The Hardest Thing that I have EVER done...

...is to walk away from my daughter when we dropped her off at a residential treatment center (RTC) yesterday! The second hardest thing was to hear her voice on the phone later in the night begging us to come and pick her up. At this point she is feeling alone and hopeless, distrustful of everyone around her, and generally miserable. And I am a weepy mess!!! My heart keeps crying out with every breath, "I am NOT okay with this!" But I am still breathing and for today, that is enough.

So, what led us to this point??? It has been a slippery slide downhill for the past year. What started as the usual October cycling escalated when Mary's grandmother passed away in November. From there it was a series of medications losing their efficacy, growth spurts, changes in routine, cycling more and more, etc. We had come to the point of knowing that we probably needed to do a medication wash (take her off of all medicines and start fresh - all with the doctor's approval and direction, of course). However, we were not comfortable with any of the local inpatient units to serve this purpose. We tried to join a study group at NIH, but at the time, Mary was the only participant and they could not justify taking her off of all her medications for the knowledge that would be gained... and they were no longer doing any medication trials for bipolar kids. We decided to start the medication wash at home and see what happens all the while trying to find a good placement for her to complete it.

Our reasons behind not wanting to use the local phosp for this were numerous... she would no longer be on the children's unit, but the adolescent unit... which means she would be one of the youngest on the unit. She is fairly sheltered as far as what we expose her to and she is also young and naive for her age group. Her idea of trying to commit suicide was a butter knife to her thumb (which showed lack of know-how, not lack of intent). We really did not want to put her into a unit where the older teens could "educate" her on better ways to do this. We also know in our hearts that this is a MEDICAL condition and as such needs medical treatment. When her medications are right and her moods are stable, her behaviors fall in line. Not to say that she is a perfect kid. She is still quite the little sinner (just like me!) and needs correction and discipline, etc. The difference is that when she is not medically stable, all the "good parenting" in the world doesn't make a difference. She is physically not capable of controlling the behaviors. Our last stay at the local phosp resulted in no medication change at all and her coming away with the message that if she doesn't say she wants to kill herself then she won't have to go back to the hospital. That willpower can only carry her so far. So, all in all, we felt like we were better able and better equipped to "crisis manage" at home then they would be in the local hospital, and we can do that indefinitely.

What finally led us to the decision to put her in a RTC was not our need for a break. In fact, it will be much harder for us to have her away because we are not the type of parents to drop her off and ask them to call us when she is "fixed". We are very involved in her care and will probably be known by the staff as the "pain in the butt" parents who monitor everything! We will try to do it all with love and grace and in the most kind fashion, but at the end of the day, she is still our daughter and we don't trust anyone else entirely with her care! So, what really brought us to this point was the fact that she needs to heal. She needs round the clock medical monitoring while we complete the medication changes. She needs a different approach to therapy then she has been getting every week for the past 5 years since her diagnosis. She needs to fully recover from this long period of instability. We are hoping and praying that this stay at the RTC will give her just that!!!

Will it be easy??? Not on your life! It is going to be an uphill climb the entire time. But most things in life worth having are not easy to obtain.

Ways you can pray:

Pray for protection (spiritual, physical, emotional) for Mary while she is out of our care. There are many abused and neglected children in this facility and they are hurting. We want Mary protected from the influence of those hurts.

Pray that we can be a light in the midst of terrible darkness. Pray that the darkness would not consume any of us.

Pray that Mary would settle in and accept that this is a good thing for her. Right now she is only focused on wanting to go home.

Pray that insurance funding would be approved.

Pray for peace for our entire family in the midst of the chaos.

Pray that real healing can take place and that Mary will return to our family quickly.

Pray that medications can be regulated and that they will find something that will work for many years to come to stabilize her moods.

Pray that even in the midst of all of this, that God would be glorified.

Pray that we would have wisdom in making decisions regarding her care.

Thank you to all of you who pray faithfully for us and who support us during these trying times.