He's out!

rejectedmom

New Member
difficult child was released today. We picked him up this morning and then went shoping for a few things he needed, took him to lunch and then had his intake for the group home this afternoon. The prison released him with no medications and no perscription. Then didn't return any calls that the socialization services made to try and get them for difficult child. difficult child was on litium and Prozac. He had them this morning before he left prison but by 2pm he was shaking uncontrollably. Does anyone know what stopping these medications cold like that can do to difficult child?

The intake was long we had to go through reams of paperwork then finally about 4pm we were taken over to the home. The place is old but clean. Unfortunately it is in the worst part of the city and difficult child was told not to walk around in the neighborhood at all that it is very dangerous. His caseworker told him to only go directly to the program and then directly back to the house not to linger or talk to anyone. Oh yeah, I can really see this working.

So we got difficult child all settled in and then left. We were about three blocks away when we realized we hadn't given him any money and he is going with the group to the county fair tomorrow so we swung around and went back only to find difficult child smoking a cigarette outside on the steps. He hasn't had one in a year is out of our sight ten minutes and he's smoking again. husband says to me "he is an idiot". "Thanks" I said "your comment doesn't help me work through all this concern I'm having."

We are worried about him going off his medications and in a new environment etc.

When we got home I once again approach my husband about going back on his own AD medications as a precaution against sinking back into depression and he says no. husband tells me he thinks he (husband) will be OK. I tell him that his history gives me no confidence in that statment to which he says the subject is closed. I shrugged and walked away.

A bit later my daughter called. She told me that she is wants to meet with difficult child alone first and lay down the ground rules before allowing him to see her children. No problem with that. The problem is with the fact she has never told the kids that difficult child was in prison this last year. I think she should have. She told them that he was away at college. Even when I told her that their cousins knew the truth and might tell them she stood firmly against tell them the truth. When the kids asked her how come their other uncle came home on the holidays and difficult child didn't she made up some cacamaimy excuse.

Anyway she continues talking and tells me that my grandson told his other grandmother that he thinks difficult child's birth mother is trying to take him away from us and that is why he hasn't come home for so long. I told her that I think mayby she should tell the kids the truth. I say that I am concerned that they will find out by overhearing someone talking and then they will be angry that everyone lied to them. Daughter says that she and her husband have given difficult child a clean slate with her kids by not telling them at which I interject "there is another way to look at this" At which point she gets all snippy and rudely cuts me off and says "I'm not looking at it another way. THIS IS WHAT I AM DOING!"

I shut up but boy, was I angry with her tone. I told her I was tired and that she needed to let me go get some sleep.

So I'm emotionally exhausted. And not too happy with some in my family right now who tend to add more stress on instead of taking a little off.

Oh well now I really do need to get some sleep. -RM
 

witzend

Well-Known Member
{{{{{{{{{{Big hugs}}}}}}}}}}} This must be so stressful for you. I don't envy your position right now.

It's unfortunate that your easy child has chosen to tell a different story than you would want her to. It's really frustrating to hear that your husband is on a totally different page regarding difficult child's medications. I don't know what the right answer is for you, or even if there is one. Will husband go into therapy again? My husband and I have been in and out of it for years, mostly with M. But it seems to me that we have more of a chance this time. I don't know, I have to have hope. That's kind of the hard part with mine, he always acts like he's interested in improvement, but when push comes to shove it doesn't always work out that way.

For now, I hope you can get some rest. There's nothing you can do to change any of them or their circumstances tonight. It was a hard day. Give yourself some recovery time, and try again when you are sure you have the energy for it.

We're with you.
 

rejectedmom

New Member
Witz, Thanks for yur support, I think you did misunderstand one thing though. In addition to my difficult child not having his medicine due to prison not sending him out with it, I was also talking about my husband going back on his own medications.husband had been on ADs for over a year because he wasn't handling difficult child's situation well. He went off them a few months ago and has been doing pretty well but I fear a relapse now that we are to be involved with difficult child stress a bit more. I don't want husband to slip back into that dark place and maybe jepordize his new job so I suggested preventive measures but he won't consider it. Oh well like you say you can lead a horse to water... -RM
 

KFld

New Member
RM, I know this is so difficult, but let go and let god. This will be the test that will show you whether difficult child learned from being in prison or not. There is nothing you can do.

