Disconnected

I thought I clicked on post. Shoot! This is from Wednesday...
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Day 2 of CDQ being in RTC.

The kids had some minor acting out yesterday.  Little tantrums about chores and homeschool.  They were so excited CDQ was gone they automatically expected to be able to do all the things they couldn't do while she was here. We had our little meeting and I got a few apologies and life went on.

The projection for CDQs stay is 6 months but the actual expectation is for longer.  We started packing up her things today and rearranging the living arrangements. Poor SS needs a break from the boy. He likes to play rough with her because she plays back unlike Poufy who wouldn't dream of it, but last year for his birthday he got a remote control car from his Nana and promptly ended up wrapping SS's hair around the wheels until the car was firmly pushed against her head.  Since then it has been on. LOL!

See, those things...normal sibling crap, I can totally handle.  I am the type to let them work it out on their own. My mother on the other hand, escalates the situation. Argh.  She blows little things into something huge in a matter of seconds....instigator comes to mind...*ahem*

Anyhow, I know SS desperately needs a break and since she will be turning 12 in March, I don't think it will hurt for her to spend some time with her big sister. So I have moved her in to CDQs space for now.

I will be honest. I was apprehensive about clearing CDQs stuff out of the picture so fast but that went away rather quickly.

Well actually after the first sort of visit at the RTC.  I had to drop off her clothes.  I had washed all the clothes in the laundry room and asked CDQ to put a weeks worth of clothes out. When I went to her room, I discovered how she was getting over on me. See every time I wash, CDQ complains she's not getting clothes back because the others are stealing her clothes (yet no one ever has them) or I didn't wash her clothes (but nothing's left in the laundry room). I know I am washing her clothes because I see it go through the wash. What I wasn't doing was making sure it was all there, because honestly...how the hell am I supposed to add that to my list of things to keep track of? Anyways, I hear myself explaining and I'm coming to realize I don't have to...long story short. Found dirty clothes neatly folded and put away. She was pulling clothes from there to accuse me that I wasn't washing. There were piles of clothes all over the place.

I grabbed what clean stuff that I could find, which yes, it wouldn't have been her first choice...but well guess whose problem that is since she didn't anticipate RTC, she was ready to accuse and tell me I didn't wash this or that.

Anyhow, get there with her clothes and she's bitching about what I brought. Arguing with me that she had sorted her clothes...blah, blah, blah. Then I thought she cussed at me. I asked her what she said and she said she didn't say anything, then she said she said it in her head. The oldest heard exactly what she said. When we got home. Hubbins asked how it went and the oldest told him and that's when she said CDQ called me an F'in B. Which is what I thought I heard.

But see I didn't push it. When I thought she had cussed at me, I got up and went to the house mother and I was ready to go.  That's when I snapped a little. Because I had read R's comment before I got there and I knew it was ringing oh so true.

"As a side note, I have a job doing telephone intakes for legal aid. We frequently get calls from people seeking divorces. Frequently when a woman has just left a particularly horrific domestic violence situation, she is completely matter-of-fact about what her day-to-day life is like. The lawyers ask us to get details about past incidents of violence, in part so they know what type of danger this woman is likely to be in (because a woman is most likely to get killed while trying to leave) and also to use the information when they draw up documents for things like protective orders. But often these women at first have a lot of trouble recounting specific incidents of violence. To them, it's like saying, "tell me what happened the last time you ate cheerios (as opposed to corn flakes) for breakfast." It's that much a part of their daily life that they don't remember discrete incidents; it's more like "I eat cheerios every day." (Don't know if that analogy makes any sense.) They can tell me the most recent event, but not other specifics, aside from the general pattern. But as we talk longer or over the course of the next day or two, things come out, and they start sounding more shaken, as the realization of what they've lived through (and how much danger they're still in) slowly sinks in. I kind of see it in your blog, and in the writings of other parents whose kids have been institutionalized. Hang in there as it all starts to sink in... " 

