The Prodigal Daughter Didn't Return

Danielle's visit turned out to be substantially different than what I expected.  She came to town a week early, interfering with plans for me and my sweetheart to leave town to visit his mother.  We had to change plans at the last minute so we'd be in town and available to attend Danielle's birthday party.

Despite all her talk about moving back, by the time her birthday rolled around, her plans had changed.  She planned to go back across the border after her visit, but promised to sign up for Job Corps on her way home.  She'd stay with her biological family until she could enroll, and then she'd get on with her life.

The plan sounded really great.  It's a shame she didn't follow through.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised.  Danielle has always talked a great talk, but rarely followed through on achieving goals or doing things that required much in the way of dedication or effort on her part.  As far as I know, she's still living with her biological aunt where she's not going to school and doesn't have a job.

For the most part, her visit was pleasant.  I guess I got something of a quasi-apology for her past behavior.  She admitted she had been a "difficult child" and had regrets.  I can only guess what she meant by that, because she didn't elaborate.

It sounds like her life with her biological family has been less than wonderful.  Danielle reported that a family member had been stealing her clothing and selling it for drug money.  Another family member is seriously ill, leaving Danielle in charge of childcare.  While I guess she is being useful, I worry that she's not developing the skills that will lead her to success later in life.  That disappoints me.

Still, I am relieved that she decided not to move back to town.

While Danielle stayed with FosterEema for about two weeks, I saw her only a handful of times.  Since we had to change our plans to pay my sweetie's mother a visit, we were out of town the second weekend she was here.  We didn't see her when we returned, because we came home with a very bad cold and didn't want to share the germs.

We invited Danielle and FosterEema over to have waffles as a celebratory birthday breakfast.  It was odd having the two of them in the house.  Even though this is the home we had shared for years, they both felt like strangers.  In a way, it was almost as if FosterEema and I had never been a couple, and Danielle  was never our child.

Odd feeling, that.  I give lots of credit to my sweetheart who was kind and polite to both of them, even though he has no reason to be.  He is a good man, and I'm grateful to have him in my life.

The Prodigal Daughter Returns?

While the title of this post might seem a little odd because I am Jewish, I still thought it somewhat apt, given the circumstances.

I've heard secondhand that Danielle plans to return for a visit.  At last word, she'll stay with FosterEema for a few days.  After that, my understanding is that she plans to move back to my fair city.

No, she will not live with me.

At last word, Danielle was hoping to move in with a male friend she knows from her time at the charter school.  I don't know who he is, or anything about his living situation, but I fear this could be a recipe for disaster.

Just the idea of Danielle moving coming back to town has stirred up a lot of big feelings for me.  The truth is, I'm not entirely sure I want to see her.  While it's been nearly a year since we've had any face-to-face time, I feel reluctant to bring her back into my life.

While I've done my best to forgive Danielle for her final explosion in 2013, I haven't been able to forget what she did.  She caused hundreds of dollars of damage to the house and hit me hard enough the police arrested her and sent her to juvenile hall.  It was the sixth time we had to call 911.

I'm not without sympathy or empathy for her and her problems.  I also see that a year hasn't been enough time for her to change in any meaningful way.  Danielle hasn't completed high school or gotten her GED.  She's not working.  She's spent the last 11 months bouncing from one birth family member to another.

My stepmother often repeats the phrase, "Wherever you go, that's where you are."  I think Danielle has moved about thinking that all her problems are caused by the people around her.  Before FosterEema and I split, she blamed me for her difficulties.  Once she and FosterEema had their own place, suddenly everything was FosterEema's fault.  As she travels from home to home, the same problems reoccur, but Danielle doesn't understand her role in them.  People are, it seems, grossly unreasonable for expecting her to contribute in a meaningful way to the household.

I fear that Danielle will move in with her male friend, only to discover that all the problems she had living with me, FosterEema, and her birth family are still there.  Sure, there will be different people, but the difficulties always seem to be the same.  She hasn't learned the world doesn't owe her a living.

It's sad.

My biggest worry is that she'll end up blowing out of her living situation and end up on my doorstep, homeless.  My sweetheart and I have discussed this possibility, and we both agree that we cannot allow Danielle to live with us.  While my man is a very sweet and generous soul, he isn't ready to take on the role of stepfather to an extremely troubled, and sometimes violent, young adult.  I do not wish to again live with a young woman who verbally and physically abused me.

If she ends up homeless, the most I can do is be a sympathetic ear and to offer the best advice I can in the moment.