Detatch. Be there for him when he's making good choices and back away when he's not. he's 20 years old, so it's time for him to start making 20 year old decisions.

Do something for yourself. Stressing won't change a thing.

Thinking of you :smile:
 

goldenguru

Active Member
I would be concerned especially about stopping the lithium cold turkey. Hubby takes lithium and when he misses just one dose, he knows it. Can you contact his case worker and express your concern??

I wouldn't worry about the smoking (assuming it was just a cigarette) It's the least of his worries.

Well ... it's up to your son now to make his way.

I don't know your whole story ... but I do understand how hard it is to worry about our kids.


How old are your daughter's children? I have a brother in law who has been in and out of prison for years. We met as a family and talked about what to tell the kids (Ours is a huge family). We decided to tell the older kids (approximately 10 years and up) the truth about this guy. For the younger ones, we decided it was best not to tell them the whole truth. We told them that "Uncle is in some trouble". Children should never be given information beyond what they are capable of processing. I don't think small children could (or should have to) comprehend drugs, illegal activities and prison. But, that was our position.


Hugs.
 

Suz

(the future) MRS. GERE
RM, I would also be concerned about the cold turkey off medications for your son. I've read too many stories here about folks having a hard time weaning off of their medications, let alone dropping them overnight. I would urge you to see what you can do to get his medications where he is. I'll bet he feels really bad today without them.

As for your husband.......... :hammer:

Hugs,
Suz
 

Sunlight

Active Member
I know when some prisons release an inmate they give you a brochure telling you how hard the next weeks will be. sigh.
I had to smile at you spelling a word I have heard but never seen in print before:
cacamaimy

lol
I love verbage. hey there, while you are worrying about all those adults....remember to take care of you.
 

Sunlight

Active Member
LMAO see you didnt know you were educating the world even in the midst of the swirling doodoo around you....you got me thinking here and I found this on the word you wrote:
Something ridiculous, incredible or implausible.

Cockamamie is intrinsically funny, but it’s truly incredible that word historians believe it’s a close relative of decal, a design prepared on special paper for transfer to another surface. (It is instead sometimes said to be Yiddish, but this turns out not to be the case.)

The original of both cockamamie and decal is the French décalcomanie, which was created in the early 1860s to refer to the craze for decorating objects with transfers (it combines décalquer, to transport a tracing, with manie, a mania or craze). The craze, and the word, soon transferred to Britain — it’s recorded in the magazine The Queen on 27 February 1864: “There are few employments for leisure hours which for the past eighteen months have proved either so fashionable or fascinating as decalcomanie”. It reached the United States around 1869 and — to judge from the number of newspaper references in that year — became as wildly popular as it had earlier in France and Britain. The word was quickly Anglicised as decalcomania and in the 1950s it became abbreviated to decal.

The link between decalcomania and cockamamie isn’t proved, but the evidence suggests strongly that children in New York City in the 1930s (or perhaps a decade earlier) converted the one into the other. There was a fashion for self-decoration at that period, using coloured transfers given away with candy and chewing gum. Shelly Winters wrote of cockamamie in The New York Times in 1956 that “This word, translated from the Brooklynese, is the authorized pronunciation of decalcomania. Anyone there who calls a cockamamie a decalcomania is stared at.”

Quite how the word changed sense to mean something incredible is least clear of all. An early sense was of something inferior or second-rate, which presumably referred to the poor quality of the cheap transfers. It might have been influenced by words such as :censored2:-and-bull or poppycock
 
RM,

You poor thing, I can hear the stress (well, read it, but I can just sense the tone) in your post. Let me please help you.

You were worried about the neighborhood. Well, perhaps so is your son. If the very worst thing he does is smoke a cigarette, that's not so bad. I have high hopes for him and with all the prayers that boy is getting, there is every chance in the world that he will make it.

