Hello all. I found this forum while searching the web out of desperation. I have been living in complete hell for the past 5 years, and I'm literally at my wits end. My hair is falling out, my heart palpitates...my worries about my son consume my life, and has made it quite miserable. It was nice to find a place where I can vent, and people will accept me without judging me.
I guess it's best to start with a little history. I'll list just some of the major things that have happened over the last 5 years. Keep in mind that difficult child was the perfect child, if there ever was one. Sweet. Loving. Considerate. Honor student (up until the 10th grade)....and a HUGE momma's boy (his father and I are divorced). Sadly, we're slowly becoming enemies.
He changed schools in 10th grade, and that's when things started happening. It started with getting kicked off of the football team for dipping in the locker room. Of course, he was warned 3 times. Of course, everybody else did it, so that made it ok. The coaches were stupid, ya know? Soon after that, I caught him smoking cigarettes. Then, the fighting began. He turned into a very angry person. Always mouthing off and picking a fight with other guys, whether it was over a girl, or something somebody said. I had guys driving by my house flashing brass knuckles and baseball bats. Everybody wanted to fight. He even had a friend that got beat so severely in the head with a baseball bat, he was in the hospital for over a year. Traumatic. His grades began to decline. His anger was showing in class. He punched a brick wall because a teacher told him to put his hacky sack up. We agreed he needed in school counseling. The counselor was stupid, and didn't know anything...so the story goes. His senior year, he began dating a freshman. Ever since, he's always dated girls that are much younger. I think it's because he's on their same maturity level. But we have warned him the trouble he can get in for dating such young girls. He's invincible, and there's nothing wrong with an 18 yo dating a 14 year old. Ugh. That relationship turned VERY toxic. Fights every day. Yelling. Screaming. Controlling. Breaking phones and punching holes in the wall due to anger. I don't like judging people, but this little girl was the epitome of crazy. CRAZY. So, 2 young and crazy kids dating wasn't pretty. Fortunately, he DID graduate! Whew!! It came time to decide if he was going away to college or staying home. He had a great opportunity to go to an SEC college, tuition paid for by my parents. Of course, leaving the girlfriend behind weighed on him. He made the decision to go on his own. We were all happy and very proud of him. I spent a lot of money making his dorm room feel like home. His 2nd weekend there, he wanted to drive home for a visit! Sure, why not! When he left to go back on Sunday, he was pulled over for speeding, and got arrested for possession of marijuana, driving under the influence of marijuana, and having a case of beer in the back of his truck (he had some buddy buy it for him before he left to go back). One of his fraternity brothers bailed him out (by the way, the fraternity thing only lasted 2 months, before he was butting heads with the older guys. He didn't like being told what to do, and soon dropped out.) After taking off work to go to court with him, paying the 2300.00 fine, it was MY fault that his license got suspended. The judge was stupid. I was stupid. And NOBODY is gonna take his license away. He left the courthouse without saying goodbye to me, knowing I had driven 3 hours, and wouldn't see him again for however long. Jerk. Fast forward a few months, and he caught a ride home with a friend that lives in our area. He was driving a friends car that had a busted tail light, and got pulled over. He was arrested again for driving with a suspended drivers license. 175.00 to bail him out, and another 1200.00 in court fees that I paid. Of course, it wasn't appreciated. The cops are dumb. Yada yada yada. He flunked his first semester, and we said it was time to come home. He pleaded that he wanted a second chance and we gave it to him. Only to find out that he never went to a single class his second semester. Thousands of dollars down the drain. And a son that got a degree in drugs and alcohol 101.
