Random Ramblings

Did I ever sound sorry for myself! I wish I could take back my last post, but in all honesty, that's how I felt. While the situation has not changed today, I do feel more like myself. I don't know that there is a silver lining in all of this, but I am bound to try to find one, somewhere! Zech has given up! He refuses to try at all, and I have come to the realization that this may be "as good as it gets" with him. It is hard to look at your almost 18 year old son and realize that he will never be able to achieve the things in life that your kids are supposed to achieve (driving, going to college, having a job, kids...). We are actively looking for a placement for him when he turns 18. There are several houses in the area that take on mentally ill or mentally handicapped. Unfortunately, they don't fit his needs. His I.Q. is 70 putting him just on the verge of being mentally handicapped. His processing speed is that of a 3-4 year old, which affects the outcome of his IQ. Unfortunately for him, he has a very high verbal IQ up towards his normal age. All this makes it very difficult to find a place that can work with his needs, while not dumbing everything down completely! Couple this with his mental illness diagnosis's and we have even less places. A lot of the placements that we could look at for his developmental needs will not take him because of his mental needs. All we know is that we MUST find him a placement! We thought at one time that we could care for him ourselves. But we were wrong. I am still very angry with the state for kicking him out of his residential placement. He had made more progress, and now we have gone backward by several years. However, I need to move on from anger to action.

I went out and bought myself a treadmil at a garage sale. I have decided that I have to do something for me, at least once a day, so I am trying to walk for 20 minutes (no easy feat with my own health issues). I am going to attempt to lose some weight (although I am not going to make myself crazy with set ideas about this). I am going to spend some time every day working on my cross-stitch, praying and reading my bible. I may not find any silver linings in the clouds hanging over my head right now, but I know enough to realize that God will see me through. I am going to keep plugging through. At some point I will be able to give the life back to my two younger children. I know I am doing the best that I can, and that HAS to be good enough!

Thanks to all of my friends who responded yesterday and encouraged me. I couldn't ask for a better group of friends. Please know that my comments in my post were not directed toward those who read and responded to me. Rather it was directed at people who are presently involved in the situation we find ourselves in...in the person so to speak.

Okay I have been MIA...Would love to say I fell off the face of the earth, but I could not get quite that lucky. Life in our house has been extremely chaotic and very troublesome lately. My son has decided not to try anymore and has made living with him a rather big chore. He is still doing what he must to stay in our house (go to school, take meds, and go to counseling appts), but he has told counselor that he does not need therapy...and so they sit for an hour once a week staring at each other. WHAT A WASTE OF MY TIME!!! My daughter and other son have "run away from home" so to speak. My daughter has been at her best friends house this whole week, and has called begging me not to make her come home! What a very sad existence we have to lead right now.

I am trying to be mindful that, this too shall pass, but seeing no end in sight it becomes rather bleak at times. Honestly, I am in such a state right now, that I don't want to get online and chat, or play games, or pretty much anything. I have worked off and on with my cross-stitching, and have read a lot as an escape. I just feel so overwhelmed and alone in this struggle. I am most of all tired, but I am also angry that so much has had to change because some bureaucrat somewhere saw fit that he would be ultimately better off at home. On the plus side, even now the school is beginning to really have problems with him and his attitude. I no longer feel as though I am swimming in a sea alone. I spent almost an hour talking to Zech's social worker at school this morning, who all but admitted that when we first began working with her she did not see a problem, but has now...and is beginning to understand what we must be going through. Ahh vindication at last! Its not that I really want vindication, cause after all that means he is acting up for someone else, but at the same time, I want people to understand, TO REALLY UNDERSTAND, what we go through on an every day basis. Just getting him up and out of bed is a 45 minute process every morning, and that is before we begin the day doing things like brushing teeth and washing face. I have to constantly clean up after him, much like I did when my kids were two, only now the messes are much bigger, cause he is much bigger!

And then there is the guilt and anger. The guilt at being angry with him for changing our lives so dramatically, the anger at my ex for nearly killing me and causing the brain trauma to my son, the anger at the bureaucracy, the guilt for wanting him to just go somewhere else...when he is my flesh and blood, the anger over what it is doing to my other children and my husband and I's relationship. The complete and utter frustration over what this is doing to my health! Oh and the anger over the friends who have the pat answers, but no real solutions for me. I know they care, I know they want to say something to make it better, but there isn't anything!!!! The thing is I really don't blame my friends. I know they try to understand, and lend a sympathetic ear, and I know that they are stuck as much as I am in this.

Anyways, I guess I will stop my ranting for today. Just please understand that I just don't want to post about my life right now. I can think of no positives among these clouds, and that is just not who I am. I don't like who I am becoming, and I refuse to make my posts to be a constant barrage of negative! I will write again when I have found the silver lining, or at least I am able to see some sunlight gleam through the thick canopy of trees! Thanks all for understanding!