Your daughter told her kids a fib. You would have liked her to have told the truth. That does not make your way right and her way wrong. Both ways can be right, but just different. Yes, she took a tone with you. I take a tone with my mom when she does not listen to me, either.

I believe that you are reacting out of stress and fear. The nap you took was probably the best thing that you could have done. relax, let go, and let the chips fall where they may.

husband - if he comes around, great. If not, you can always tell him "I told you so" (!)
 

rejectedmom

New Member
Oh Janet! Thanks for the smile I also like the work Poppycock!

Karen, I know to Detach and I am. It usually takes me a day after a stressful event to accomplish it though. I'm not able to do it instantly ...YET!

Goldenguru, The kids are 8 and 5 (going on 15 LOL) I don't think they need all the details but i thought my daughter shold have told them that difficult child did a bad thing and had to go away to pay the consequences. Or something to that nature. I too don't believe in giving more than simple info when the concepts are so complicated.

Suz. They were working on gettimg him his medications but the people who cold have help that happen were not returning the phone calls. I e-mailed them a list of network providers for difficult child's insurance so maybe they will o that route. I cannot do any more.
I told them to take him to the hospital if he had any problems. I have heard nothin so maybe no news is good news. As for husband he is stubborn stupid He doesn't want to change that so I use my detach skills there also but it is hard when it is your source of income at risk.

Melissa. Prayers are always appreciated and difficult child is going to need all the help he can get to make a go of this program.
 

lovemysons

Well-Known Member
Hi rejected mom, I hear ya on all your concerns and agree with you. Wish we could change minds and attitudes I haven't found a way to do that yet, smile.

As for the smoking...both my sons, oldest difficult child fresh out of prison rehab and young difficult child fresh out of basic training from the Army...both of them were either dipping or smoking within moments of their release it would seem. I don't worry about that. I do hope your son gets his medications soon...that would probibly be my biggest concern if I were you.

Am listening and caring,
Tammy
 

tpcmom

New Member
And they wonder why these people they let out of our so called "system" are all screwed up. Why on earth would anyplace rlease anyone without at least a week's worth of medications, especially something like lithium?? You can go into a major withdrawal and mania with a sudden stop of that medication.

It's just unbelieveable!
 

Jen

New Member
I am in the medical field, and prison vs no prison if you have medical services and treatment, then you are negligible in not sending a script, or at least the nec dosaged with him, until his intake was completed. It would be acceptable if the new place was in the same buliding, but doesnt sound that way.

As for you husband sounds like my husband, and no deprssion occuringf there. Lack of common sense and priorities, ie. comment on how stupid it is he is smoking, and not caring aobut the nec medications... duh.

I interpret it with my husband as just not being in tunes, is detached, adn really doesnt care. Unfortunately who is really feeling the pain here? Not your son, and not your husband.

Take care of your self first.

Jen
 
F

flutterbee

Guest
Nothing to add that hasn't already been said, but I wanted to let you know that you're in my thoughts.


(((hugs)))
 

rejectedmom

New Member
JMS, I am not concerned about the cigs only in so far as difficult child doesn't have any spending money as of yet and worry that he will get hooked on them and then maybe do something stupid to get them.


TCPmom and Jen, Here is the story as told to me: apparently the prison started crushing difficult child's medications and making him take themas a powder something about a federal audit. But really lithium powder ICK!!! difficult child tried but couldn't stomach them (he was throwing up) in that form so he stopped taking them until they once again gave them to him in tablet form. The bueaucracy being what it is they still had him down as non=compliant in the system even though difficult child had been taking his medications for a while and had even had them the morning of his release. The program director said that if difficult child went into a MH crisis they would take him to the ER.

Heather thanks for the good thoughts. I didn't get any calls this weekend but that doesn't necessarily mean all is well. I spoke with the program director on Friday evening and shesaid that difficult child had a good day and that they were going to moniter him closely over the weekend due to not being able to get hiis medications for him. I haven't heard anything but I'll call on Monday and morning and make sure all is well. -RM
 
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