I hope it doesn't come to that.

Even my father and stepmother, who have long been Danielle's most ardent supporters, feel the same way.  While they are okay with her visiting for a few days, they've made it clear they aren't willing to live with her.  My stepmother remarked that Danielle clearly needs help, but she won't take even the smallest steps to help herself.  We've suggested she enroll in programs like Teen Challenge, Job Corps, or return to high school, but so far she hasn't shown any interest.

Without a diploma, GED, job skills she has guaranteed herself the hardest life possible.

Abandonment?

35 days have passed since Danielle's 18th birthday.  The last I heard from her was 34 days ago.

I am not surprised by the lack of communication.  In the end, it was pretty clear there wasn't much of a bond between us.  FosterEema has received some texts from Danielle, most of them focused on Danielle's desire to come home.

FosterEema, quite understandably, has been steadfast in her refusal to allow Danielle to live with her again.

Danielle accused FosterEema of abandonment.

I found myself shaking my head when FosterEema shared that round of communication with me.  Danielle was the one who, against all advice, withdrew from school, packed up all the stuff she could carry, and moved out of state.  It was she who made the decision to leave.

How is FosterEema abandoning her by refusing to rescue Danielle from an unwise adult decision?

For the record, Danielle is not at risk of becoming homeless or starving.  She's staying with members of her birth family.  As near as I can tell, she's simply suffering from a case of The Grass is Always Greener on the Other Side of the Fence.

Abandonment?  I don't think so.  FosterEema explained that Danielle had made decisions about how she treated people for the past seven years, and that she had also made the choice to move out.  Part of being an adult is to experience the consequences of one's decisions.

I agree.

I'm also sad.  I've been monitoring Danielle's social media accounts, and so far I haven't seen her post much that would indicate she is being productive.  She hasn't posted that she's enrolled in school or found a job.  She has written remarks that suggest she has been drinking.

Sigh.

It's incredibly sad.

Although my posts might imply otherwise, I don't spend a lot of time dwelling on Danielle.  FosterEema and I did the all we knew how to do.  Perhaps it wasn't enough, or the best.  However, we did fight for her.  We tried to do the right thing.

Was it the right thing?  It's hard to know.

These days, I spend most of my time working, repairing the house, and cultivating a new relationship.  My life is incredibly peaceful.  I no longer have to lock my bedroom door at night, worrying about what Danielle might do next.  I feel as if a huge weight has been lifted from my shoulders.

My finances are in order.  My house is clean.  While I still feel somewhat overwhelmed when I think about all that has transpired over the past seven years, I realize that it's over.  It's time for me to move on to the next thing, whatever that is.

Failure or Success

I think most parents would be disappointed if their child withdrew from school on his or her 18th birthday.  Certainly that's not the future that we imagined, all those years ago, when we adopted Danielle.

Looking back, I can't remember what I had imagined for her.  Certainly when we started fostering and the extent of Danielle's problems weren't known, we had great hopes for her.  We figured she'd be able to catch up, graduate from high school, and eventually go on to college.

We hoped that we'd be able to break the generational cycle of abuse, neglect and unwanted children.

I fear we didn't make much of a difference, or at least not the difference we wanted to make.  We wanted to give her a successful life.  A high school diploma was just one step in that process.

Will she enroll in high school in her new city?  Unknown.  I don't know if I'll even hear from her.  When she arrived at her destination, we exchanged the following text messages:

Danielle: Made to XXXX
Me: Glad you are safe.  Good luck to you. :-)
Danielle: thank you

And that's the last I heard from her.

So in large measure, I feel as if we failed.  We wanted to "fix" Danielle.  We wanted to take her out of the impoverished and abusive life that she'd led for her first decade and give her something better.  We wanted to give her a leg up into the middle class.

We failed.

And yet, we did make a difference.  Granted, the difference we made was much smaller than we'd envisioned, but it was there just the same.

When Danielle came to live with us at almost 11 years old, she didn't know how to read.  She didn't know her alphabet.

I taught her to read.  I used a book called Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons.  It was a great help.  Night after night we sat together and went over the lessons.  It worked.  In just over three months, Danielle went from being completely illiterate to being able to read Dr. Seuss.

That made a difference.

Wherever she goes and whatever she does in life, she will carry my gift with her.

We also managed to help her reach the age of 18 without any pregnancies.  By keeping her away from boys and insisting she receive an implantable contraceptive, we made a difference in her life.  While she's still starting out at a huge disadvantage by not having a high school diploma, at least she's not starting off even further behind by too-early motherhood.

