Residential Treatment - Our Long Journey
By Guest Writer Beverly Hall. Please feel free to ask Beverly questions on our forum.The events leading up to Residential Treatment - page 3
The next morning after a sleepless night I spoke with her therapist and we both agreed that because of the poem we were going to place my daughter in a weekend facility to monitor for suicide. Of course we had to find her first. The arrangements were made for the hospitalization, and I called the sheriff's department again. I asked them to call the house of the people in the country. Sure enough, my daughter was there.
When they finally brought my daughter back to the police station I was there and my daughter did not hug me or say anything to me. She had been gone for 28 hours and nothing was said. We got into the car and I told her we were driving into town to the therapist office immediately. I did not want to stop at home and let her change clothes because I was afraid she would run again. I also did not tell her that we were going to hospitalize her because we thought she would run. At the therapist office she explained to my daughter about what was going to happen. I was amazed that my daughter agreed to go.
We left their office and went to the hospital and after processing the paperwork, she was admitted for the weekend. They did a BAC ( blood alcohol test) on her and we discovered she did drink the night before. These were the signs in the beginning and I was reaching out to the therapist, to the school authorities, and nobody would listen to me. I did not know what to do.
That weekend in the hospital did not do any good. She continued to hang around negative peers that were influencing her very strongly. Later that month there was a dance and my daughter wanted to go to it. Frankly I was concerned that she would meet that particular boy there and since she did not introduce him to me, I was leery. She did end up meeting the boy there, but she did not tell me about it. I later found out that this boy was part of a group of four boys who hung around together, drinking and doing all other kinds of things on weekends. It was around this time when things began to get very volatile here at home. In November, I discovered that I would have to have surgery in January. It was major surgery, hip replacement and it would require me to be off my feet for quite a longtime. Every day at home was a nightmare. I could not trust what my daughter said and did. And as good as I was at being perceptive about things, nothing seemed to work. She did not steal from me yet I hid my purse when I came home.
We went home to Texas for Christmas and it was the worst Christmas of my life. Some other family members of mine drink, and of course I didn't know that my daughter had been drinking many months before this. We spent a lot of time at Christmas at my niece’s house, and I discovered that my daughter was trying to drink behind my back.
My dad decided to come up here in January 1999 when I had surgery and I knew that would be a big help for me since I would not be able to drive nor would be able to take my daughter to school activities. So, on January 13, I went to the hospital for the surgery. My daughter along with my father sat in the hospital room while they got ready to take me into surgery. Instead of my daughter talking to me, she sat at the other side of the room and had her headphones on listening to music. Probably trying to drown out some hurt at seeing her mom having to go through surgery. At least this is what I think happened. I got back from the hospital and my daughter took advantage of the fact that I could not drive and could not get around. She was much more focused on her friends and school in the negative crowd and what they were doing. She was involved in cheerleading something that she wanted to do, and I found out later that many of these cheerleaders were drinking. My father went back home to Texas on January 30, and I felt so alone.
At this time my daughter was lying about everything. There was not anything I could trust her to say that was true. I would tell her I didn’t have brain surgery - that I could think and reason just fine, thank you.
The month of February 1999 was a nightmare. My daughter would not come in at the time she was to come in, lying about where she was, and basically took advantage of me in my condition. I was in constant contact with her therapist who told me that “this too shall pass.” Frankly I did not feel her therapist knew exactly what was going on. Although I talked a lot about what was going on, my daughter manipulated her into believing something different. The bad thing about this was about how my daughter had her therapist fooled.
I had the opportunity to work from home after my surgery, which really helped me, because otherwise I would have had no income coming in. At the end of February, there was a dance it was called Winterfest. They have his dance every year at the same time and my daughter claimed that she did not have the date for the dance. Little did I know that she had plans on being with another boy who was part of that foursome and he was somebody I did not approve of. I never met this boy or his folks. I knew about him from what I heard and that was all I could do to base my character judgment on. My daughter promised me that she did not have the date for the dance and I knew she was lying out of her teeth. I took my daughter and a friend of hers to the dance. A parent never knows what goes on in a dance even if it is a school function.
It was at this time we also had an in-home therapist who came to the house weekly and she was probably the only one who realized what was going on.
We talked about how my daughter was always sabotaging things at home when something good was happening to her. For example, She claimed that she wanted to get a job and I thought maybe this would be good for her so I agreed that she could get a job on weekends only.She interviewed at a fast food joint and was told she could start a few weeks later after the spring musical.
It appeared things were looking better but as I learned just a few days later, unbeknownst to me, my world was about to crumble into a thousand little pieces.
March 5, 1999 will be a day I will never forget as long as I live.
That morning was like any other school day. The only thing that was different was that my daughter made it a point the night before to call a girl she went to school and church with to get a ride to school. That wasn’t like her to call this gal but I knew her and trusted her.
Her friend drove up about 7:30am and my daughter kissed me lightly on my forehead and said bye. I was still on crutches and had decided to work from home that day. I got my coffee and sat down at my desk and proceeded to turn on my lap top and get to work.
At 8:20am, the phone rang.
“Beverly, you need to come to the school and pick up your daughter”, the advisor said.
“What for? Is she sick? She seemed okay less than an hour ago when she left for school”, I told him.
He said, "She came to school intoxicated and some of her friends carried her to the office".
“Oh Dear God”, I cried.
(Author’s note: This was only the beginning of my long nightmare into the juvenile system, lawyers and shrinks. Part two covers the time between that dreadful day in March and what happened later that night and June 4th when I drove my daughter to residential treatment for 6 months. These are all excerpts from my untitled book about my journey of adoption)
at the Parenting of Adolescents Site |
Not yet a Parenting of Adolescents Community Member? Log in as a Guest to read the posts. We hope you'll join us in the discussions!
