example, when is the last time your doctor's nurse drew your blood for testing? Now, it's outsourced. They can charge and bill more seperately if outsourced. I know these things. I've seen it in my prior career. So when I start asking this self proclaimed "Manager over.." she all of a sudden doesn't know anything and is just the messenger.

So the next thing that is done and we can go into our therapy session. I'm pissed and feeling overwelmed. During this time Penelope has been with the one therapist doing the neurofeedback. My mother and I go in with the lead therapist. She apologizes for the craziness. I told her that it was just really crappy timing and I don't understand why.... She hem-hawed about it but then just said how angry it makes her. She said "I wasn't going to tell you this today but I have decided to retire." She said it had to do with all the administrative changes that have happened over the past couple of years and this was the last straw for her. That they did not need to make this billing change and she fought it but lost. It was all so overwelming, I just turned to mush in my chair. Slumped back looking at the ceiling I just cried and thought "Now this? I can't take all this." This therapist is the one that knows what is discussed in the sessions. And even though I know the other one is "filled in" later, I can't imagine the paperwork being that detailed. It's not a strength of hers. Plus, how will it look in the court process that another one of Penelope's therapists is changing/leaving. Like I don't have a stable set treatment program for her. Then with the news of the billing change, how can I continue at all? I had a lot to process.

While I'm thinking of all of this, staring at the ceiling, my mom starts telling the therapist how we had been talking about me getting a cheap apartment in my community so that Penelope can continue to go to school there but still live with her and my dad. Just store my things in this apartment. I'm hearing this thinking "Oh God, please no." Of course the therapist likes this idea. But then, she could have been just being nice to my Mom. She knows that her and Penelope, and her and I, struggle. I don't know. I don't go to these appointments any more! But I got myself back together and got into the conversation. I told her how maybe I can see if the insurance will pay for if it's deemed "Medically Necessary" like the trauma therapy. She said that was a good idea and to try it. She also said that they had already discussed it and the other therapist is going to give us 1 1/2 hours to get everything in. Don't get me wrong, just because I'm upset by the lead therapist leaving, doesn't mean I don't have all the faith in the world in the other therapist it's just the lead therapist has been my go-to person. MY support. Not that she doesn't have her faults. But we've been through a lot in the last 20 months. She has been a huge part in saving Penelope's life. I'm just glad we still have the other therapist. I don't know where we would be without them. It never occurred to me that we could lose either one of them. They have been such an important part of our support team, like family.

Just a lot on my mind.

Hearing Aftermath

I found it interesting and funny to learn that within 2 hours of the hearing earlier this week, the police detective in the case sent a uniformed officer to my twin brother's house to get his phone number. He also gave the detective's phone number to my brother. My dad told the prosecutor at the hearing he would get his cell phone out of his car and bring the numbers back to him but the prosecutor gave him his card and told him to just call him later. But based on what we learned, the detective got a butt chewing for not making contact. I guess the task of contacting the family was delegated to him.


So my brother called him, as requested, and I'm not sure what the conversation the only thing I heard was that he wanted to see if the victims have been showing signs of abuse. They have not. But the prosecutor has not called him yet.


After work the day of the hearing I was told by my mom that Penelope had complained about a woman who asked her uncomfortable questions. I had no clue what she was talking about because no one asked her anything other than how was her summer going and if she liked the class teacher. But in therapy she brought it up again and they figured out it was the competency evaluator. But she wasn't at the hearing. Interestingly enough, her attorney asked if about the evaluation and the evaluator and Penelope couldn't remember the evaluation even after Papaw reminded her that it was when he went with her in and what had happened. But she remembers the evaluator now but in a different context. Penelope is saying that the evaluator asked her how many times the boy raped her. She was angry with the woman for asking that question because she is a total stranger to her. The therapist tried to get Penelope to open up more about her abuse but she wasn't having it this week. I'm not surprised, with everything that has happened.


I did find out that she said when she disclosed the rape in the bathroom in the middle of the night that when she went back to her friend's room, she was crying and her friend woke up the parents and they were told what happened. But we don't know what they did, if anything. If George was told or not. George has been evasive about information regarding this family - even a little hostile. He doesn't deny that she couldn't have been abused but can't remember anything about their names or where they lived exactly. Despite the fact he had an older brother live with him for a year, volunteered at the firestation with the dad (how Penelope met her friend) and were friends with them for at least 5 years. When I pushed for him to contact people out in the area that could get their name and location he bucked and said "That's the police's job." Hello!? Are you kidding. That was about six months ago.


Now with these new revelations, the issue of their identity has come up again. Yesterday my dad went over to George's house to drop off something for him and he told him how the hearing and therapy went. My dad said that George was all pissed off about the whole therapy thing. He claims that that Penelope's attachment therapists told him that they were not going to try to get Penelope to talk about her trauma. That it's best if she doesn't talk about it and that they will discourage her from talking about it. She needs to just forget about it. LIE LIE LIE LIE. He said he wants a 2nd opinion (so he is on that kick again). He wants her to go to a different therapist or doctor that isn't her attachment therapists.