That's something, too.

Now that Danielle has moved back with her biological family, I feel a mixture of sadness and relief.  I'm sad because we wanted so much more for Danielle.  We weren't the right family for her, and we never should have adopted her.  Given the choices available (adopt her or return her to foster care) we did what we thought was right.  We didn't get the help or resources we should have received.  We did our best, even though it wasn't good enough.

I'm sad too, because I don't believe that there was a mythical "perfect family" out there for her.  If we had given up, she would have gone back to foster care.  Just like her older biological half-sister, she would have bounced from home to home to home until she aged out.

I am also relieved.  Danielle will no longer be able to hit me or my former spouse.  She will no longer be able to damage my property or make violent threats without consequence.  I no longer have to live in fear of a child or sleep with my bedroom door locked.

Danielle's behavior didn't improve (as some suspected it would) after she and FosterEema moved out.  When I'd speak to FosterEema, she'd tell me, Danielle is Danielle.  Her pattern of disobedient, defiant, and disrespectful behavior continued.  She made threats of violence.  She began to ditch school. FosterEema (with her insurance from her new job) began seeing a counselor so she could better cope with the unbelievable stress.

In less than three months after they moved away, the situation became untenable.  Although Danielle completely believed that everything would be just perfect once I was out of the picture, she simply found a new person to combat.

I fear that it won't be long before she repeats that pattern with her birth family.

Even my extended family feels a huge sense of failure.  They all fought so very hard for Danielle.  My father paid many thousands of dollars in attorney's fees to help us fight to keep Danielle. My extended family invested their hearts and their time trying to help her, to bond with her, and to love her.

Danielle did the one thing that everyone wanted her to avoid.  She quit school.  She left without saying goodbye.

In the end, I think that Danielle was never our daughter.  Her heart, her mind and her soul always remained with her birth family.  We always knew that she would one day return to them.  We'd just hoped we'd be able to keep her long enough for her to finish high school.

While the so-called professionals love to sell the idea of a "forever family" to prospective foster and adoptive couples, I think the reality doesn't exist.  This is especially true with older child adoption where the kid knows, loves and misses his or her biological connections.

And perhaps, it is as it should be.

Danielle never should have been adopted.  We never should have been forced into the position of having to choose between adoption or sending her back to foster care.  Ideally, she should have remained in our care in a permanent fostering arrangement until her 18th birthday.  She should have received better mental health care and preparation for the day when she'd return to her family.

We did the best we could.  Danielle is out in the world and on her own.  Only time will tell whether her life will be a failure or a success.

18

It has been over a year since I posted here.

Today Danielle turned 18.

If there is anyone still hoping for updates on our story, here they are.

In July 2012, FosterEema asked for a divorce, though the reasons weren't what you would expect.  She decided that she would like to pursue relationships with men.  There was no infidelity, no affair, just a change in her orientation.

Last February, Danielle exploded.  She did considerable damage to the house and attacked us, injuring me.  She spent 21 days in juvenile detention, received some heavy duty counseling services (ones that we had requested and had been denied years before) and six months probation.

In April of this year, FosterEema and I signed a get, a document that grants a Jewish religious divorce.  We've delayed filing for civil divorce in order to to make the paperwork simpler and to maintain our health insurance.  Now that Danielle is an adult, I expect we will be filing soon.

We remained together as family, with FosterEema and I functioning as platonic roommates, until July of this year.  The original plan was for us to remain together until Danielle's 18th birthday, but FosterEema found a job in a neighboring county that required her to relocate.  Danielle moved with her, as I was afraid to be left alone with her.

Her challenging behavior continued after the move.

Danielle was scheduled to graduate from high school this coming June, but she has decided to withdraw.  Her biological half-brother, who lives in another state, has sent her a bus ticket.

While I'm happy that Danielle will finally get what she wants -- to be reunited with her birth family -- I fear this decision is not in her best interests.  I fear this move will prevent her from getting her high school diploma.

But of course she is an adult now, and she can make her own choices.

A Tearful Apology

Yesterday afternoon, Danielle called my stepmother to apologize for her lie.  She sobbed out her tearful apology, saying that she had made a mistake and had "misunderstood" something that we said.

My stepmother seemed pretty gracious in accepting the apology, but she did ask Danielle if it was really a misunderstanding, or if it was just a lie.

What did we say that Danielle claimed to misunderstand?

