Thank you all so much for the warm welcomes and advice. I'm feeling more calm today. So far it's been a good day. Some days it seems like some days it seems like I'm lost in a pitch dark tunnel buried under ground and others it feels like while I might not see a light at the end of the tunnel there's at least a firefly around to relieve the darkness a bit. Coming here it feels like I might have just found a torch and a hand in the dark. Thank you! I'll try to get "The Explosive Child" book as soon as I can. First a bit more background and an answer to some of the questions.
difficult child ~ "K" was a "normal" although high risk pregnancy as I was on heparin therapy the entire time. (and yes, two shots a day for 9 months sucked) She was born without complications and seemed ahead in development, ie. talked early, crawled early, slept through the night at 3 months and was a relatively happy baby.
All three of her siblings are older so she's had a lack of same age interaction although she's had friends within a year or so of her age. I stayed home with her for the first 2 years of her life although it wasn't a 24 hr a day thing, I had a biweekly night out, my husband and I traded off. K was however never in daycare or with a caregiver other than either myself, my husband or our older easy child daughter. We took her often for social outings like the Children's museum, park, etc.
She was VERY excited to start kindergarten and only a bit nervous. (She had never shown a true aversion to strangers or any separation issues previously) I had been going to school myself for 2 1/2 yrs and she would often study with me, she was very interested in my anatomy books. The first few days were fine but as we went into the second week she started not wanting to go to bed. Then not wanting to us to leave her at school, then not wanting to get ready or go to school. It got so bad we would have to physically put her in the car and hold the buckle on the seat belt so she couldn't undo it and try to get out. Thank God for child safety locks on the back doors. At first we thought it was behavior but as the reactions escalated we were at a loss.
We recently moved (March) to a very small town in Kansas hoping the tight community would help and so far the mental health group she sees has been more helpful than anything thus far...that being said the past month or so has been pure hell. To start as I said I had to leave not only my job but school as well. My husband has a f/t job but isn't paid well. One income for a family of three is just not working and over the past couple of years our financial situation has only gotten worse and it's finally reached crisis stages. Our car was recently repossessed leaving us without transportation as my husbands van croaked a bit over a year ago taking us to the one car that is now gone. My husband has to ride to work with coworkers or ride a bicycle which would be ok except winter is coming. As we live in a tiny town there are no buses or public transportation so we are no longer able to take her for outings. With the serious lack of finances I am often forced to explain that we are unable to do a lot of the things she'd like to do. Even a trip to the grocery store (and we receive NO assistance) is difficult to arrange at times. I didn't explain the finances for pity but to demonstrate some of the level of stress here. As I mentioned we moved here rather recently but contacted mental health here first thing. Before school began this fall I spoke to her psychiatric Dr who thought starting school in Aug was too soon and we needed to wait until the new semester coming in Jan. In my own stupidity I did not realize you had to be registered as a private school to home school in Kansas. We have been working with mental health trying to get her ready to go to public school again as that has been my goal from day one.
K sees mental health in the form of a psychiatric dr once a month, a therapist every two weeks, parent support weekly and a case manager and attendant care 3 days a week each on alternating days. A couple of weeks ago SRS (Kansas version of CPS) shows up at my door with a complaint that K had not been to school and a false report that she had never been diagnosed and I was just saying that to avoid sending her to school. (Note she has been diagnosed by two separate psychiatric Dr's in two states) When I explained she was seeing mental health and did in fact have a diagnosis and that we were only home schooling until we could work her into public school I was made aware of the need to register. SRS has since been back to our home to check again. Assured by mental health that we were doing everything correct I was shocked to wake up two Sat's ago to the sheriff pounding on our door to serve us papers for court. SRS was taking us to court to discuss removing K from the home although in the papers it was documented she appeared clean and healthy with no bruises or injuries, the house appeared clean and in good order and they had spoken to the principal who confirmed we had a start date and comprehensive plan in place to integrate her back into public school as well as the fact that I had registered as a private school to be in compliance with the laws. As we were in compliance when we went to court we were given informal supervision until 11-30 at which time they will review and as long as she's been in school and mental health care they will dismiss it. However, I now worry constantly that I'm going to do or say the wrong thing and they'll take her. I don't even feel safe calling for assistance in a crisis meltdown because I'm afraid they'll say if I can't handle her alone that she needs removed.
My husband and I barely talk about things any more and are often like two strangers simply co existing in the same house. While she has been going daily for an hour to the school to get more familiar with the teacher and the building nights have become torture. She either doesn't want to go to bed or wants me to be there the entire time or like last night goes to bed happy and fine and then keeps getting up again and again until finally she's refusing to get back to bed and having fits. Honestly I don't know what to do anymore. I don't want to give in because she has to learn she needs to follow the rules and she HAS to go to school or they'll take her but almost every move is a fight sometimes. It's gotten to the point where I can't even step away to take a breather because she clings to my clothes so tight she's actually ripped them pulling on me. I have headaches on a daily basis and sleep less than 3-4 hrs a night although my appetite seems in over drive and my butt is growing exponentially I'm really not sure how to continue or if I'm going to end up having a stroke from all the stress and tension with my high BiPolar (BP). Anyway, I apologize for writing a book I just wanted to explain as much of the situation as possible. And THANK YOU, ALL for all the kind words.
Crystal