I hope R. doesn't mind that I've reposted it.   But what angered me is that I felt my heart start racing and my hands were actually shaking. I'm not even sure if that normally happens or if it happened because we were in a different setting then we normally are. I was just really aware of it and of course it all happened while the housemother was with the other children. Then to top it off. I had an acupuncture appointment after her intake and when the doctor came in he was concerned because my eyes were dark. Not like circles around my eyes but my actual eyes. He immediately took my pulse and then when he came back in after the session he told me he was giving me something for my emotions but when I looked it up later that night it was for palpitations of the heart and regulating the heart beat.  So now I'm somewhat worried about that (which I think is what my Doc was trying to avoid). I had heart issues when I was born but I thought they had resolved themselves.

Yesterday I was spent. I ended up taking a nap and when I woke up I was all kinds of angry. It was like something woke up in me and I was no longer feeling sorry for this child.  I was so angry that it scared me.

It was a culmination of all the crap hitting me.  I forgot to mention when I was collecting her clothes I came across her journal.

All across it was written about how much she hated me and that I was a liar and I could kiss her @$$.  I flipped through it and did see snippets of how much more she hated me and how I was the devil.

There's only so much you can't take personally.  Maybe I'm not a big enough person. But at this moment in time, I am so angry. All I did was do for this child. I never expected anything from her. I understand adoption is a trauma.  But I have not done a damn thing to this kid and she's fixated on me and made up so much stuff.  I am emotionally done.

I think about how stupid I was for crying about her leaving, giving in with her, trying so desperately not to rock the boat.  And in this case, I think maybe the last therapist was right. This issue is mine, I realized I was so worried about her because I know what it feels like to be abandoned.  I didn't want her to feel that.  But I've come to realize she doesn't feel anything but sorry for herself.

One of the things the therapist said is that she has all the markers for narcissism, oppositional defiant and a whole list of other things. But his main concern is that she has the main symptoms for a sociopath, well he said they don't call it that anymore. They call it antisocial personality disorder or something like that.  He said we should know by the time she is 15 whether that's what her diagnosis will be. There's still a chance she can turn it around at this age.

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I was writing the above last night and I got called away to dinner.  Dinner was so...peaceful.  It's usually a struggle to get CDQ to eat. She has to complain about everything being nasty (even her favorites) and she doesn't eat all her food (but I hear she's chowing down on everything at RTC, go figure).  Then she has to manipulate the entire event. Inappropriate topics and making snide remarks towards others at the table, talking over them. Getting mad if people don't respond to her.

I realized last night, the kids were at ease. Usually they are wound up trying to talk over each other and get their parts out. Last night.... they took turns, they laughed, we talked about menu planning again and what they'd like to see on it. We talked about the menu for Poufy's party. There was happiness and excitement and peace.  Not one fight.

Sure it could be a honeymoon period with the others, but I don't think so.

I sort of worry about sharing this stuff on my blog because I can bet it will come across as me being against CDQ and bragging about the other children.  But I can guarantee you that I'm coming from a place of astonishment and eye opening awareness. Yes, I am mad still at CDQ.  But I'm not embellishing one thing about her. I don't have to.

Even this morning, I realized my oldest cat, who has been holed up in my room for a couple of years has taken to wandering the house. It started yesterday. I've always suspected CDQ broke her tail at the tip and I worried CDQ would hurt her because she is dear to me (apparently, she's even told the oldest if we had a baby she would hurt it).  In the past, I would tease Scrawn when she would sit by the doorway. I would nudge her off the carpet and into the living room and she would come flying back into my bedroom and hide under the bed.  I thought she was being shy or silly but I guess she has her trauma too now.

For a a couple of months now, I've been trying to think what's best for the family.  Before that I was focused on what was best for CDQ. Maybe I was so wrapped up with her issues with me that I didn't fully see that it wasn't only me and in someway the entire household is/was affected as badly as I have been. I mean I know that the household was affected but I always thought it was lesser because it was being deflected by me. But now it just seems like we were all suffering the same.

That makes me feel like such a failure...