During our family therapy appointment, when it came out that Danielle was off her meds, we said we needed to make sure that my stepmother (or father) actually watched Danielle take her pill, so that we could be sure she wasn't skipping her dose.

How that managed to get twisted into it is my stepmother's fault Danielle wasn't taking her pills is beyond me.

Despite Danielle being back on her medications since Thursday evening, things still aren't back to normal here.  When I tried to talk to Danielle about her lie, she called me a bunch of names, and walked off, shouting some elementary school version of I'm a mirror and everything you stay goes back to you!

Real mature.  This coming from an almost-17-year-old.

An hour later, Danielle came back and tearfully apologized to me as well.  I accepted her apology, but I also realize that her apologies are absolutely meaningless.

As I wrote about in my old blog, there are three components to an apology:

1. The apology itself.
2. Making amends for the wrongdoing.
3. Not repeating the act again.

Danielle's an absolute pro at the first item on the list, but I can't think of a time where she's managed to complete the other two.

Sure, she might be extremely sorry in the moment, but all of the regret in the world doesn't seem to be sufficient to motivate her to change her behavior.

Nothing changes her behavior.

Maybe she's just not capable.  Certainly her doctors, therapist and teachers think she should be able to do better.

Me?  I don't know.  I worry about her future.  In 13 months, she'll turn 18, and she'll be out on her own.  FosterEema and I have had some long, hard talks lately, and we both agree we are going to ask Danielle to leave (if she doesn't go on her own accord) when she becomes a legal adult.

It's not a decision we like.  Danielle will turn 18 long before she graduates high school.  Although we did discuss the possibility of her staying until she graduates, the latest explosion makes it clear it's not a workable option.

Danielle is currently a minor, so we have no choice but to put up with her fits of temper, defiance, name-calling and episodes of violence.  Once she is 18, we are no longer obligated to put up with this sort of behavior in our home.

We know Danielle won't be ready to launch.

We are tired of being verbally abused and traumatized by our child's rages.

It's not a pretty choice.

A Sober Realization

Yesterday evening, we made our regularly-scheduled trip to the family therapist.  One of the things we discussed at that meeting was Danielle's recent explosion.

Danielle admitted to the therapist that she had stopped taking her medication.

Why?

She doesn't like taking it, and wanted to see if she could get by without it.

I realize that medical non-compliance is very common among the mentally ill.  I also recognize that Danielle is not safe living in our home without it.

She is almost 17 years old.  We cannot make her take her pills.

At the last appointment, Danielle's psychiatrist instructed us to stop supervising her medication.  She told us that Danielle needs to learn how to manage her medications on her own.

It didn't work out so well.

We are just over a year away from her 18th birthday.  Now that we've witnessed how quickly she decompensates without medication, it is even more abundantly clear that she cannot continue to live here after she becomes an adult.

I hope that we can find some sort of alternative for her that doesn't involve driving her down to the homeless shelter on her 18th birthday.

I am not sure that we can.

Of Meltdowns, School Testing, and Cavities

In the past, the longest we've been able to go without some sort of violent outburst has been about six months.  This time around, we've made it about eight, but it looks like that streak of calm is coming to an end.

Yesterday, Danielle lost it in a big way.  She had a meltdown, complete with crying, screaming, ranting, raving, calling names, and throwing things around in her room.  Although she didn't get violent against people, it's behavior like this that usually indicates that a violent explosion is just around the corner.

The day before, she had started with some pretty amped-up, out-of-control rudeness, defiance, and disrespect.  This is also a harbinger of an impending explosion.

The triggers to both of these episodes?  It was the same old thing: we asked Danielle to help out around the house.  The first episode happened when we asked her to help out with some household chores.  The second episode started when we asked her to clean her room because something in there was starting to stink.

After crying, screaming, and carrying on to the nth degree, she finally discovered the source of the smell -- she had some wet, soggy papers stashed somewhere, and they were starting to mold.

In another recent development, we got Danielle's state mandated testing results back.  Not surprisingly, she still has not achieved proficiency in English/Language Arts or Math.  It's discouraging, because her failing scores on the state mandated tests mean she will likely not pass our state's high school exit examination.

And then, just to add more unfortunate news to the pile, Danielle had another four cavities when she went for her six-month dental checkup.  The dentist said she's not doing an adequate job of brushing and flossing.