So my thought is "Why is he saying this??" "What's his agenda now?" He has got to still be trying to hide something. Either something he has done, or something someone else has done that he has covered up. I try not to be an alarmist, or paranoid, but I do worry about things.. but things I worry about tend to come true. This family out in the countryside of Indiana that hurt Penelope.. that George met and knew pretty much his entire time living out there... why would he protect them? George also belonged to the KKK out there (as we learned later and I've discussed in the original post). Maybe he's protecting one of their members. I can't think of any other stupid reason to protect them unless he himself hurt her too and it would come out when discussing her abuse from them. I've told both my parents that I think he did something. I said "Let's think about this. You have a little girl who is sexualized. You have a perverted adult, yes her father but still, who loses his wife and has his daughter take her place in his bed from the get go until I take her. You have a young girl who is confused about her love for her father because of sexual abuse. It would only be a very small bridge to cross for him to abuse her too. They couldn't deny the possibility but don't want to think he did something. UGH I HATE HIM! My dad did say that if we find out that George knew something or did anything he was going to kill him. Especially after Penelope disclosing that the parents were told when it happened. There is something more to this. Something worse than what has already been disclosed. I just feel it. It keeps me up at night.



The other night I had a long conversation with my twin brother - that he initiated - about what he is considering telling the prosecutor when he calls. He obviously had to discuss this with his wife. She is just as much a part of this as he is. He is definitely stuck in the middle of a mess. He said it would be so much simpler if it wasn't family. He is dealing with so much guilt. He feels guilty for not hurting if not at least yelling at Penelope when it happened. He always thought if someone hurt his kids, he'd kill them, but he didn't do anything but send her away. He feels guilty for allowing it to happen. He kept listening for fighting and would hear them playing peaceful, but then he checked once and it was quiet but he was "too lazy" to go upstairs and see why it was quiet. He feels it probably happened then. He also feels guilt that he doesn't fell as much conviction to have her punished like his wife does. He feels he should. Like its saying he doesn't care or love them as much. But he feels that since he didn't hurt her then, he needs to hurt her now. He also knows how much I've given up and sacrificed for her and how she is essentually killing me, and mom and dad. He said that he feels like he should be at the hearings, should want to be at the hearings but doesn't make a point to. He feels like he should be more on top of this then he is and he doesn't know why.

I do know that he is going through a lot outside of this, being unemployed. His unemployment was denied. His wife has been on him to find A job. He is trying. He feels like she is holding him directly responsible for the slow movement of the unemployment claim being contested. She went and got a second job through a friend. The burden of that - him not working and his wife working two jobs. Then all this. I can't imagine things are happy at home.

I told him mom and dad both said that they know that his wife has a strong opinion about Penelope and they know she is the one he has to live with. He sounded releaved and said "I'm glad they can appreciate that. They won't hold that against me." I said "Now, I didn't say that. I can think of one person who probably will (Mom)." After some thought, I don't know if I wouldn't be able to hold it against him either. I told him "I just wish that you could talk to different people that could give you all the facts. Not just the legal stuff, like what are the options of punishment, but also why it happened and all the other pieces." I just feel like if they could focus on the fact that she wouldn't have hurt there kids if she herself wasn't abused. They could redirect their focus of blame. He did bring up the boy who raped her. I told him I still don't know who it is, but I want to pursue him. I just don't want to do it too soon where Penelope has more to disclose and we make her talk about it with strangers and it causes her to close up. She retracted what she had told me during the forensic interview that the detective set up. He completely understood and wants to make sure the truth and the whole truth comes out. Because we both suspect George in this one way or the other.

Honestly, I am trying to have him refocus his blame on George. That's where I truely think it should be. George and Harriet. But her physical and sexual abuse is alllll George. His wife on the other hand, I don't know. I did ask him what she wanted. He said she wants Penelope treated as if she is not family. I then asked him if this situation was reversed and it was her neice Susie, who has her own mental illness from neglect and possible abuse. He said that he said the same thing to her, and she said she'd feel the same way. I doubt that. She is very close to her parents and her parents do just as much for Susie as my dad and I do for Penelope. I've had long conversations with my sister-in-law's mom and we have similar stories. I do feel that my sister-in-law is truely disregarding my brother's family because 1) after what Penelope did, it's easy to hate her 2) She never has liked my mom or my dad so it's easy to dismiss there wishes 3) no one likes George so that's easy and 4) that leaves me. So what. No big loss.

He is stuck in a bad place and I feel for him and I so wish he wasn't in this spot just as much as I wish this never happened. I do feel like I'm losing him as my brother. I can see him trying to distance himself from me.

Competency Hearing #2

Earlier this week was the follow-up Competency Hearing from her Restoration Classes and re-evauation. I was really stressing about this one. The doctor who re-evaluated her told my dad that based solely on the definition, Penelope is competent. She just had a lot of "but"s because of her mental illness. I don't know how that translates into her charges.