He's been home going on 2 years, and I have 5 requests of him. Get a job. Do your own laundry. Put your dishes in the dish washer. Don't do drugs. Pay me 40.00 a week for your truck insurance and cell phone. Simple. Yet he fails at ALL of them 95% of the time. He's had 3 jobs. Two of them I got for him due to my acquaintances. He lost the first one because he was constantly late, he took long lunches, he was a smartellic to his boss, and he came back from lunch sometimes smelling of weed. He was warned numerous times. The second job was just temporary help, but he blew through the 1,400.00 he made in no time. Without paying me a dime. Always had an excuse as to where his money went. His current job is experiencing a slow time, and he maybe works 1 day a week. He sleeps, eats, plays video games, and screws his girlfriend in my house when I'm not home, and sometimes when I am home. His vice is spice, or synthetic weed. It turns him into the devil. It got so bad, that I had him arrested this past October, after I had gone through numerous outrages with him. I had simply asked him a question, and it set him on fire. He began screaming at me, knocking pictures off the walls, tuning lamps over, cocking his gun at me, and then taking a knife and acting as if he was going to slit his wrist. We left him in jail for 3 days. His father took away his guns in lieu of bail. We had one stipulation. He HAD to get help after he got out. He agreed. His father went and got him and took him straight to the local treatment center (I couldn't be involved because I was the one who had him arrested, and there was a restraining order on him) . They did a 10 day outpatient assessment. I was in touch with the therapist and she did inform me that if he did not commit to intense treatment, I would be identifying him at the morgue one day, or he would end up doing a lot of jail time in the future. He is an addict in denial. He wasn't real receptive to the treatment...it was ridiculous, everybody in his group has problems that have nothing to do with him, and he knew what he needed to do. So, we changed him to another treatment center. This one would provide more one on one counseling. Again, he's been unreceptive, doodles on paper, draws tattoos on his hand, and gets an attitude with the therapists. It's all been a total waste of my money, and that was proven just Sunday. I caught him smoking spice in MY HOUSE, with me just down the stairs. REALLY??? The audacity. After words were exchanged (yes, I went crazy on him this time), his girlfriend came to get him. He was gone about an hour before I got a text stating that his girlfriend is 5 weeks pregnant. This is a new girlfriend....and did I mention that she is only 16 yo?? My heart sank. Tears started flowing. I got mad. Sad. All of the above. Did I also mention that he's already been through this scare once before with the toxic girlfriend? She's already had the baby, and it's not his...thank goodness. But she led him to believe that it was for a long time. So, here I am with a 20 yo difficult child, who is on drugs, has no ambition in life, has a huge sense of entitlement, thinks he's invincible, eats me out of house and home, leaves his laundry piled up in my laundry room, leaves his dishes in the sink, has cussed me and called me every name under the sun including b****, mother f'er, c*nt, etc, stolen from me, changed the amount of a check I gave him to pay a ticket, pilfers through my room looking for change for drugs, thrown suitcases and shoes at me...and now he's going to be a father.
We go to court tomorrow. It's a follow up from when I had him arrested in October. He has violated his probation by not working full time, not going to AA, not attending his counseling like he should and smoking spice. I'm a nervous wreck and my heart literally hurts from thinking that I may have to watch the court take him tomorrow. I've been the best mom I could possibly be, and I'm so sad....
If you made it this far in my post, THANK YOU! Any thoughts? Advice? Anything? I'm desperate. And I want my normal life back.
I guess it's best to start with a little history. I'll list just some of the major things that have happened over the last 5 years. Keep in mind that difficult child was the perfect child, if there ever was one. Sweet. Loving. Considerate. Honor student (up until the 10th grade)....and a HUGE momma's boy (his father and I are divorced). Sadly, we're slowly becoming enemies.
He changed schools in 10th grade, and that's when things started happening. It started with getting kicked off of the football team for dipping in the locker room. Of course, he was warned 3 times. Of course, everybody else did it, so that made it ok. The coaches were stupid, ya know? Soon after that, I caught him smoking cigarettes. Then, the fighting began. He turned into a very angry person. Always mouthing off and picking a fight with other guys, whether it was over a girl, or something somebody said. I had guys driving by my house flashing brass knuckles and baseball bats. Everybody wanted to fight. He even had a friend that got beat so severely in the head with a baseball bat, he was in the hospital for over a year. Traumatic. His grades began to decline. His anger was showing in class. He punched a brick wall because a teacher told him to put his hacky sack up. We agreed he needed in school counseling. The counselor was stupid, and didn't know anything...so the story goes. His senior year, he began dating a freshman. Ever since, he's always dated girls that are much younger. I think it's because he's on their same maturity level. But we have warned him the trouble he can get in for dating such young girls. He's invincible, and there's nothing wrong with an 18 yo dating a 14 year old. Ugh. That relationship turned VERY toxic. Fights every day. Yelling. Screaming. Controlling. Breaking phones and punching holes in the wall due to anger. I don't like judging people, but this little girl was the epitome of crazy. CRAZY. So, 2 young and crazy kids dating wasn't pretty. Fortunately, he DID graduate! Whew!! It came time to decide if he was going away to college or staying home. He had a great opportunity to go to an SEC college, tuition paid for by my parents. Of course, leaving the girlfriend behind weighed on him. He made the decision to go on his own. We were all happy and very proud of him. I spent a lot of money making his dorm room feel like home. His 2nd weekend there, he wanted to drive home for a visit! Sure, why not! When he left to go back on Sunday, he was pulled over for speeding, and got arrested for possession of marijuana, driving under the influence of marijuana, and having a case of beer in the back of his truck (he had some buddy buy it for him before he left to go back). One of his fraternity brothers bailed him out (by the way, the fraternity thing only lasted 2 months, before he was butting heads with the older guys. He didn't like being told what to do, and soon dropped out.) After taking off work to go to court with him, paying the 2300.00 fine, it was MY fault that his license got suspended. The judge was stupid. I was stupid. And NOBODY is gonna take his license away. He left the courthouse without saying goodbye to me, knowing I had driven 3 hours, and wouldn't see him again for however long. Jerk. Fast forward a few months, and he caught a ride home with a friend that lives in our area. He was driving a friends car that had a busted tail light, and got pulled over. He was arrested again for driving with a suspended drivers license. 175.00 to bail him out, and another 1200.00 in court fees that I paid. Of course, it wasn't appreciated. The cops are dumb. Yada yada yada. He flunked his first semester, and we said it was time to come home. He pleaded that he wanted a second chance and we gave it to him. Only to find out that he never went to a single class his second semester. Thousands of dollars down the drain. And a son that got a degree in drugs and alcohol 101.
