Maybe End of the Road for State and County Services

[DaisyFace]

So, I had my regular meeting with the State Supervisor today.

For those of you keeping track -

As of today, the NEW, new Behavior Therapist is out (due to being a fraud)
Old County MH office is out (due to our move to the neighboring county)
New County MH Office is out (due to super-scary SW who feels difficult child must have been sexually abused as an infant / toddler).

So I asked what was next? What are my options?

State Supservisor apologized and basically admitted that there isn't ANY service available through the state or county that will be better than OUR PARENTING. (Yes - you read that correctly!) She asked if I wanted to try and find a private therapist to work with difficult child (on my own dime, of course...) and I told her that would be tough to afford weekly sessions if they were not covered by insurance.

So - Supervisor is going to look around to see if there is anything at ALL that might be available...

And I have an "out" in which I can walk away -

I think I should take it!

 

[keista]

You know...... After all the hoops you had to jump through, after all the fights you've fought, after all the insanity these ppl have put you through, I'm guessing that if your only job is to parent difficult child, then life will be "easy" Yes, we must point out the irony that you probably went hunting for such services because parenting difficult child was "too hard". You just had no clue what dealing with government social services was going to entail!

 

[DaisyFace]

You know...... After all the hoops you had to jump through, after all the fights you've fought, after all the insanity these ppl have put you through, I'm guessing that if your only job is to parent difficult child, then life will be "easy" Yes, we must point out the irony that you probably went hunting for such services because parenting difficult child was "too hard". You just had no clue what dealing with government social services was going to entail!

LOL! Keista that's a funny way to look at it for sure!

Here I thought I couldn't handle my difficult child - so I got to deal with a whole TON of difficult child's...

and now that I have perfected my skills - I'm good to go!

Yep - probably so!

 

[TerryJ2]

Absolutely. Get out while the going is good.

 

[Bunny]

Ugh!! I'm so sorry, Daisy. It's just amazing that no one is able to help you get difficult child the help that she needs. And that SW's idea that she HAD to be molested when she was a baby is just ridiculous! I can tell you that I see my difficult child doing some of the very same behaviors that your difficult child does, and I can assure you that he was NEVER molested. Why would she think that molestation is the only reason that a child would behave this way? She's not a well read SW, that's for sure.

 

[buddy]

WOO HOO! Party time!!!

 

[InsaneCdn]

That whole layout in your orig post?
Get that acknowledged in writing.

(cya paper)

 

[whatamess]

Very ironic, but the truth is sometimes (a lot of times) WE really are the experts on our kids and no one else can come close to supporting the needs of our kids appropriately.

 

[InsaneCdn]

Very ironic, but the truth is sometimes (a lot of times) WE really are the experts on our kids and no one else can come close to supporting the needs of our kids appropriately.

Challenge is... way too often, there is nobody to support US in that process... (way too many of us around HERE know what that's all about.)

 

[JJJ]

LOL! Keista that's a funny way to look at it for sure!

Here I thought I couldn't handle my difficult child - so I got to deal with a whole TON of difficult child's...

and now that I have perfected my skills - I'm good to go!

Yep - probably so!

 

[whatamess]

I agree completely. I'm at the point of telling my school district, I'll make the plan, you provide me the staff!

Challenge is... way too often, there is nobody to support US in that process... (way too many of us around HERE know what that's all about.)

 

[klmno]

Yes- get what she said in writing if you can. This is basicly the same as what the family assessor from DSS concluded both times the GAL asked the judge to have DSS look into our situation- the DSS SW concluded that (in her words) "there was nothing the county or state could do that the parent was not already doing" and privately she told me I was doing more than they could ever do. The counselor in place now who is ordered by the PO and is supposedly an intensive in-home therapist is an intern who claims he'd deal with all the family issues but then says he's writing a tx plan which I speculate is outlining what private tx I should go get = family therapy- which is what I was trying to get anyway. So in reality, these agencies have nothing to give parents or families. They are there to soak public money for nothing, in my humble opinion.

 

[susiestar]

Get what the supervisor said in writing and then get o-u-t asap!!! All this has done is to provide further inconvenience and some people to blow sunshine up difficult child's keister with stories of scholarship money raining down from the heavens, and banks that will let her do what she wants with-o your approval.

I am glad that they fired the lying therapist though. That was crazier than most of them - unprofessional and who would expect a family to do that for them???

I am glad you got your 'out'!!!

 

[recoveringenabler]

Looks like you have your "exit strategy." Congratulations!!

 

[DaisyFace]

The thing that makes me the most angry about this whole thing is the fact that the program was touted to connect families to services that were not available through any other channel.

Instead, I think it is really geared to help kids get out of abusive homes. "Troubled" kids are identified and it is assumed that the behavior stems from a problem at home. And because they don't want to come right out and accuse the parents to their faces - they call it "Family Support Services" and use the kinds of words and phrases that will encourage cooperation from parents and caregivers.