I didn't tell Penelope that she had court until the evening before, which she handled okay. Not happy but didn't get upset. She handled having court better than I did. She was restless. I couldn't sleep for anything. I didn't fall asleep until probably 4am and had to get up at 6:30. We were down to the courts with time to spare. But we had to wait for the probation officer who had the competency evauation report. No one had copies of it yet. When it finally did come, we were told it said that she was found not competent but highly probable she will become with more restoration classes - if they were one on one "due to the barriers her mental illness is currently causing." This is better than being found competent but what does this mean? One on one classes? Is this therapy? After having more time than just a few minutes to think about this, I wonder if they are going to continue to postpone the trial until she is mentally better? I don't know. There is another Competency Hearing set for the end of August.





But during the hearing, it was pretty straight forward and no one contested the findings by the evaluator. I had told our attorney that Penelope has gone through some testing and that both her therapists feel she is significantly if not severly dissociative. Even though this is just my word, she brought it up during the hearing to the judge. I believe this information caused more importance for the judge to have the parties resolve this before it may or may not go to trial. Everyone seems to agree that this just needs to be handled/settled whatever you want to call it. It was brought up that the "victim's family" hasn't been able to be reached. The judge said he has notes from the prosecutor in the file of attempts to reach the victim's family. There was a new prosecutor assigned - something to do with rotations? Anyway, while the judge was saying this I was slowly shaking my head like "misinformation buddy." The judge asked me if I knew why the family hadn't returned the calls. I told him that I am VERY close to my brother, and I told him right after the last hearing that you had instructed the prosecutor to get a hold of him. But the last I heard, they haven't received any calls or messages. Then our attorney mentioned how the Detective on the case has also been non-responsive. That no one has called the family. The judge commented that it the prosecutor's office must have outdated phone numbers (not) and asked us to provide the prosecutor with updated numbers. We said we would. Then there started to be side conversations everywhere. The prosecutor and the probation officer wanted something from the therapists regarding this. They would prefer to have weekly reports from the therapists about her progress. The judge and our attorney started talking about something which the prosecutor got involved in, while the probation officer came over and was talking to Penelope and I about the summer - trying to distract her. Penelope talked to her but also knew that there was a lot going on about her in the room and started to cry. It was all too much, too much talking about her, too much noise. She just looked at me with the most pitiful painful look. I started to cry and just petted her hair and said "It's okay, we are almost done" and answered a question someone asked me and just held her hand. It was over a minute or two after that.

Once we were done, our attorney asked us to wait for her outside. She came out and said that the judge wants the prosecutor to get a hold of the family and get this resolved. They talked about maybe probation. I think this was unofficial. It wasn't part of the hearing at any rate.

The big question is, honestly, what is my twin brother and his wife going to say? It's a topic that I don't ask about and he avoids whenever we are together. It's not my place to say or tell him what to do or think. I don't know how much weight what he has to say has on the outcome. I think they will want to know if they want her prosecuted or not. If not, then I don't know what happens. Is so, they already said there is no place for her in the jail system.

But the rest of the day I was pretty much a mess. I couldn't eat or think straight and just cried a lot. It was hard to sit through and it was hard to see Penelope go through it. Even though the outcome was okay, good I guess. It's all just about where we are today - living in my parents' guest room with our three cats, my house on the market in foreclosure, this court case, my relationship with my twin brother and his family hanging on by a thread, trying to find a new job or make my current one work (how?) making my $7.30/hour, in limbo with where we are going to live, if Penelope will be going to school or not, where if she does, and so much more. Just too much. Too much! My job selling "cemetery needs" is very psychological. Besides all the issues with selling in general, you are discussing things people need once they die. No one wants to talk to you, not when they are healthy. And there are a lot of people out there who take it personal that you want to discuss their demise. They become super defensive and sometimes hostile. I get that at home. But I don't get to talk to the "at-need" families. Is that what I want to strive for? All I hear about is death and religion day in and day out.. and sales goals and closing techniques. I do this out of necessity but at the same time, how can I sell when I am emotionally a mess? How do I find another job when I work 6 days a week (sometimes 7) sometimes until 8pm like last night? I clean the house and do laundry on the 7th day. I cook more than half our dinners - just so we have dinner before 10pm. It's all too much. I need a vacation from my life.

Is it worth it? As long as Penelope gets the help she needs. Right?

Competincy Eval #2

Penelope's Competincy Follow-up Evaluation was yesterday down at the "Youth Center"/Jail. I couldn't take her to it so Papaw did. From what he told me, it went very different than the 1st one. My dad isn't a details kind of guy, at least in spoken word he isn't. So I didn't get much out of him. Not yet anyway. I plan to pepper him with questions the first chance I can, which probably won't be for a while as Penelope is ALWAYS around.

Compared to the first one , this one was much longer. It was also with a female psychologist. Penelope went in first, alone, and was in there for an hour. Then just Papaw for about half an hour. He said that the magistrate sent over a copy of the law that defines competincy which they never do and by those standards alone, she is fit to stand trial. BUT, she has a lot of "buts" to that. All related to Penelope's mental health. My dad got the impression from her that she was going to write it up that way. She was going to explain that based off the legal definition, she is fit, but there are so many other issues involved here and go into detail about it. She asked my dad "Who is leading this?" In other words, why is she being charged? He said "We guess it's the detective." She said that there is nothing that can come out of this. There isn't a jail to put her, she is too young, and this is really an issue around her mental health. She is already in therapy. There isn't anything more to do. I'm really curious what she ends up writing in her recommendations. According to the woman I talked to a couple of weeks ago, they would be sending a "Treatment Plan." Which isn't necessarily to dictate her mental health treatment but maybe it is to spell out recommendations for consequences - I don't know.

