vent lost my temper

[Jena]

i'm so ****** at myself right now.

i lost my temper with difficult child. i smacked her, yup not hard at all yet in the face of all places. yea i know bad. got it.

i just am so fed up with-it all i truly am. i'm at my breaking point no one sees it or respects it especially her. my ex who i cannot stand with a burning passion.

she walks around this house not eating refusing to drink water. just licking spoon after spoon of peanut butter and nutella that makes her sick. she can't go to the batrhroom. she wont' drink water just milk. i keep telling her drink the water she wont'. everythings a struggle.

last night husband and i tried yes tried to have an hr alone to play wii. can she let us no. she had just licked alot of nutella so she gota sugar rush. refused to go to bed stood in the dining room saying my name as i could see her from the den refusing to go to bed. had to physcially drag her down the hallway.

i just dont' see how i'm going to keep it together 3,600 miles away with feeding tubes and all the fits she's going to throw. i can't get in to see therapist before i go as if that would even help.

i go in to take her pressure, i am pretty sure she needs a bag. she wants to go to the movies today. yea it's just sitting yet i know her and her pulse goes high when she's dehydrated and well she wont' let me so i had had it after calmly saying ten times please stop wiggling around let me do this. like it's a joke she sits there laughing.

stupid ex wants her overnight to bring her to his stupid parents house i dont' want to let her go why because he's such a help.

i'm just soo done it's not even funny right now. i hate hate hate having her in myspace when she isnt' eating. it is the most unnerving thing in the world for me.

 

[smallworld]

Jen, if you can hold on long enough to get her to Oregon, the staff there will take the responsibility of her care off of you. It won't all be left to you to keep her alive. What is getting to you is that the responsibility is all left to you, and it's too much pressure for one person to endure. Once I got my daughter in the right treatment program, I could relax because I knew she was well taken care of and it wasn't all left up to me.

Hang in there.

 

[Jena]

i know i'm trying i am. a new low for me today. truly.

 

[DammitJanet]

I agree with SW. Right now your in that panic state as if your daughter was having a heart attack and someone was on the phone going well...get a steak knife and insert it into the 4th rib. Your like...say what? Do what? Im not trained in heart surgery!

You can hold her hand, make soothing noises but surgery is just out of your league!

When you get her into the treatment center, they can do the treatment, and you can go back to being the mom. The one who kisses the boo boo's and holds her hand while they do the icky stuff. Not the one who does the icky stuff. Big darn difference.

 

[Josie]

I agree with Janet and Smallworld.

Also, there might even be support for you at the treatment center. If nothing else, there will be other parents around.

Probably, she will also have medicine to help with her anxiety.

You will get to go in every day and tell them what happened and they can try to help. It won't be just you trying to figure it out.

 

[Jena]

yea i know. she's just such a handful as are most our kids besides this eating disorder. the screaming at night still, etc. it's just sad. it really is. i hope this thing gets beat than i'll have to return and work on all the other things with her somehow.

to be very honest and this is going to sound terrible. i got married just 6 short mos. ago and the pressure she has put on this relationship from the beginning and since the wedding it'll be a miracle if i dont' wind up divorced. between the financial strain, the emotional strain she's put on me, the lack of time him and i get together due to her constant neediness. the fact she wont' even sit on a couch next to the guy even after he's laid out thousands of dollars because he cares. it just is hard.

than i get fed up and i blow say things i dont' mean to him, due to stress, he does same due to lack of attention. and it equals grose. i beg her to leave us alone yet every night that man walks in she's out of that bed.

and i ask basic things please drink water. she can drink milk. yet she fights me. it's absurd. she's defiant even still weak she's still defiant. the will of a terrorist the last hospital said she had. sick. if only she could use all of that for good and not evil we mite all have a leg to stand on.

that's my biggest fear is that the sick defiance she has will kick up there and she wont' adhere to the program and yea ill be mad really mad if that happens. bigtime. i'll begin to resent her

 

[Jena]

i made soup, cooking calms me lately. forced two glasses of water down her and some broth. told her we'll go to movies in town to see little faulker's movie. it's simple no walking really. we need to get out of here, need air a break.

yea i'm just freaking out, it's been a long haul. so nervous about leaving easy child, husband and i need so much work and now our counseling has to get put on hold. alot of junk. yup i'm complaining. i just really want my life back. i used to have one and it was great. i keep looking to place blame somewhere on the loss of it. yet fact is i have to get this kid stable eating, sleeping, functioning. it was bad before yet now it's outta hand with-o food intake. than find my piece of existance i had prior to her onset of issues at age 4. everythings' been about her for so long now i can't remember a time it wasnt'.

