I was posting here during the summer as my son's behavior declined into 3 arrests, 2 expulsions, 4 visits from the sherrif PERT team; all before he was 15! Being on probation seemed to help a lot; since then he did come home drunk once and steal some prescriptions twice and got two tattoos but all that seems to have slowed to, seemingly, nothing. We moved neighborhoods, he switched "schools" (ind study since he's expelled), went on medication, did counseling and, in the middle of this mess I met a wonderful guy. We got married in January and difficult child has really taken to having a step-dad (he never had a dad); they do guy stuff and "team up" against me when we're deciding what to eat, etc. difficult child has not done anything stupid since we got married which is 3 months tomorrow. We are still pretty vigilant but signs of his real personality are coming back, he sometimes actually volunteers to help around the yard and is much more stable and cheerful and he's even mentioned going to jr college. Just checking back to let everyone know not to give up hope, things looked flat out hopeless for me at several points, about three years of hell, but things CAN change and I hope they do for everyone else on here as well