I also got the summons in the mail for the new hearing date. It's not until the middle of July. I can't wait until this is over. I hate limbo. It makes me a wreck. This is limbo for me. And I feel like a lot of other parts of my life are in limbo. Living with my parents (For how long?Where are we going to live?), my work (How/When am I going to make enough money to live on?), getting back to our community (Can we do it before school starts in 8 weeks?), okay.. that's a big one. The one that makes me sick to my stomach and feel like such a failure. I stopped at the house yesterday to pick up my mail and some things. One the way out, I passed the condo that my mom and I looked at about a month ago. All the for rent/for sale signs were gone. I started to cry. I know they aren't going to wait for me forever, but in my head, it's the Plan. Get a new job/make the one I have work and become this awesome cemetery property sales person (very unlikely), then do a lease option on this condo. It's center of our community, walking distance to school, the library, and even the high school - It's the perfect size for us with her room in the back too high to sneak out the window (I'm thinking once she gets to that snotty teenager stage). It doesn't have central air and the kitchen needs a renovation but then it also makes it affordable. It's perfect. The others around are either way more expensive or in super bad areas.
When I got in, I looked it up on the internet and it's still for sale and NOT pending. I don't know if it's pending and it's not on-line yet or not, but it gives me hope. Please God, I NEED this.

Court date in June

Penelope is suppose to have court on June 16th - which is Wednesday. This past Thursday, the 10th, I called her Probation Officer to find out when Penelope is suppose to have her new Competincy Evaluation since she has been going to the Restoration Classes on Saturdays. She kinda hem-hawed at first and said that the Psychology Dept at the Youth Center (nice name for the juvy jail) takes care of that. I told her that I hadn't heard anything and I didn't know if she did that, since she was the one to schedule the first Competincy Evaluation. She continued to hem-haw and then said that she had put in a request to have it scheduled and receive a report before the 16th. She is off tomorrow (Friday) but would put in a call to them to follow up for me. I also talked about how my brother, "the victims' parents," hadn't yet received a call from the prosecutor's office which I thought the judge had instructed them to do - as an effort to resolve this quickly. She said she'd talk to them and remind them as well. She asked me how the classes were going. I said that I've heard that they are going fine, it's the aftermath that it's difficult. I told her that Penelope didn't get to go to her last day of school and has been having a really difficult time functioning from all of it. "If we are here to help her, then we need to get this resolved so she can move on and start to heal." She agreed and reiterated what she was going to do. She was also going to call me on Monday (today - didn't happen).
Friday, a woman from the Psychology Dept at the Youth Center (Jail) called me to let me know that the earliest they could schedule the Compentincy Evaluation isn't until a week after Penelope's court date and that it should be okay though because her Probation Officer can request to have the hearing continued. But Penelope will have to continue to come to the Restoration Classes until the Evaulation Date. This just pissed me off. Someone dropped the ball. Was I suppose to call and prompt someone? I did in a way, almost a week in advance. Not good enough. I started to get emotional - because that's just what I do these days. I explained to her that she may think this is all good and not a big deal but we live day to day right now. These classes and the whole court process has her mental health issues on overdrive and this is just going to be like throwing fuel on the fire. She talked about the Dr. submitting to the court a "treatment plan" which I still don't get. From what I think I got out of her, it means if Penelope needs more classes or not because I asked if it meant anything to do with her mental disorders and she said no. I would hope not. During his last eval, he deemed her of low intelligence and that's not the case. He doesn't know the first thing about what's going on with her other than the diagnosis and meds list.
But at any rate, I asked if we still had to go to court on Wednesday and she said that the Probation Officer would find out and let me know on Monday.. you know. Today. I'm not going to hear from here. She's already gone for the day. So I have to find out tomorrow at the latest or we will have to go and see if we have to be there.

Request for advice

I started a different post yesterday, trying to catch up on the day by day roller coaster we've been on with Penelope lately. But things have taken a turn for the worse. Penelope is currently in attachment therapy with her Papaw. I'm currently sitting at work and am completely pre-occupied with what is going on with her. There is too much sh*t going on in both our lives and I'm trying to get my head around it all.

I haven't really spoken about it much on here because I gave the counselor my blog address in order for her to get Penelope's history and a better understanding of what we have been doing over the recent 1 1/2 years. So I didn't want to say anything negative on here, but just keep it between us. When Penelope abused her cousins, it was very apparent, regardless of what CPS or the police would want, that Penelope needed additional services. We had discussed it with her therapists and they agreed. When CPS came out and evaluated our situation to ensure Penelope was safe and being cared for to their standards, we met those requirements. But I asked for a referral. Who could help Penelope with her own abuse so she isn't compelled or whatever the right term is, to do this or anything like this again? The police wanted Penelope to get extra help too but they had their own agenda we have recently found out. We were referred to a place that does evaluation to determine services needed and then they find places to refer you to. Then I got a call out of the blue from this place, I'll call the Purple Place.