i sit back sometimes and say wow i used to be a really happy person, rested, woke up refreshed everyday lol. sheesh where did that go? i know easy child sees it, she'll often say when difficult child isnt' around your like a different person. husband sees it and well says alot of times you gotta seperate, decompartmentalize it all. when he comes home after working 17 hours i unload on him.

alot of this is therapy, gotta go when i return, find my place in this life with her. she's very overpowering across the board.

thanks for listening. it is appreciated bigtime. i just gotta take it one bit at a time. my head keeps jumping to oregon, how the docs are going to go nuts trying to find the right medication how not easy this will be, the same road i've gone down now her entire life.

ok enuf venting for me.

 

[pepperidge]

Jena

I suspect that most of us have been pushed beyond the breaking point at one time or another with our difficult children.

I hope that in Oregon she will not only get some help for her eating disorder/phobia but also for her other issues. I hope that you will be able to enlist the docs in helping your achieve a bit more healthy separation from you. I would tell them that you need at least several hours each day (if not more) to be by yourself and do things for yourself. the weather in Portland should at least allow you to go for a long walk each day (bring your rain jacket) along the river and maybe the docs can even guide you to somewhere that would have free or cheap yoga classes or the like each day.

As you know, the whole medication thing is a crapshoot and it might takes weeks to dial in something. Hopefully you will have good feelings about the docs and let them work on the medications. It sounds like the kind of place that wil use a feed tube so you can at least relax about difficult child getting some nutrition. I suspect that with some distance from both difficult child and your husband that you will be able to reconnect in a better way and that your stress level will go down.

Your anxiety level has got to be really high right now as is difficult children I wouldn't even have too many talks with her about the whole thing, just stress that this will help her get back to a normal life and leave it at that. Don't be surprised if she has a sudden miraculous bout of eating this week for awhile. Go anyway to Oregon if she does.

good luck to you.

 

[Marguerite]

Jena, what's wrong with her drinking milk instead of water? Milk is mostly water, plus it has added protein, sugars and fat. I'd say drinking milk is a positive step.

Hang in there.

Marg

 

[Jena]

pepper your right, very insightful that would happen all the time when i worked in mental health. tell a kid their being admitted than suddenly the behaviors change suddenly to manipulate situation. gotta love difficult child's. she's drinking broth from soup that' her latest thing. she seems to think she can avoid the feeding tube by getting the weight up.

i'm just ina very bad mood today. not real anxiety ridden just highly irritable. a shame but true.

marg hi. yea doctor's said too much milk isnt' good for her also it doesnt' hydrate as water does. she was drinking that last time she had to get a bag to hydrate. i'm just backing off her this week truly. she wants to collapse so be it we'll call the ambulance again and she'll go get a bag. i can't handle the stress of it.

your right about difficult child's pushing our buttons, and the sad fact is alot of marriages dont' make it.the divorce rate for parents of kids like our whether it be autisum, add bioplar etc is very high. we all know why also. as far as walks not a bad idea we'll see i'm in bad shape right now legs hurting knees swollen popping advil everyday. if i get tine each day to write that would be great. i'll be at hospital most of day it's the maudsley family based approach to this. yet it will be helfpul when i get fed up and say ok guys i'm taking a break and there are ppl to allow me to do that.

i'm just havinga bad day today that's all i'll level off again. need a good nights sleep and some quiet.

 

[DammitJanet]

Jena, I would hazard a guess that most of us or at least a lot of us, have had experienced times where our kids have put us through unending hell. I have told people many times that I wouldnt raise Cory again through his teen years if you paid me a million bucks...heck, not even 10 million bucks! It was that bad. Right now things are really pretty much a blur to me about that whole time but I remember just the unending trauma, the never being able to get anything to work right, schools not working, medications not working, HIM not working. I remember calling his father several times a day just screaming..."do something with your kid!" This lasted years and years. Heck we still get into fights with and about him.

Nothing with this stuff is easy.

Now...one thing I do want to say about your hubby and you. I can only imagine how hard it is to be newly married and going through this but you guys were together for a while before you got married so he knew what he was getting into. You didnt surprise him. None of this came as a shock. I also think you may have more time to actually talk and be more emotionally intimate with your hubby on the phone than you are when you are sitting right there in the room with him. I have found this to be especially true for me and Tony when he works out of town.

