More detaching, more accepting, more of what is.............

recoveringenabler

Well-Known Member
Staff member
Well, my difficult child's joy in her new dwelling lasted almost 4 weeks. The phone call was familiar, my difficult child crying, angry, another situation where she is horribly disappointed. I went over to her house, which she asked me to and attempted to intervene and mediate between she and her new roommate. I am usually very good at negotiating and have training in conflict resolution. The long and short of it is that once my difficult child moved in, the roommate changed the agreement. difficult child does not have her own bedroom as promised, with her own bath and closet, the roommate just wants the money without giving my difficult child anything but a small bed in the corner of a bedroom with no privacy, no closet, with the room jam packed with the roommates furniture which she refuses now to move out. The new roommate ate all of my difficult child's food purchased with her food stamp money. This is far from a healthy environment.

The roommate was not willing to compromise. I told my difficult child that although I understood that this was not her fault, I did understand that until she gets some help to pull her out of the survival mode she is in, surrounded by people who operate in desperate, hurtful, unsavory ways, she will continue to run around the hamster wheel. My difficult child has some serious mental issues which she cannot acknowledge. The mental issues have come upon her so slowly over so long that she does not recognize it as anything other then her normal reality. She has enormous trouble staying focused and cannot "future think" among various other symptoms that are debilitating. She lives in a world with others much like her, where I imagine she feels as if she fits.

I have talked to my therapist about this. I have done so much for my difficult child for so long to try to help her. Each step of the way I have to learn another level of detaching. It is not easy. It hurts my heart and makes me very sad. I have had to learn to move in and move out of her life with each incident that arises, and I've done that. There is no formula of detaching that covers it across the board, it's living with it daily and making choices daily which feel right in that moment. And then living my life, with my granddaughter, my SO, my job, my life.

I haven't heard from my difficult child in a week. I believe she is making an attempt in her own way to keep me out of the drama of her life. It takes a toll on me and she knows that. The local NAMI organization has a department which I investigated and I offered my findings to my difficult child telling her that this would be the step I would take if I were her. I requested she consider going through the program, but it would take her admitting to her mental issues and seeking help above her own very strong somewhat indomitable will. I hope she is considering it but I don't know. It feels right to me to keep out of her way now. She knows my position. It's difficult being on the sidelines watching her life continually explode. I'm much better at not worrying all the time, I can go on in my life and put it all aside, but ................you all know how it is.

It's been a tough week. My granddaughters new found driving freedom has brought out her teenage need for more liberation which brings more difficult conversations about boundaries that are as hard on me as they are on her since that isn't my strongest suit. My job is more demanding lately and I have to go in for surgery to correct an umbilical hernia at the end of this month. I made a decision to ask for more help at work, of my SO and of my granddaughter to carry more of the weight on my shoulders. I'm once again having to figure out what the next step is in my continuing story with my grown up difficult child and then live with my choices in a way which still offers me some peace and some joy. Sigh. I am feeling tired and depleted.

I just paused in this post and picked up the phone which was my difficult child calling from the County jail where she was taken today for violation of parole. She was driving, got stopped for a bad tail light, the cops realized she is on probation and searched the car. They found an Ativan and a Valium which she doesn't have prescriptions for. That's a violation of her parole. They arrested her and her car was towed to a facility here and impounded. Another drama in the never ending drama of my daughter's life. So, I've been on the phone with the jail, the impound lot, the roommate, trying to help arrange all the stuff until difficult child can get out. I have no idea if that will be Tuesday when her court date is, or what. I am weary of this. Tomorrow I have to drive an hour to see her in jail and get a release of property form. I think I have to go back on Tuesday to pay for the release of property form, it's difficult to get information on the phone, so I'm not entirely sure of the process. All of this will cost about $600 minimally.

I have talked for a long time with my SO about this today. We decided to do all this and then to tell her that we can't do anymore. I have reached a point where I am just done. Her life, whether by choice or circumstance or bad luck or whatever is draining me emotionally and financially and I have to place a limit on it. I thought I had reached a point of detachment a couple of months ago, but there is now more. In therapy we discussed how this is on going and each step of the way I have to accept it, again and again and make hard choices again and again. It wears you out. And, yet, there is this odd, small place inside, which with each step feels more liberating and more detached which somehow makes it easier each time. And on it goes............

Thanks for listening.
 
F

firehorsewoman

Guest
Wow. All I can say is wow and ask again "how the hell do we survive this?!"

Reading this post makes me feel so many emotions: sad for you, afraid of the future with my difficult child, tired for you, tired for me, sad for your difficult child, ****** off at the universe, amazed by you....

Wow.

Maybe I am not ready to read the Parent Emeritus posts? LOL
 

Calamity Jane

Well-Known Member
Oh, RE I'm sorry. You're doing great, just hang in there, I know it's hard. Sending you many, many cyber hugs today, and continuing prayers for your difficult child.
 

DammitJanet

Well-Known Member
LOL....this is why we have the PE board...we dont want to scare the parents of younger kids!

RE, I kinda know what you mean. Cory and Mandy called me recently and asked me to look up on the court docket to see when their court dates where. WHAT???? I stopped having to live with that website icon on my computer desktop about 2 years ago. I thought we were done with that. Well thankfully its all driving stuff but still, Im unhappy. Number one, keep up with your own dang stuff and dont involve me. Number two, it worries me.

They have just moved again to a place across from her relatives. I think its a place one of her people own and they are getting it for a song but do have to pay utilities. He had to pay the down payment for the power to get turned on. I came to me to borrow a little bit of money today and I asked him where Mandy's money was going and why she couldnt help him with cleaning supplies and food and he says its his responsibility. She pays her car insurance, her gas, and her nails and hair. LMAO. Excuse me? I dont get why they cant pool their money to get the bills paid. He has taken care of her for years while she hasnt worked or worked less than 10 hours a week and only used that money to get her hair, nails and new shoes. She constantly has new shoes and clothes. Their relationship confuses me. I see his texts to her when he uses my phone and its like he is begging her to come home on the weekend. They hardly see each other during the week because he works from 5 am till 7:30pm and she works from 2 pm till 10:30 pm. He is normally asleep when she gets home. On the weekend, she goes one way and he goes the other. Not that he wants it that way but she wants to go spend time with her friends. He does ask to go play poker when he can afford to with his friends on Sunday night but like today they are trying to move and she had his truck keys with her in her car and he couldnt move without them. He asked her to please, please come home. It was a begging tone. Tony asked Cory if they would come to dinner today because we hadnt seen the baby and Cory said well he wasnt sure because he hadnt seen Mandy all weekend. Sigh.
 

Hound dog

Nana's are Beautiful
Janet, Cory has grown up, matured, become a man. Mandy is still very much a child. If she doesn't start catching up with Cory soon, that's going to get old fast.

RE, I was going to ask why you were going to do all that for her this time and if you would continue to do so. I see you've drawn the line on your own though and that isn't necessary. I am a bit quicker about drawing up boundaries.......but I've lived with an entire family of difficult children and it doesn't take long for behavior to become predictable. Somehow, some way difficult child has got to figure it out on her own.....or not and deal with it. You're not going to be around forever.

But you're right, the more battle weary we become, the easier it is to say "enough already, fix it yourself". It doesn't mean we don't worry, though. I think that part never completely goes away. Still, learning to detach allows us to move forward with our own lives and stay away from the drama.

(((hugs)))
 
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