I met with the Program Supervisor who came to my house and met Penelope and I. She talked about having in-home intensive therapy up to 3 times a week. This person would work with Penelope in the home and work with both of us to help me help Penelope. She would also go and observe Penelope at school. And then if I was interested, a Trauma Therapist. I liked it all. I was concerned because of the fact they do not do attachment therapy but she said almost all of their patients have RAD. Okay, well than this is where we need to be I think. A new frontier in Penelope's healing. She tells me who she is thinking of assigning to us and says that she is her best home-based counselor.

The problem is, the counselor that she assigned doesn't seem to get it. I told her from the beginning about dependability being essential for trust. If she says she is going to be at the school to observe Penelope at 1pm, then she better be at the school at 1pm. The counselor's first visit to the school, she was late and I had gotten a report from the teacher about Penelope's inability to focus and participate because she was watching for her new counselor. I told her what I've learned to do is, whenever possible, just don't tell her and just show up. Then there is no expectation set so if she is on time then great, if she is late, not a problem. But when you say "I'm going to do this" you better do it. She said she understood and was used to that with her other kids. But she is usually late to our house too, either traffic or her prior appointment. Always sorry. Always apologizing. She has been late picking up Penelope for her truama therapy from school. She forgot she promised Penelope she was going to get her cookies as a treat the next time she came, one time. But when she called to let us know she was late, Penelope said "Did you bring the cookies?" to which she responded to me, "Oh shoot I forgot. I'll stop and get them right now." But I covered for her with Penelope. But "I forgot" is a common phrase too. "I forgot." "I'm sorry." And it's not just Penelope, she does it to me as well. She forgot my Medicaid application, she forgot to have me sign some forms that we had to date retroactively for her purposes. I don't care about the forms, but I do need Penelope's Medicaid. But that's not happening either. I tell her I haven't heard anything and it's "You'll get something in the mail." I was told she knew people and has helped people get this done in the past. Her boss should go in sales. Maybe that is her position and I read into it as a mental health professional. Anyway, I spoke to her about our concerns, and the schools about Penelope's ability to function, fears about her cracking and ending up back in the hospital and just Penelope's overall decline. Her answer was to observe her in the classroom last Friday and call me afterward. No call. I was told by the school she came at the end of the day after class was over. That would explain why there was nothing to report. A couple weeks prior I had a conversation with her about how when Penelope was physically mature enough I am going to have her put on birth control. Even though I told her that her ATs and her Psychiatrist all agree that is an excellent idea, she felt that is overboard. That her sister wants to put her niece on birth control and you have to let your children make those decisions without that umbrella. The reason I bring that up is I feel it speaks to her approach to Penelope's issues. This is Penelope, who has been abused a good portion of her life, became sexualized at a very early age and has 4 counts of rape against her at the age of12. This is not a regular turn-of-th-mill child. So, during this conversation about Penelope's decline, I find out that last week Penelope was trying her hand at manipulation and splitting and told this counselor "My mommy won't let me buy her a mother's day present. We aren't going to celebrate mother's day." Not how the conversation went down with Penelope but even after my explanation that we were going to just spend the day together but not celebrate it - keep it low key, she felt that wasn't fair to Penelope and a cause to her decline. That she should be able to celebrate mother's day for me. Like I'm not acknowledging our relationship as mother/daughter. I reminded her of what happened last year - Penelope drawing her stabbing me to death with a dagger multiple times with an evil grin on her face. I also explained the hardships of the years before as well. It's common knowledge in the RAD world that Mother's Day is a day that is very hard for these children. A day to celebrate a woman that has hurt or abandoned them, or someone they have mixed feelings about. A person that they thought was perfect and have since been disenchanted with. A person that every one else in the world has except them. (At least that is how they feel sometimes.) A day that brings out strong emotions they struggle coping with. And us Mothers do what we can to help them and us survive these days without permenant scars.

Over the next few days this conversation rubbed me wrong. I felt like it needed to be addressed because Penelope needed to see the counselor and I on the same page about the issue and we needed to address any possible feelings she may have like I didn't want to acknowledge her as my daughter. Which I already know is not the issue. People, she is splitting! So when Wednesday came around, our regular scheduled home visit she was a no show. She was suppose to be there at 6:30 but after 7pm I called her. Usually by now she has called to let me know she is running late again. She answered it like I woke her or something. Then it dawned on her that we had an appointment. She said she went home sick so she's at home and forgot. It was hot today and she got overheated and went home. She forgot to call us and she was sorry. I didn't know what to say. It had been a horrible day with Penelope and once again, it's "I forgot, I'm sorry." I really don't know what I was expecting anyway. I hadn't yet seen her value. It's just the disappointment of an empty promise. Promise of additional support in the home. Whenever I talk to her, it's always "Plan to go see Penelope at school today/tomorrow.." but what about here? What about home stuff? I had brought up a couple weeks ago more frequent home visits because things were getting worse but I got a "umm..hmmm." It's easier for her to see Penelope at school because she can drop in when it fits her schedule and I'm only home in the evenings.