So they make arrangements to get people in the home and do what are essentially parenting classes for the adults and they take the kids out to the mall and for ice cream to "give them a break" and "a sense of autonomy" and they try to "fix" the way the parents are treating the child.

And when the parents mess up and blow up at the child? The agency offers "respite" to the family by arranging for the child to spend a few days with an approved family while Mom and Dad cool off, get some more parenting skills, and learn how to avoid that sort of blow up again in the future.

This is a great system...unless the child really and truly has an issue.

And if the child does have an issue? The agency is completely out of their element. NONE of their in-home providers are versed in things like Personality Disorders. And their respite homes? Those are just for a good kid who needs a place to sleep for a couple of days. If the child is the one with a problem, those families don't want to be within hundred miles of that nightmare!

So here we are. The State Supservisor can finally admit that WE are not bad parents - and we probably have a lot more skills than the folks they are trying to put into our homes.

OK - great.

But an ackowledgement of my parenting skill is NOT what I was looking for - it's not what my family needed.

My CHILD still needs help.

And that's what is SO unfair.

I jumped through EVERY hoop. I followed every idiotic therapist and psychiatrist and SW and Behavior Therapist and MST Worker. I went through TWO different parenting programs. I called hospitals and universities and goverment agencies. If there was a possibility of help for my child in the entire state of South Carolina - I went after it.

And that's it. I have reached the end of the line. There is nothing left.

But is the problem "solved" ? Is everything better now? NO!

So what next?

Is it time to "Let go and Let G-d" ?

???

 

[InsaneCdn]

Time to get political - behind the scenes political.
Who in your state government is responsible for child welfare?
THEY need to get this picture.
The problem isn't that what is there is bad... it's that it only addresses one set of issues.
So... where else do we go?

I had to do a bit of that... so far, making minor dents in a couple of things. Every little bit helps.

 

[klmno]

DF I completely understand and yes, I think you are right about how they are viewing it and what these "therapies" are set up for. I don't think blaming the parent or the kid is the answer when our difficult children are exhibiting troubling behavior. Personally, I think our whole society these days sets it up for many kids to become difficult children and the people who are supposed to "help support" at-risk youth are really enabling worse behavior and more family turmoil most the time.

My son is 17yo now and showing a lot more maturity so I have decided to hang in there and do my best to tread water with the powers-that-be until he's over 18 and out of high school. If your signature is current and your daughter is still 16, I have no words of advice. Actually, I don't have any anyway because only you can decide wwhat is right for your family.

Maybe you can at least feel a little better about having validation, even if you are left with the frustration of knowing that they don't have any better answers than you do.

 

[exhausted]

DF-run don't walk away from all this. I am thrilled you have an out. They don't have help for you. There are sliding scale places around and even services through NAMI-can you get these in your area? Now you will have one less difficult child to deal with-yahoooooo!!!!!

 

[Tiapet]

Daisy, yes walk away. Interesting that just recently this is sort of a conversation I had with middle difficult child's worker. The agency we work with mainly works with kids that are either part of the CPS system or truly come from dysfunctional families. As she put it "the kids come home to chaos, live in chaos". Most of them don't necessarily have too many "true" mental health issues. While they offer a lot of different programs and she has knowledge of a lot of services, none of them truly 'help" those with mental health issues sadly. This isn't your state but I have seen this in several states I have now lived.

This CD board has more wisdom with us parents collectively and has gotten us through much more then most of our services. We are not the professionals but we know our way around and bounce off things to and with each other and get through what we need to because we have access to not just a single mind, or at least that is my thought. There are thoughts of all kinds and we come at things from that perspective to brain storm what's going on from any issue, including medications. This too is sad.

Clearly I've seen that the "professionals" end up being my back up "support" people instead of the treating professionals that they ought to be. The only thing that they actually are "treating" is in writing out the prescriptions because, well I don't have a degree or license to be able to do so or to write out for diagnostic tests. I also now consider the fact (from history) that if I don't have these professionals in my back pocket so to speak, there is no paper trail just in case things go south and accusations fly in the wrong direction. I can help or hurt, true, (and I've had both happen). It's just a matter of making sure that when ever building a team you be sure that you have good people on your team that can back you up should a problem arise. Hope this made sense to everyone.

 

[JJJ]

Clearly I've seen that the "professionals" end up being my back up "support" people instead of the treating professionals that they ought to be. The only thing that they actually are "treating" is in writing out the prescriptions because, well I don't have a degree or license to be able to do so or to write out for diagnostic tests. I also now consider the fact (from history) that if I don't have these professionals in my back pocket so to speak, there is no paper trail just in case things go south and accusations fly in the wrong direction. I can help or hurt, true, (and I've had both happen). It's just a matter of making sure that when ever building a team you be sure that you have good people on your team that can back you up should a problem arise. Hope this made sense to everyone.

That is so true. I have had several professionals tell me that I had more experience and knowledge regarding severe mental illness than they did. They simply become the support staff.