Kanga's over the edge even for the other youth

[JJJ]

Two of the other girls at Kanga's Residential Treatment Center (RTC) have approached staff (seperately) to voice their concerns about Kanga's inappropriate behavior around boys. The one is very concerned that Kanga is setting herself up to be raped (not sure if it would be rape cause in this mood she'd be a willing participant). Kanga was bragging that another boy wants to be her boyfriend and the girl may a comment that she thought Kanga needed to take a step back from boys. Well, it was on. Lots of name calling on Kanga's part, a lot of "oh no you didn't just call me that" on the other girls part. Staff got in between them before it became physical and the other girl walked away when requested. Staff worked with Kanga and got her calmed down enough to go to the next group. Staff call the on-call clinical team member and the clinician dropped Kanga to the lower behavior level. When Kanga was told, she tore open a LOCKED cabinet to get at her coat and shoes and said she was leaving. Two staff stood between her and the door and she repeatedly punched the wall but didn't touch them. She did end up pulling it together and went to bed. However, she stated her plan was to take care of business today at school and she didn't care if she went to juvie. School has been warned.

 

[susiestar]

Wow. How very scary for you to hear of this. How scary for the staff who have to deal with her. I hope that somehow they can get through to her some day. Was the cabinet flimsy or does she get that strong when she rages? I would be VERY wary when you visit her or if you have to transport her to the new Residential Treatment Center (RTC). If she is that strong maybe she should be sedated for the move.

How brave of the two girls to speak up to staff. That is probably a pretty rare thing, esp to have two do it at about the same time. I don't know how it would be looked on by the law. Hopefully her mental state would be taken into account if the legal system was involved.

Is she on daily birth control or something like norplant? I would go for the longest term form of bc you can find. Sooner or later she IS going to escape and find people to have sex with. At least you have kept it from happening before this (at least in a dangerous setting before now).

I can only imagine with horror where she would be if you had not adopted her. She has a lot more chance to learn to cope with the world with you advocating for her all these years. Even if it seems like all your efforts have done is exhaust and traumatize the family and esp you.

Hugs.

 

[TerryJ2]

Arg. Maybe this will get her some help?
This will be a rocky day for you, no doubt.
{{hugs}}

 

[JJJ]

Wow. How very scary for you to hear of this. How scary for the staff who have to deal with her. I hope that somehow they can get through to her some day. Was the cabinet flimsy or does she get that strong when she rages? I would be VERY wary when you visit her or if you have to transport her to the new Residential Treatment Center (RTC). If she is that strong maybe she should be sedated for the move.

How brave of the two girls to speak up to staff. That is probably a pretty rare thing, esp to have two do it at about the same time. I don't know how it would be looked on by the law. Hopefully her mental state would be taken into account if the legal system was involved.

Is she on daily birth control or something like norplant? I would go for the longest term form of bc you can find. Sooner or later she IS going to escape and find people to have sex with. At least you have kept it from happening before this (at least in a dangerous setting before now).

I can only imagine with horror where she would be if you had not adopted her. She has a lot more chance to learn to cope with the world with you advocating for her all these years. Even if it seems like all your efforts have done is exhaust and traumatize the family and esp you.

Hugs.

This wasn't the toughest cabinet but yes, she gets that strong when she is enraged. She is very dangerous at that point because she is so strong and doesn't care if she hurts anyone. I can guarentee she did not hit staff because she didn't want to be restrained -- not because she cared about hitting them.

Thankfully, since I refuse to transport her alone (have only done so twice in two years and then only a short way), current Residential Treatment Center (RTC) is transporting her to the new Residential Treatment Center (RTC) both for pre-placement visits and when she moves.

I'm not sure her mental state should be taken into account at this point. She has had intensive support and services for almost 4 years now (2 at home and 2 in Residential Treatment Center (RTC)). She is choosing to play games, fool people and not really engage in therapy. Maybe a short stint in juvy will wake her up. Realisitically, if she assault another child at school today, she will be arrested and spend the night in the local juvy and maybe have to stay there for a few days until her case gets heard in court, she will then be released to the Residential Treatment Center (RTC). Eventually, assuming she doesn't assault another person, she willbe found delinquent on the charge and will be order to comply with Residential Treatment Center (RTC) (so no consequence at all since she already is suppose to be complying with Residential Treatment Center (RTC)).

She is on daily birth control and we are working to get her on Norplant but that seems to be taking a while since we are dependent on Residential Treatment Center (RTC)'s part-time nurse to get it all set up.