So all these thoughts come down on me with this, and I needed to accept that this is just who this counselor is and what she brings to the table. It's not what I'm looking for for Penelope and I. It's hurting not helping. I became emotional and just said "I can't do this anymore..... " and hung up. My dad was there and he felt that this was the final straw. I was feeling the same way. But I don't like to make decisions when I'm emotional. I don't think straight. Shortly later she sent a text saying that she would start coming every Wednesday instead of every other Wednesday. Then later she left a message saying she was planning on going to see Penelope at school and to call to discuss what was going on. I had told her that it had been an extremely difficult day. But after talking to my dad about it and put some thought into it, around 10:30pm I sent her a polite email terminating her services. I asked her to mail me the copy and receipt of the Medicaid application so we can continue to follow up with it - she had told me she always gets a reciept. I also told her I would follow up with the trauma therapist about finding a better appointment time now that Girls on the Run is over and Penelope isn't particpating anymore. I had asked her on Friday to talk to the therapist about a better time and I hadn't heard back on that issue yet either.

She left a message around 10am the next day saying she was planning on seeing Penelope at school around noon. I left for an early lunch hour to run some errands and to call her supervisor so I could get a new counselor for Penelope when I found the message. I called her right away and ended up leaving her a message stating that she must not have received my email and that I had made the decision to discontinue services with her and that I'd prefer she'd not go to school and I wished her luck. I hadn't talked to her supervisor yet but after my lunch break I got ANOTHER call from the counselor. She was disappointed in how I felt and that it can't be worked out but informed me that if I terminated her services, Penelope can't continue with the trauma therapist either. That wasn't my intention as I wanted someone else - someone that is a better fit, who is actually supportive anyway, but to not be able to continue therapy? What the heck!

So I called the supervisor and requested an immediate call as soon as possible. She called about an hour later but had obviously already talked to the counselor. The supervisor defended everything that the counselor did - except the lateness. She said she'd talk to her about the lateness. But it's the whole thing that is the problem. The lackadaisical approach and the message it sends. Like Penelope is just some regular kid and I'm just some whacked out helicopter mom. Like when Penelope went into a rage fit in her room barricading herself in the closet banging her head and fists on the way but she continued to talk about court stuff in the living room ignoring her fit. Then when Penelope comes out full of piss and vinegar, it is time for the counselor to leave. She talks to Penelope for like two minutes and leaves. Where is the support in that situation? She said "We believe in focusing on their strengths not their weaknesses. We take the strength-based approach." I'm like, "So, what? You ignore the weaknesses? So when she is struggling, you just act like the problems aren't there?" Well, I can see you are struggling, but hey, at least you didn't off yourself. Thanks for being strong enough not to do that today. Seriously! She says "That's when she goes and observes Penelope in the school." So I talked about that. How I've told the counselor that Penelope has been on a spiral decline and there are serious concerns by her teachers and myself that she is going to end up in the hospital and all she comes up with is she will observe her in the classroom so she can see for herself and call me to let me know how it goes - which she didn't. But that the counselor had said that she hadn't been observing Penelope, just pulling her out so this time she will observe her. But even with that, what is she suppose to do with that information? Because she hasn't done anything. She didn't say anything. I said "What would you do if you went to school and saw Penelope not able to focus enough to read, or to write on her paper, or be present? What would you do." She said "Well, I'd take her out of the class and ask her what is going on?" I said "Then what do you do with that information?" She said "I...would...talk... to.. her about it." Like I'm crazy to think there is anything more to do. Hmm.. maybe investigate it a little more with the teachers and the parent and see how long a situation has been going on, if it hadn't already been reported. Maybe do some problem solving and figure out some ways to help her cope with whatever is going on. Maybe educate Penelope on what to do when she is emotionally shutting down and withdrawing. Maybe educate the teachers on what can be done. You know, in a 5-10 min. conversation over the phone at a later time or something. Problem Solving. Progress. Support. HELP! I mean seriously I didn't sign up for this to give people something to do.
I talked about how it doesn't seem she takes anyone's opinion into consideration and if she does, she takes the opposite stance. She treats Penelope's situation like she is a regular kid with regular problems. I talked about the conversation about birth control and how she compared Penelope to her niece. She said "You have to treat them regular or they feed into it and they get worse." I said "You sound just like her Uncle before he left her alone with his 3 and 5 year old." These kids do not have the same instinctual boundaries that normal kids have.

I just feel like it's another example of a mental health system that is failing these children! But I don't know what to do to help her. Do I look for something similar and just "learn from my mistakes" with these people or is there something out there that truly understands the nature of reactive attachment disorder but can focus on helping her with her abuse? I am lost.

Flashbacks

School has been close to impossible for Penelope this week. Work has been close to impossible for me this week. Penelope made it through school on Monday and Lisa went and visited her at the very end as she promised Penelope she'd go during the last bell. Penelope pointed out to me when she got home how Lisa was late, but at the same time we talked about how satisfying it is that she made it through. The report that I got from school was that she was present but struggled to particapate and be on task. I felt that was understandable.
But as the week progressed, Penelope deteriorated.

