klmno
Active Member
All this venting on the board and writing things out as draft letters must have helped me a lot to articulate things in a calmer, more understandable way. LOL!
I matter-of-factly told PO that I now had to pay CS and was making min payments but am unemployed so I will be paying the 3 mos arrears after difficult child comes home, the judge ordered me to have health insurance in place for difficult child by the time he gets released (impossible actually but that's ok- he didn't make it a written order), and I can't do those things plus support difficult child without working full time so I didn't know what I was going to do because the judge's orders and supporting my son are just as much legal obligations for me as the PO's orders and obviously, I can't meet PO's orders and still work full time. Then I reminded him that this is how I lost my last job and since the probation officer had told me this kind of stuff was my problem last year, I am looking for jobs outside this area so I can move to a place near a bus line where difficult child can use public transportation because I don't want to lose my son.
He told me he really thought we could work it out. I reminded him that difficult child is not old enough to drive and I simply cannot work my job around another's employment schedule. But, since difficult child is really motivated now in school and wants to go to college and I have told difficult child that I withdrew some money from his college fund to help pay some of the costs he caused, so difficult child will need to keep grades up to get a scholarship, I didn't see why he couldn't go to summer school, or do volunteer work at an animal-related place, or do a leaders-in-training camp thru the summer. He said he hhad no problem with that- (get this-) he can't really legally order difficult child to get a job since he is under 18yo and still in school. Well, pffft, then why did he ORDER it to begin with instead of just suggesting it to me? So I asked him to confirm that he would remove that order as long as I had difficult child involved in something constructive and he did.
Then, I said if difficult child needed a mentor AND a therapist, wouldn't it make more sense to get a therapuetic mentor than to have two different people with varying schedules to meet and he said "oh, that's a good idea". I said I thought it was important to keep our lives as simple as possible and low-stress for both difficult child and myself so we did not get tensed out and start bouncing off each other like we did before. I guess we'll see. Really, I can't find anyone hiring around here anyway but I was pushing to get a job out of this jurisdiction because of these things.
One little concern I have left- which I will address before this starts- is that the mentor program they use is behavior modification where the mentor takes the kid out to do fun things as long as the kid behaves. If the kid does something wrong, they don't take the kid out so they aren't rewarding bad behavior (I agree with that part) but they also cut the visit short and only come to see the kid to talk to them about what they did wrong, then they leave. This is the part that has me a little worried because difficult child clearly started having issues when he convinced himself that his father didn't want him because he (difficult child) was bad. That';s when he started breaking the law and aacting erratic. While I am in full agreement that it's not good to reward bad behavior with fun times, I don't think refusing to see the child except to fuss at him is a good idea- difficult child has abandonment and rejection issues- and I can see difficult child seeing this method as reinforcement that he's bad and flipping out again. Even if the guy gave difficult child some mundane punishment and supervised difficult child while he did it, it would be better than just leaving. I'll discuss this with them. I realize, also, that everyone has to learn that other people aren't going to stick with them if they don't treat them right and stay out of trouble, but I think difficult child needs to learn to deal with his father issues before he can get much use out of anything else. Inn order to do that, I think he needs to feel accepted by a male, even when he's being punished. I would hope they would be willing to tailor that a bit for a kid with certain issues, but of course, that will require them taking my word for it.
Maybe I should ask you ladies who have gotten therapeutic mentoring on board in the past- is ALL therapuetic mentoring behavior modification and nothing more? If so, there's no sense pushing for anyone different than what the PO already plans on using.
I matter-of-factly told PO that I now had to pay CS and was making min payments but am unemployed so I will be paying the 3 mos arrears after difficult child comes home, the judge ordered me to have health insurance in place for difficult child by the time he gets released (impossible actually but that's ok- he didn't make it a written order), and I can't do those things plus support difficult child without working full time so I didn't know what I was going to do because the judge's orders and supporting my son are just as much legal obligations for me as the PO's orders and obviously, I can't meet PO's orders and still work full time. Then I reminded him that this is how I lost my last job and since the probation officer had told me this kind of stuff was my problem last year, I am looking for jobs outside this area so I can move to a place near a bus line where difficult child can use public transportation because I don't want to lose my son.
He told me he really thought we could work it out. I reminded him that difficult child is not old enough to drive and I simply cannot work my job around another's employment schedule. But, since difficult child is really motivated now in school and wants to go to college and I have told difficult child that I withdrew some money from his college fund to help pay some of the costs he caused, so difficult child will need to keep grades up to get a scholarship, I didn't see why he couldn't go to summer school, or do volunteer work at an animal-related place, or do a leaders-in-training camp thru the summer. He said he hhad no problem with that- (get this-) he can't really legally order difficult child to get a job since he is under 18yo and still in school. Well, pffft, then why did he ORDER it to begin with instead of just suggesting it to me? So I asked him to confirm that he would remove that order as long as I had difficult child involved in something constructive and he did.
Then, I said if difficult child needed a mentor AND a therapist, wouldn't it make more sense to get a therapuetic mentor than to have two different people with varying schedules to meet and he said "oh, that's a good idea". I said I thought it was important to keep our lives as simple as possible and low-stress for both difficult child and myself so we did not get tensed out and start bouncing off each other like we did before. I guess we'll see. Really, I can't find anyone hiring around here anyway but I was pushing to get a job out of this jurisdiction because of these things.
One little concern I have left- which I will address before this starts- is that the mentor program they use is behavior modification where the mentor takes the kid out to do fun things as long as the kid behaves. If the kid does something wrong, they don't take the kid out so they aren't rewarding bad behavior (I agree with that part) but they also cut the visit short and only come to see the kid to talk to them about what they did wrong, then they leave. This is the part that has me a little worried because difficult child clearly started having issues when he convinced himself that his father didn't want him because he (difficult child) was bad. That';s when he started breaking the law and aacting erratic. While I am in full agreement that it's not good to reward bad behavior with fun times, I don't think refusing to see the child except to fuss at him is a good idea- difficult child has abandonment and rejection issues- and I can see difficult child seeing this method as reinforcement that he's bad and flipping out again. Even if the guy gave difficult child some mundane punishment and supervised difficult child while he did it, it would be better than just leaving. I'll discuss this with them. I realize, also, that everyone has to learn that other people aren't going to stick with them if they don't treat them right and stay out of trouble, but I think difficult child needs to learn to deal with his father issues before he can get much use out of anything else. Inn order to do that, I think he needs to feel accepted by a male, even when he's being punished. I would hope they would be willing to tailor that a bit for a kid with certain issues, but of course, that will require them taking my word for it.
Maybe I should ask you ladies who have gotten therapeutic mentoring on board in the past- is ALL therapuetic mentoring behavior modification and nothing more? If so, there's no sense pushing for anyone different than what the PO already plans on using.
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