Yes, I do wonder if we have made any positive difference in her life but I know she has made a negative difference in the rest of ours. I made a comment to the other 3 about how great their brother-sister relationships were within the 3 of them. They brought her up and said it's not the same. I said no, and it will never be the same because they are not growing up with her due to her issues and that it isn't their fault but she will never be the same kind of sister to them that Piglet is, simply because she isn't capable of it.

God, please let her leave them alone when they are all adults.

 

[JJJ]

Arg. Maybe this will get her some help?
This will be a rocky day for you, no doubt.
{{hugs}}

Terry, short of her having another psychiatric hospital stay, she is getting all available help. She is just refusing to use it. The current Residential Treatment Center (RTC) is very disappointed. They thought they had made progress with her. I warned them time and again that she wasn't improving as much as they thought. This is 99% the Kanga we gave them -- only improvement is that she didn't hit staff but I truly feel that is because she was heavily outnumbered (two standing with her and two more just a few feet away blocking the way to the other youth.

The main benefit of Residential Treatment Center (RTC) is to keep the rest of us safe and give the other 3 children a chance to grow up without living in fear everyday.

 

[JJJ]

We just had a meeting on Kanga with Residential Treatment Center (RTC) staff and the psychiatrist.

psychiatrist is going to add Trileptal to her medications. therapist is going to try and process this with her (therapist is still investigating Kanga's allegations that all these boys are hitting on her and want sex with her - but so far there is no confirmation that the boys are doing anything, this appears to be all Kanga). School sw is putting her on a special program at school to try and get through the last 7 days without a major incident (a support program not a punishment one). We (of course) are going to do a family session. Not sure how I can help anymore than I am but whatever I'll be on the conference call.

The best part of the meeting was psychiatrist's suggestion, "While she is obviously taking this to an inappropriate extreme, developmentally it is appropriate for her to be rebelling against her parent's ideals and to be trying to figure out who she is. What if everyone backed off and told her it was her choice."

Everyone else on the call busted up laughing. therapist said, "She'd be having sex within 5 minutes."


You can tell psychiatrist only sees the girls for about 15 minutes/month.

 

[susiestar]

Some "experts" are so clueless that they probably couldn't even function with training wheels.

LOVE that everyone else on the conference call laughed!

I pray that Kanga leaves the other kids alone when they are adults.

At least the Residential Treatment Center (RTC) keeps the rest of you from living in daily fear of kanga.

 

[JJJ]

School staff confronted Kanga about her allegations that she was doing inappropriate things with boys at school. Typical Kanga, when their questions and facts didn't fit her "reality" she got angry and stormed out of the school. Now she wants me to feel bad for her because she got another day of in-school suspension and has been banned from all end of year activities. Um, nope sounds like an appropriate consequence. Her idea of what they should have done - "just tell me I was bad". Yeah, that'll work.

5 more school days...let's see if she lasts
19 days until transfer to new Residential Treatment Center (RTC)...wish everyone luck

 

[gcvmom]

Regarding your concerns for the other three when they are older... any chance of a permanent restraining order against her at some point? I know that may sound horrible, but if she never stabilizes (and right now, unless they get a serious handle on her medications and they make a significant difference), I don't see there ever being a safe relationship between her and her sibs. And I know how you believe she has ulterior motives for whatever reunification possibilities there might be...

I'm so sorry, JJJ. I can hear the fatigue in your posts. I wish things were different.

 

[Wiped Out]

Saying some extra prayers tonight. Hugs to you.

 

[JJJ]

We couldn't get a RO at this point because in our state you cannot get a restraining order on a minor against her own home. And a RO only works if the person (1) understands what it means (2) cares about the consequences of violating it.

I'm hoping that if she continues down this path, that she kicks us out of her life and forgets about us. Once she turns 18, the new Residential Treatment Center (RTC) will assist with reunification with birthparents if she asks them.

 

[TerryJ2]

Oh, how sad.

I'm glad everyone laughed on the conf call. Yeah, some "experts" are fools.

In-school suspension sounds very appropriate.

 

[AnnieO]

We couldn't get a RO at this point because in our state you cannot get a restraining order on a minor against her own home.

Sigh. That's insane. Just another bit of proof that the system is way out of whack. So... If she got violent and actually badly hurt or killed someone in her own home, that would be OKAY? Not.

{{{{{HUGS}}}}} You're awesome. Glad the conf call went well.. Apparently psychiatrist hasn't a clue. Sigh.