Tuesday she made it through and did get pulled out for Trauma therapy in the morning. This was a long day at work for me so I didn't get home until late evening. My mom had her and Penelope had told me that morning she wanted her hair cut. I told her that she had to have eaten dinner, pills taken by 7:00, have her homework and reading done, and showered by the time I get home at 8pm because we will only have about an hour before bed. Penelope claimed she had no homework, she did some of her reading (which she only has to do 30 minutes a night of), and they ate at a local diner Penelope likes for dinner. No meds in her. My mom had taken her with her to show a house. (Which explains why that list of items couldn't be accomplished in 5 hours) She said that Penelope embarassed her in front of her client because she kept wanting to go off in the house they were looking at - go upstairs where the bedrooms were. Penelope has been somewhat of a thief lately so that's not a good thing. Then she wanted to go to the car and get something. It ended up being a tape measure. Penelope was measuring the house, the width of the bushes outside, the steps. Play-pretending she is a realtor and making notes on the details of the house. I can see her do that, especially right now. Well, then don't schedule something on Tuesdays after 3pm! I had made Penelope get in the shower before my mother explained what happened. When Penelope was done I scooted my mom out the door. Somewhere along the line Penelope had "found" a pink razor. It's not mine so... maybe that showing house? She announced that she saved her private parts. She went into great detail and wanted to show it to me. What the heck!? I just told her that she knows better than to shave and not to do it again unless consulting me first. Now it's going to grow back itchy. (And it has). I honestly don't even think she is that mature yet but she insists it was necessary. I don't even know what to think about it. That's all I'm going to say on the subject because I just don't know... Flipping back to the issue of her having in her possession a razor, it has since been discarded and the rest of her body has been checked for any cutting like lines. Ugh. So, her pills kicked in during the haircutting session and bedtime went smoothly.
Wednesday I ended up being sick all day, really started Tuesday at work and by Wednesday I was full blown cold with a fever. She didn't know that I stayed home but knew my sinuses were running. I got a call at the end of the school day right before Girls on the Run. She said with the worst overacting of a stuffy nose imaginable, "Mommy, I'm sick. I have a cold. I feel like I'm going to throw up. I have a fever. Please have Papaw come get me." I asked her if she had gone to the nurse, she hesitated and said "No." I knew she was struggling and using this as an excuse. But I am not pushing it with her. She would have just tried it on the teachers running the GOTR program and she still wouldn't have participated. So I went and got her. After I picked her up she seemed fine, telling me about her day. She had also told me she found a dollar. She wanted to give it to me. She has picked up that I'm not making any money worth speaking off at work. Not her problem though. I needed to stress that. I'm not even going to acknowledge she did it for me, because it's wrong and there will be no rewarding the behavior. I asked her why she didn't turn it in. She said "It's just a dollar? I was planning on giving it to you." I said "It's not mine to keep." She should have turned it in. I posed the scenerio of it being her lost dollar and how she would feel? She didn't like that idea. I told her she needed to turn it in. She said "When would I do that?" I said "Tomorrow at school." She said "But I'm sick!" I said "You will be fine by tomorrow, I know it." She just pouted a little but accepted it. I let her veg once we got home. I know she needs it. I ordered pizza for dinner for us and we just R&Red it. But I did try to get her to do her regular reading but there was no having it. She went into tantrumy type mode with her facial expression, words, and body language. I told it was up to her, it's her responsibility. It doesn't work like it used to but I just don't think she can do it right now. Penelope started telling me how she has a lot she is dealing with and she starts to cry. She is sitting as far away from me as possible in the room. She says "I have a secret and I JUST CAN'T TELL!" I had her sit across from me so I could hold her hands and look me in the eye when I told her "Don't carry all this stress and worry on your own. Let me help youcarry it Penelope. I can handle it. Tell me what's going on." She told me she has been having, based on what she described, flashbacks. She described 3 of them to me. First, she remembers when she was born and Harriet holding her and then George, which made him cry. She said she told Mrs. Brown and Mrs. Brown gave her a look like she didn't believe her. I told her that I think it's possible. But another one is from the very first time her step-mother beat her when she was 9 years old. The last one was another time where her step-mother squeezed her wrist in the movie theater until she was afraid her wrist was going to break and when she moan in pain the step-mother covered up what happened by telling her dad that she must have hurt her wrist at school and acted like she was upset by her pain. Since she was hiding her abuse of Penelope from George. She had never told me about that incident before. I just gave her a long hug and she just sobbed. I told her she doesn't have to be scared anymore because she can't hurt her anymore.