As a couple who has been together forever, you can imagine just how much we actually talk in day to day life. Most of it is stuff like what channel is on and who is taking out the garbage...lol. We might actually throw in an occasional "do you have any toilet paper?" for good measure! However, when he goes out of town, we talk for over an hour every night! We actually set up a time to call each other and sometimes watch a tv show together. If he is out of town when Idol is on, that is our show...everyone knows it. Isnt that cute? LOL. But we really talk. We get more said when he is out of town than we ever do in real life. That is probably sad but its true. I bet it will happen for you too if you make it a real effort to call each other and talk each day and really talk. Not so much about the kids or the house...but each other. Of course, if there is a tv show you want to watch together that is a great way to start it off...lol.

Hugs honey. I am really pulling for you.

 

[Jena]

thanks janet and i know you are. his work schedule is a problem. and he cant' talk while there it's a restaraunt. yet we do spend about a half hr each night talking when he gets in even though its' late. thing is we battle for that because difficult child keeps knocking on the door, screaming my name etc. and yea we were together for a while, yet i guess we were both looking forward to the whole newly wed thing when we returned it did feel diffferent being married yet life is what it is and since we got married she works even harder to seperate us all the time.

i love her dearly i do yet she's annoying bottom line. and somewhere god forgive me deep down inside i resent her becaues some of her stuff is behavioral. she;s a highly difficult kid. so i can imagine it must be hard for him to pay out all this money for her while she ignores him and acts like he doesn't exist and than to boot interrupts any any time him and i ever have alone.

years ago we wanted a child together than we saw how she was getting worse and worse and said wow we'd be dead if we ever did. we went as far as to call the doctor's i went to the first appointment to chk me out, he was going to go. than we had to get realistic

 

[DammitJanet]

Of course she is annoying! Actually I have yet to meet a kid easy child or difficult child who cant be annoying at some point in time. difficult child's just take it to the extreme. At least when he gets home while you are gone it will be 3 hours earlier on the west coast so he can call you and it wont be so late for you. Someone else can deal with her while you take that phone call. Personally, I would make that a priority just to save your sanity and his.

 

[Bunny]

thing is we battle for that because difficult child keeps knocking on the door, screaming my name etc. and yea we were together for a while, yet i guess we were both looking forward to the whole newly wed thing when we returned it did feel diffferent being married yet life is what it is and since we got married she works even harder to seperate us all the time.

Jena, I think you hit something square in the head there. Before you were married, in her mind it was different. You even said it felt different coming home after your wedding. Suddenly, you're married and it's more permenent. You're not going to get back together with her father because now there is a ring on your finger from another guy. Even though you lived together for a long time before you got married, even then it's not the same. There is always the chance that he could leave and difficult child would have you all to herself. She is trying to get and hold your attention any way she knows how. My difficult child does this, too. I will send him to his room and he will scream my name, telling me that he HAS to talk to me RIGHT NOW!!!!! He wants to be the one to control his punishment, or any other thing that he feels he has to control. If he thinks he can do that by having a tantrum, he will. difficult child is trying to control who you give attention to by refusing to eat or drink. If she has all of your attention, then your hubby does not. She likes it that way.

I agree with you that you need time alone with your hubby. Can you leave difficult child with easy child so that you and husband can go out? Will she stay with a babysitter? Even if it's just to the 7-11 to get a cup of coffee. You can get out of the house, breath in some fresh air, and have a few minutes to yourself.

When you get her to the hospital in Oregon the majority of the responsibility for her care will be taken off of your shoulders, and it sounds like you need that. I firmly believe that no one can parent a difficult child alone. You need help and the doctors in Oregon will be able to give that to you. And I agree with Janet that when you talk to your husband on the phone while you are away you will be able to actually sit and talk, which you can't do now. It will be quiet and it will be just the two of you.

Lastly, please don't be too hard on yourself for losing your temper. I will say that I have lost my patience with difficult child more times that I can count, and on occasion I have smacked him. I always feel badly about it afterwards and I always tell him that I am sorry for doing it. Let's face it: if I want him to display good behavior I, as his mother, need to be a model of what I expect from him.

I don't mean to be preachy. If I am, I'm sorry. I know that you trying to do what is best for her. It can't be easy watching her not eat and drink.