She'll turn 18 in just a bit over a year.  When that birthday arrives, she'll most likely lose her state-sponsored health insurance.  Even if the current political climate changes that, she will definitely lose her dental coverage.  Our state system does not offer any dental coverage for those over 18, no matter how serious their problem.

I explained to Danielle that if she doesn't learn to brush soon, she's potentially facing a very painful toothache and a lot of costly dental bills.  With as many cavities as she's had, I'm worried she might not have any teeth left by the time she turns 35.

It's just a sad, sad situation.

As for my dearth of blogging lately, I've been gone for a number of reasons.  First off, there hasn't been much to write about on the Danielle front (positive or negative) so there hasn't been much to say.  I've been working on a number of other writing projects, which have somewhat diluted my enthusiasm for blogging.  Also, work's been crazy busy of late, so what little time I do have available, it's not really being spent here.

Still, I figured an update was warranted, especially because it sure looks like an explosion is nigh.

In-School Services On Line

I apologize for my unannounced, and rather long, blog absence.  Since the middle of February, I've had a lot of stuff going on in my personal life that has had nothing to do with Danielle's behavior.  It's left me with a huge lack of time, energy and motivation to write about the same.

Although most of the events that have taken me away fall into the category of good news, two are certainly not.  FosterEema has received news that one of her grandparents is expected to pass away, after battling Alzheimer's Disease for many years.  This news has had a profound effect on our family.

I have an extended family member who is facing surgery and a long recovery from a procedure designed to ameliorate some long-standing pain issues.  As the geographically-closest family member, the responsibilities of post-operative care and basic housekeeping will fall to me.  I expect that over the next few weeks or months, I may be posting even less.  I just don't see myself as having much in the way of free time as I try to juggle the responsibilities of running a business full time, managing my family duties and relationships, and caring for a recovering family member.  I will be back; it just may take some time.

So that's the bad news.  There are several pieces of good news which also have contributed to my absence.

I've launched a couple of other writing endeavors (a new blog and a novel) that have been sucking up almost all of my free time.  Neither of these projects have anything to do my family, foster/adoptive parenting, or the badly-broken child welfare system, and being able to focus on something intensely positive has been quite a relief.  Although the situation with Danielle hasn't changed, having something that makes it easier to ignore everything going wrong in our family is a welcome distraction.

We will be adding a new companion animal to our home.  After Sir Spudly's passing, we had planned to wait a while before adding another critter to the house.  Several lucky coincidences happened, enabling us to add a new friend.

I learned that I will receive an award for some volunteer work.

The camping season has officially started in our area, and we had the opportunity to take a short trip during Spring Break.  Danielle did not go with us on this trip, as she was staying with the grandparents, but it gave us a welcome and badly-needed break.

So, those are the reasons for my long absence.  Now, here's the update on Danielle, which I think is why most of you are reading my blog.

First off, it seems that we've managed to get the problem with Danielle's in-school counseling  straightened out.  A few brief e-mails and phone calls later, everybody on Danielle's team at school realized that someone had screwed up.  Within a day, a plan was created to fix the problem.  Within two days, we were at Danielle's school, signing authorization papers for her to begin individual counseling.

While we were at school, we again raised the issue of Danielle's desperate need to have some sort of transitional living plan.  The school agreed that Danielle's current plan, which is to examine the feasibility of moving out of state, working as a waitress, joining the military and going to medical school, isn't really an adequate educational goal.  We have a year and a half left, people, so we need to be working towards attainable goals, not examining the feasibility of those that are completely out of reach.

For some kids, moving out of state, saving money, joining the military and going to medical school are attainable goals.  For Danielle, these goals seem pretty lofty, especially since her size and psychological conditions will keep her out of the military, and her lack of interest in learning, especially when any sort of reading is required, will most certainly keep her from meeting the prerequisites for medical school.

Danielle regularly repeats a phrase that claims reading causes a terrible, difficult-to-treat, and often fatal, disease.

It makes me sad when I think of all the things she is missing because she simply hates to read.

Now that in-school counseling is coming on line, we are now at a point where we sit and wait.  Danielle's new therapist will have to establish some rapport with her, and we'll have to see where that goes.  We are also, of course, waiting to see if her new medications will create a permanent change in her behavior.  Her behavior has been better since she started the new anti-depressant during the second week of March, and the new anti-psychotic earlier this month, but it's hard to tell if the medication is truly working, or if this is simply a placebo effect.  When she first started her previous antidepressant, it seemed to work for a short while, but then her tantrums and explosions grew worse, not better.

So, we are back to waiting and seeing.