Thursday she went to school with very little fight. I layed out for her (she is too out of sorts to pick her clothes in the morning and she'd never get to bed if I had her do it in the evening) a cute outfit to give her some confidence. She likes her boots with her jean skirt and to dress it down I layed out a t-shirt. She liked it and felt good about going to school. My dad picked her up from school and took her to therapy. I told him about how she has been doing at school and how she is at home. He took her to the park for a picnic afterwards and to a minature golf place. Somewhere along the way, he said they'd stop for ice cream. But the time ran long and she had to do her reading when she got home. She was so mad at her Papaw from not getting ice cream. She pouted the moment she walked in the door. I tried to remind her how Papaw did all these wonderful things with her and it doesn't make sense that she is mad at him. It was all about what he DIDN'T do. I said "How do you think that makes Papaw feel? Maybe like he wished he didn't do all those nice things if it is ending up with you all mad at him." She then started to cry saying "Don't regret doing those things?!" and ran off. Like the thought of him wishing he didn't do those things hurt her feelings. It's too much for her and her brain is so disconnected.

Mrs. Brown had been trying to contact me on Thursday and she wasn't available when I'd try to return her calls. Finally around 9:30 she reaches me. She is very concerned about Penelope. She has a really off day, not functioning. Any participation she did she was off context. In Language Arts, they are reading a book in class and the teacher asked her to read two paragraphs - but she couldn't. She ended up going to the Principal's office because Mrs. Brown and the other teacher Penelope goes to were in a meeting. She wanted to talk to the Principal about how sad she is. She had drawn a picture of herself and had written "SAD" over it. She didn't want to interrupt the meeting her teachers were in. Mrs. Brown was called out of the meeting and asked another teacher to sit with Penelope after determining she needed some time to collect herself. Penelope began to write down how she felt but only got out "I feel.." the teacher scribed the rest of it. It had phrases like "I don't belong here, not just here but on this planet." and "Is there any place that is safe? Am I safe at home, or with other people? Am I safe here (school)?" She is not doing well. Mrs. Brown said that at this point, Penelope isn't gaining anything from being at school. I told her I would call her doctor and therapists in the morning and give her a call.

Friday I was home sick anyway with an upper respitory infection. Would I be getting any sleep anyway? I am at this point so worried about Penelope. I had to call Lisa anyway as she needed some contact info on Papaw. I told her what Mrs. Brown said and our fear that Penelope is going to end up back in the hospital. How she isn't functioning and she is having these flashbacks. Lisa said she was planning on visiting Penelope at school anyway but this time she won't pull her out and talk to her, she will just observe her so she can see for herself. She said that what Penelope needs is for her teacher to help her calm down when she is done with a flashback to let her know it was not actually happening and that she is safe. That she'd hope that her teachers were observant enough and cared enough to do that. I think that they are. She also told me that Penelope told her that I didn't want anything for Mothers' Day, that she isn't allowed to do anything special for me - and she felt that wasn't a good idea. But I'll talk about that later actually.. because I've had a few days to think about it and I'm kinda pissed.. Anyway, I emailed Mrs. Brown what Lisa said as a way to help Penelope. I had also put in a call to her Psychiatrist to set an appointment to talk about Penelope. But honestly, all he'd end up doing is upping her meds. That's what he has done in the past. He sometimes has changed her meds but I just don't think that's the issue. If she ends up in the hospital, then it will happen then. Then I thought, "What if we can get this whole thing plea bargained out, then Penelope won't have to go to these classes." So I called my brother, knowing that the prosecutor won't even begin negotiating without input from the victim's family per the judges recommendation. He is with his family and in-laws on the way to Florida via SUV to go on a cruise. I asked him if he had heard from the prosecutor yet. He said he hadn't. Disappointed but determined, I said I was going to try to see if they could go ahead and call him while he was still in phone reach before he got on his week long cruise. I started blubbering about how Penelope is just not doing well and for both of us to survive we need to move forward with this. He said that it was too late to try to talk to the prosecutor for the fact he is in his car traveling. He isn't going to talk about it with his kids in the car. I didn't think of that. So we have to wait until next week anyway. UGH! He said he'd call me that night when they got to their hotel. I told him to not worry about it and enjoy his vacation. I'm not thinking clearly.
I wasn't sure calling her ATs would help me since they haven't really come up with any suggestions already other than just to tell her to work harder. The lead therapist has been out the last two week again which can be so aggravating. I know she is taking care of helping her 90 some year old mother settle into a nursing home which is a lot to deal with - but we need help here and it's really hard to find it when we need it. But I broke down and called anyway - ended up calling the cell of the other therapist. She called me back about two hours later. Oh my gosh was she helpful. She confirmed seeing the concerning behavior that Penelope's teachers and I have both seen before I even had to say anything. She was concerned too about Penelope's state and where it could head. She had talked to the lead therapist and they recommend that Penelope stay in school if she can but see if the school will put Penelope in a seperate room with art supplies and puzzles and non-academic activities that are minimal stress. We are just trying to help her through this - nothing permanent. I don't know if they will or not but it's worth asking. She said all of this is related to this classes Penelope has to take. It wouldn't be a big deal but without being able to have her Papaw or myself with her to go through the series of locked doors at the same building the jail is at, AND the added stress of being in a room full of strangers without anyone to support her - they just don't know how she will make it through. It could go really bad. They are willing to write a letter to that effect for whomever. I thought that maybe that could be useful in asking the judge to let us put these classes on hold until Penelope was mentally stable enough to participate. So I called both the public defender and the probation officer and left desperate voice mail messages. That was Friday. Today is Wednesday night. I still haven't heard from either one of them.