He's been home going on 2 years, and I have 5 requests of him. Get a job. Do your own laundry. Put your dishes in the dish washer. Don't do drugs. Pay me 40.00 a week for your truck insurance and cell phone. Simple. Yet he fails at ALL of them 95% of the time. He's had 3 jobs. Two of them I got for him due to my acquaintances. He lost the first one because he was constantly late, he took long lunches, he was a smartellic to his boss, and he came back from lunch sometimes smelling of weed. He was warned numerous times. The second job was just temporary help, but he blew through the 1,400.00 he made in no time. Without paying me a dime. Always had an excuse as to where his money went. His current job is experiencing a slow time, and he maybe works 1 day a week. He sleeps, eats, plays video games, and screws his girlfriend in my house when I'm not home, and sometimes when I am home. His vice is spice, or synthetic weed. It turns him into the devil. It got so bad, that I had him arrested this past October, after I had gone through numerous outrages with him. I had simply asked him a question, and it set him on fire. He began screaming at me, knocking pictures off the walls, tuning lamps over, cocking his gun at me, and then taking a knife and acting as if he was going to slit his wrist. We left him in jail for 3 days. His father took away his guns in lieu of bail. We had one stipulation. He HAD to get help after he got out. He agreed. His father went and got him and took him straight to the local treatment center (I couldn't be involved because I was the one who had him arrested, and there was a restraining order on him) . They did a 10 day outpatient assessment. I was in touch with the therapist and she did inform me that if he did not commit to intense treatment, I would be identifying him at the morgue one day, or he would end up doing a lot of jail time in the future. He is an addict in denial. He wasn't real receptive to the treatment...it was ridiculous, everybody in his group has problems that have nothing to do with him, and he knew what he needed to do. So, we changed him to another treatment center. This one would provide more one on one counseling. Again, he's been unreceptive, doodles on paper, draws tattoos on his hand, and gets an attitude with the therapists. It's all been a total waste of my money, and that was proven just Sunday. I caught him smoking spice in MY HOUSE, with me just down the stairs. REALLY??? The audacity. After words were exchanged (yes, I went crazy on him this time), his girlfriend came to get him. He was gone about an hour before I got a text stating that his girlfriend is 5 weeks pregnant. This is a new girlfriend....and did I mention that she is only 16 yo?? My heart sank. Tears started flowing. I got mad. Sad. All of the above. Did I also mention that he's already been through this scare once before with the toxic girlfriend? She's already had the baby, and it's not his...thank goodness. But she led him to believe that it was for a long time. So, here I am with a 20 yo difficult child, who is on drugs, has no ambition in life, has a huge sense of entitlement, thinks he's invincible, eats me out of house and home, leaves his laundry piled up in my laundry room, leaves his dishes in the sink, has cussed me and called me every name under the sun including b****, mother f'er, c*nt, etc, stolen from me, changed the amount of a check I gave him to pay a ticket, pilfers through my room looking for change for drugs, thrown suitcases and shoes at me...and now he's going to be a father.
We go to court tomorrow. It's a follow up from when I had him arrested in October. He has violated his probation by not working full time, not going to AA, not attending his counseling like he should and smoking spice. I'm a nervous wreck and my heart literally hurts from thinking that I may have to watch the court take him tomorrow. I've been the best mom I could possibly be, and I'm so sad....
If you made it this far in my post, THANK YOU! Any thoughts? Advice? Anything? I'm desperate. And I want my normal life back.