Psychiatric Follow-Up

Recently, we paid a follow-up visit to Danielle's psychiatrist.  As planned, she made some adjustments to Danielle's medication regimen.  She left her at the same relatively low dose of the new anti-depressant she started last month, and added a new drug that will function as a mood stabilizer.  I think it will be interesting to see how this medication affects Danielle's behavior, as this drug is classified as an atypical anti-psychotic.  She has expressed some pretty delusional thinking at times, and I hope this will provide some relief in that area.

The psychiatrist seemed to think that the new drug will help Danielle solidify her identity.  I see this as a positive, as I have sometimes wondered if she even had one.  She has no interests, no hobbies, and nothing really motivates her.  She often reminds me of a chameleon, taking on the coloration and characteristics of the friend she happens to be with.  I've wondered, for a very long time, where is the authentic Danielle?

I have a hard time believing that her true self is limited to being The One Who Rages.  There has to be more to her than that, but it is invisible and unknowable, at least in her unmedicated state.

Here's to hoping the medication works.

The doctor also shared with us a rather discouraging factoid.  She said that kids Danielle's age, with the issues she has "almost never" experience successful adoptions when they are adopted. Although the county is always happy to see these kids find "forever" families, they are rarely happy and successful in their new homes.

Our unfortunate outcome, seems to be the rule and not the exception.

If that wasn't depressing enough, we got some more discouraging news.  The psychiatrist told us, after having time to look over Danielle's file in detail, that she felt that it was reasonable to confirm a diagnosis that we'd asked about at least five years ago.  Unfortunately, for all of us, Danielle didn't receive help for it when she was younger, and possibly more malleable.  Still the psychiatrist told us that even though there are supposed "experts" who specialize in treating kids with this particular disorder, there is no scientific evidence that the treatments actually work, and a growing body of evidence that at best they don't work, and at worst do more harm than good.

The doctor's remarks made us curious, so we started doing some research.  Some of the stuff we learned was pretty stomach-churning.  It turned out that the discipline program that our county teaches and encourages all foster parents to use was created by someone who has been highly criticized, and who later lost his license.  We spent quite a bit of time researching all of this, and even the program that has been claimed to be the most effective "evidence-based" treatment wasn't tested using true scientific method.

It turns out, if you talk to real scientists, there is no agreed-upon treatment for Danielle's disorder, and there is no consensus that anything really works.  Sure, there are anecdotal tales from families that claim that x treatment or y treatment helped their troubled child, but no scientific, double-blind studies that have proven that anything works.

When we met with our family therapist this week, we shared what the psychiatrist had said, and what we had found in our research.  She confirmed what we had discovered, and we all agreed that we have a child who cannot be fixed.  Danielle can be given training and coping skills to better deal with her problems, and we can always hold out hope for a better future, but she will likely not be "cured," at least in any traditional meaning of the word.

There are some physical injuries from which the majority of people do not recover.  Spinal cord injuries, for example, rarely heal to the point that a quadriplegic has completely recovered.  Someone who suffers a complete separation of the spinal cord will likely never walk again.  I think, in this case, that Danielle suffered permanent psychological injuries as a child that are so severe she will never recover.

Is there such a thing as a spinal cord injury to the soul?

Perhaps there is.

Both the psychiatrist and the family therapist understand why Danielle will not be able to live with us past her 18th birthday, and so the focus is beginning to change.  We are all acutely aware that she is a mere 18 months away from becoming emancipated, and we all see a certain amount of urgency in helping Danielle come up with a workable plan for independence.

The troubling thing, we all realize, is that Danielle may not be willing to put in the work required to execute that plan.

Walking in Circles

In just a bit more than 18 months, Danielle will become a legal adult.

In a year and a half, she is going to need to have a job, money saved up, and be ready to move into her own place.

She isn't going to be ready.  We know that.  I think, perhaps, on some level she even knows that, though she doesn't want to face that reality.  In her mind, she's going to turn 18, and suddenly, magically, have a great job, all the money and skills that she needs, and she'll be able to move out and live a successful, middle-class lifestyle.

It ain't gonna happen.

Danielle isn't going to be ready to live life on her own, but it has become abundantly clear to all of us that she isn't going to be able to stay here, either. 

We don't want to simply drive her to the local homeless shelter on her 18th birthday and drop her off.  Sure, it is an option, but it's certainly not a desirable one.  It's not the outcome we would choose for our kid if some other workable solution exists.  There has to be some kind of social service safety net for mentally ill youth to fall back on.