 

[JJJ]

It keeps getting better. While investigate Kanga's allegations that all the boys were asking her for sex (no evidence and when confronted she admitted that she said it cause she knew they were thinking it but they didn't actually say it), they found out that something was going on.

Trying to keep this appropriate for this forum...during class, Kanga and Boy M were, um, providing manual enjoyment for each other. And some of the other boys watched.

I'm beyond disgusted.


This has resulted in her 2nd write-up for a sexual incident and her 3rd suspension in a month. So she has been suspended for the rest of the school year. Thank God it is not my problem to figure out how to keep her entertained while everyone else is at school.

 

[slsh]

Silly question, JJJ. Where on earth were staff? Kanga should be eyes-on supervision 24/7, period. While absolutely her behavior was inappropriate, I'd be holding the adults responsible as well. There is simply no *way* this should be going on. Is new Residential Treatment Center (RTC) up for this challenge?

Sorry, I know it's total Twilight Zone.

 

[AnnieO]

In class?????

Where on EARTH were the teachers?

Wow I'd be throwing a FIT at the school. It's one thing if they're hiding in a bathroom or under the bleachers, but - IN CLASS?

HUGS. And lots of them.

 

[timer lady]

JJJ, beyond believable that this is going on in school! I'm sure SD staff are in on Kanga's situation; where's the supervision? Incredible.

Saying that, I'm not surprised at the initial thought that Kanga is over the edge in this type of behavior(s). I've seen it in both my tweedles ~ it's ugly at best. There's such a gap between reality & how Kanga perceives the world. Hang tight - that transfer isn't far off.

You & yours aren't far from my thoughts on a daily basis.

 

[JJJ]

Where is staff? Good question.

The answer is that Kanga has done such a good job being a "sweet, wonderful girl" at school that the teachers don't believe that she is capable of these things. Since the first incident was just a kiss on the cheek, some of them dismissed it as young love. Clearly they can't excuse this away. All confirmed incidents happened in shop class - big room, lots of large pieces of equipmet to get in the teacher's line of site, a lot of time when the teacher is focused on helping a single child with a table saw, etc. The teacher feels like ****.

She was being escorted 1:1 in the hallways to keep her away from Boy T but she was not on any enhanced supervision in class. All of this is being reported to the new Residential Treatment Center (RTC) and they will (hopefully) be starting her on 1:1 supervision at all times outside of the unit.


I spoke with Kanga tonight, she reported that they didn't suspend her, that they expelled her. It will be interesting to see the actual write-up when it arrives in the mail. She also is very defiant and insists that she enjoyed it and will be doing it again. She also said people better not think things about her. I just laughed (not that it was funny, just stunningly disconnected from reality).

 

[helpme]

We couldn't get a RO at this point because in our state you cannot get a restraining order on a minor against her own home.

I don't know if I quite agree with this one. One would think that your state
might have a different policy to deal with such situations. Is it possible to
obtain a civil no contact order. The reason I am asking is because civil
no contact orders are issued by law enforcement or the courts with the
intention of preventing/securing financial responsibilities. Here, they
are mandatory if there are charges of domestic battery/assault.
Usually, they are 72 hours, and often mean that even adults or children
may not return "home" until after 72 hours. There should be some
method to stabilize everyone involved.

I would also wonder what your state policy is on becoming a Ward of
the State, does filing for an OP lead to Ward of the State issues?

 

[susiestar]

I don't understand how the whole thing works with the legal system, so no comments on RO's or OPs would make sense.

I bet the shop teacher feels like ****. He SHOULD. ALL the teachers should. They were warned. I am SURE Kanga was not so sweet and well behaved that there were not signs of this. The school just didn't want to deal with it. I hope someone has chewed that teacher out and the principal also.

Lets hope the new Residential Treatment Center (RTC) puts 1:1 supervision, eyes on student at all times, into her IEP. The whole situation is so totally Twilight Zone. Seems there has been little communication between school and Residential Treatment Center (RTC), or that school just ignored whatever they were told. At least they kept her away from boy T in the halls so he wasn't harassed by her.

While it is exhausting to have to hear about all of this, at least you do not have to handle it in person or deal with her during the consequences. I hope they find chores for her to do while the others are in school and she is suspended/expelled.

Hopefully at some point she will write you all off and stay away from you permanently. And that if reunited with the birth parents they don't all decide to "get" you because they are probably even less stable than she is.

hugs.