Pam

 

[HaoZi]

I think I landed a lucky card on this one. We recently met a neighbor (off chance meeting at kiddo's therapist of all places, when I asked her what lawyer she used for her divorce!). Her 3 girls have also been mostly ignored by their father except to stir up issues. It gave kiddo a real life example that she is NOT the only one in the world in her position, here are THREE girls close to her age that are (*gasp*) IN EXACTLY THE SAME POSITION. As well as the daughter whose friend's house we went to for Christmas and New Year's, who also keeps just enough contact to get her hopes up then more often than not fails to follow through. And who got married last month and didn't tell his daughter, her mom (my friend/co-worker/kiddo's scout leader when she was in scouts) found out on FB. Nice, eh?
Kiddo has acknowledged she has pretty much given up on her father, and she is ready for my divorce from him to be final. He is ready for it to be final. I've been ready, so now it's up to me to write up the paperwork, get him to sign it (maybe he'll actually do it this time!), and file it. Again. Because he couldn't be bothered to send in something agreeing to it the last two final hearings!

 

[amazeofgrace]

<<<hugs>>> Know I am praying sweet one

 

[Jena]

Janet i saw that this morning and just laughed.

Pam - soo deep lol and yes insightful you guys could all be therapists i'm telling you. you hit the nail on the head on the wall on that one. it is about loss of hope that sick thought that someday dad and i will get back together. the whole not if he's the last man on earth, i am starving he's temping me with a huge piece of cake if i get back together with him it wouldnt' happen lol she doens't get that it's NEVER going to happen. and yes the wedding really drove it home for her! great point! that would of cost 150 in therapy!! lol

we will try to get sometime before i leave somehow. i dont' know how but we will. it's just all soo frustrating. as i'm sure many of you know very very well. we could keep this thread going forever with all of us venting about how our marriages, relationships and friendships takea major back seat to our kids and how to fix that!

love you guys

 

[graceupongrace]

Jena, raising a difficult child requires superhuman efforts, but unfortunately we're only human. I hope that the family-based approach in Oregon includes strategies for getting your whole family well. Don't be afraid to tell the docs there that you need a way to deal with your own health issues, and to nurture your relationships with husband and easy child. difficult child is so enmeshed with you that it's squeezing out your other relationships. She needs to learn to separate from you in a healthy way. That doesn't mean you love her any less, it just means you're enabling her to become her own person apart from you -- which it sounds like she has been unwilling (or unable) to do. Praying for all of you.

 

[timer lady]

Jena, god bless you ~ I've been in your spot many times over. husband & I lost ourselves in GFGdom; toward the end of his life I lost him emotionally & then he died on me.

I'll tell you what we've done after the first few admittances of kt &/or wm; we signed the paperwork, went home, turned off the phones & slept for at least a week. Spent the next week reconnecting. Staff were taking care of the tweedles ~ we were just "the parents". The bad guys & husband & I didn't give a hoot.

Don't hang around the treatment facility. Show up only to the must have meetings. difficult child will survive. She is in the midst of a great deal of manipulation even if she's unaware of it. She's creating daily chaos & cheating you & your entire family of the bits & pieces of normalcy you can grasp.

Be tired, be sad, get angry but take that time for you. Take that time for your marriage & your other children. It's not a sin; in fact, in my humble opinion, it's a sin not to take this treatment time not reconnecting.

Take care, sweetie ~ know that I say this with the best of intentions, not with any judgment or criticism.

 

[Jena]

Linda

alot of you, and you especially Janet, our pink donkey lady where is she by the way?? all humble me with-your wisdom regarding this, shared experiences and how honest you are about them. This hands down has been by far the most gut wrenching experience i've ever had and well i've had some doozies in my lifetime lol so yea i'm at a loss with-this one.

it's a level of control of my mind and will to get to that point, that knowing what you need taking it and being ok with it. i strive to reach that in this bigtime. let go of the reigns let others handle her and just say ok time for me to breath now.

this treatment place seems to want me hands on that's the whole approach yet rest assured i will def. take my time when she's doing 3 hours of school each day to take walks, write, maybe bake in that ronald mcdonald kitchen if theyll let me lol. i'm going to need to so i can stay level and not lose it to be honest. iv'e felt that creepy seperation for days now. you know the one where your just going thru the motions saying hmm is that me my life?? lol can't be, gotta be someone else's.

Linda you have always showed such strength and i know husband passing was so hard, as with all the other hurdles you have jumped thru in your time yet your strength and resiliency never waivers even when you think it does it doesnt'. your words mean alot.

wow that was deep lol............

HAOZI i'm so sorry i missed your post. i'm glad your getting to that point and us talking on here or just shared junk helped you get there. you can't know what awaits you on the other side if you dont' release and move on i always say. ((Hugs)))