I have been told by several people, both online and in real life, that there are supposed to be transitional services for mentally ill youth.  Over the past few weeks, I've been making phone calls, but I feel like I am a hamster running on a wheel.  I call Agency A, who tells me to call Agency B.  I speak to a nice someone at Agency B, who tells me to go talk to the people at Agency A.  When I explain that I've already done that, then I'm told to go back and talk to the nice people at the county, because Adoptions Assistance surely ought to pay for something.

We've already talked to them, too.  When we spoke to them, we were given the basic message,  you adopted her, now she's your problem.

I feel like I am walking in circles, and going absolutely nowhere.

Today I spoke to a helpful person at an agency who said, "you just need to know what your rights are."  He suggested that if I just spoke to the right person, the gates would be unlocked and our kid would receive a ton of help.

It's all very well and good to say this, but he couldn't give me the name of the person I should talk to.

"Just go talk to someone in Adoptions Assistance," he advised.

He didn't seem to understand that there isn't "someone in Adoptions Assistance" to call.  This person doesn't exist, and in the past when we've called our former adoptions worker, she's been no help.

"I'm sorry, I can't help you," we were told.  She had no suggestions of where to go next with our troubles, either.

I found several agencies who, at least according to their Web sites, are supposed to help provide services to mentally ill youth.  Yet I have found, when I call them, that they don't return calls promptly, and even when they do they have no help for me, other than instructions to call the next agency.

Sigh.

Another Helpful Person told me something discouraging.  "Even if you get all these services set up for your daughter," she explained, "being that she will be a legal adult she'll have the choice of opting out."

So does that mean I should stop trying to find my kid help?  I know that if she gets into a transitional program, she'll no doubt have a hard time following the rules.  Will she even be willing to try?

I don't know.

I just keep making phone calls, knowing that my child will turn 18 long before she'll be ready to receive her high school diploma.  I keep calling people, hoping that we'll find the right gatekeeper to get our kid into some sort of vocational and independent living skills program so she might have a chance at a job and a self-sufficient lifestyle.

I keep calling, but I keep getting nowhere.

Will Danielle Leave When She Turns 18?

In response to Is it Better to Disengage than to Argue?, ricecakesandredemption asked:

I'm just curious -- do you really think Danielle will leave when she [is] old enough?

The short answer to this question is yes.

There are several reasons why Danielle will leave when she's 18.

The first reason is very simple: Danielle doesn't want to live here.  She frequently talks about how she can't wait until she's 18, and she can move out.  She regularly fantasizes about a world in which she doesn't have to live with us and our "stupid rules."  She looks forward to the day where we (and everyone else, for that matter) won't be able to tell her what to do.

She wants to leave, and she has several escape plans in mind.  She consistently expresses a desire to leave the minute she is able.

In all honesty, I'm not sure how workable any of her plans are.  The main idea is that she will move in with other people.  Some variations involve her moving in with friends, while others involve living with members of her birth family.  I'm not sure how any of these plans will work out, as our friends have already told Danielle she's not welcome to move in, and her birth family isn't capable of providing her with a stable living arrangement, even if they were willing.

Even if she does manage to convince someone to allow her to move in, she's going to have a big surprise coming.  Nobody is going to be willing to allow her to live there for free.  She's going to have to get a job and support herself, and it's clear she has no idea of the difficulties that face her.

I'm not going to bother trying to argue the merits of her exit plans with her.  She'll find out how workable they are in a year and a half from now.  For her sake, I'd like to hope that things will work out.  Based on our past experience with her behavior, I fear they will not.  Danielle is handicapped by that magical thinking that gets in the way of her seeing the true reality of the world that faces her.

I believe that Danielle will leave, of her own volition, when she turns 18.

That, I think, would be the best possible outcome for all of us.

If it turns out that Danielle doesn't leave when the time comes, it won't be because she is freely choosing to stay here.  She will stay because she will have realized that life in the big, bad world is too difficult.  She won't choose to stay here because she wants to be here; instead, she'll be staying because her plans to move out and be independent have been foiled for one reason or another.  Living here will be her undesirable second choice, and I can only see that as being a breeding ground for conflict.  She will be angry that her plans haven't worked out, and I foresee her taking her disappointment out on us.

Given that, if Danielle doesn't move out under her own power, she will move out with our encouragement.

The sad reality is, even when things are going relatively well around here, it's not good enough.  Sure, making it through an hour, a day, or even a week or two without a major temper tantrum is a huge victory.  When things are calm, and Danielle is not breaking things, she's a lot nicer to live with.

But even that isn't really enough.  As I wrote about before, peace doesn't mean that things are perfect around here, or that they are even all that good.  Danielle is still difficult to live with, even when she's not exploding all over the place like the cement mixer featured in the show Mythbusters.  She is still uncooperative, argumentative, disrespectful and unpleasant, and I do not see these behaviors changing any time in the near future.

Even if Danielle was somehow able to magically transform herself into a cooperative, agreeable, respectful and pleasant young adult, we still have the more fundamental problem of her impulsiveness and poor decision-making skills.  She is grossly irresponsible, and even if all of her unpleasant characteristics were to suddenly disappear, we still have the problem of being completely unable to trust her.

At 16.5 years old, Danielle cannot be left alone in our home even for as long as it would take for us to go to the store.  I don't see this magically changing when she becomes an adult, so I find myself wondering how her continuing to live with us could be workable.  If she's 18, we can't very well force her to go with us everywhere we go, yet we can't trust her to stay home alone when we aren't there.

Even if Danielle's decision-making skills weren't called into question, we still have the problem of the kids with whom she chooses to associate.  With the exception of one friend, the kids she chooses are not the kind of people we want around our home.  These are kids who, at least in my day, would have been called "troublemakers."  I don't feel safe inviting them to our home when we are here, and I certainly wouldn't want them over when we were not.

For all of these reasons, all signs point towards the exit when Danielle turns 18.

I can't say I feel good about this reality.  I know that Danielle is unprepared for life as an independent young adult.  I also realize that, for all the reasons I've explained above and a few that I choose not to share publicly, her continuing to live here is unworkable.  She is on a collision course with a destiny we had hoped adoption would prevent.

When Danielle becomes an adult and we are no longer required to support her, the rules of the game change.  Right now, we tolerate living with a mentally ill, and physically and verbally aggressive person because the law says that we must.  Once we are relieved of that obligation, why should we continue to tolerate her unsafe behavior? 

Asking an abusive young adult to leave our home, if she doesn't choose to leave on her own, isn't about being mean.  It is about responsible self-care and being safe in our home.  If we don't feel safe with her staying here now, while she is still a technically a child, how is that going to change when she's an adult?

It isn't going to change.

Knowing that Danielle isn't and likely won't be ready doesn't make me feel very good about this decision.  It pains me greatly as I recognize she is likely going to repeat many of the same mistakes made by her birth mother.  It makes me sad to know that I can't help my kid.  I feel great anguish when I recognize she is the horse, dying of thirst, even though she is standing chest-deep in a fresh, clean river.

I can't make Danielle change.  I can't cure her mental illness, nor can I force her to become interested and motivated to learn.  I can't change her past.  I can't fix her.  We've done our best to help her, but clearly it hasn't been good enough, nor will it ever be.

This isn't about throwing our kid out in some form of vindictive punishment for her difficult behavior over the years since her adoption.  This isn't about retribution, or even about whether or not we care about the kid.  We do care.  This is about the fact that our current situation isn't safe, nor will it be safe after she becomes a legal adult.

How long should we have to live in a situation that is not only abusive, but isn't safe?

Our answer is that we won't live this way one day longer than we are legally required to do so.

IEP Meeting

Yesterday, the school scheduled our annual delight known as the IEP meeting.

The news from the front: the school is as concerned as we are about Danielle's mental health, and the kid has some wildly unrealistic career goals.

Apparently, Danielle is now starting to exhibit mental health issues at school that are different from those she exhibits at home, and her behaviors are significantly interfering with her ability to get her work done.  The school's opinion is that she is often using these things as techniques to create distractions, or as tools for procrastination. 

The school  is very concerned.

Even when Danielle isn't having mental health moments at school that interfere with her work, they are noticing that she will often socialize in an attempt to delay or defer her work.

But the list of the school's concern's doesn't stop at her procrastination.  They have noticed that she is almost completely unable to complete her assignments independently.  She gets frustrated easily, doesn't understand what she is supposed to do, and can't seem to do the work unless someone sits with her and explains every little concept.  This doesn't bode well, obviously, for her career goals, which I'll get to in a minute.

At this point, the school is trying to refer Danielle for even more mental health services.  They completely hear and understand our concerns about her behavior at home, and they are trying to do something beyond what our adoptions assistance package will cover.  Hopefully, this will come on line very soon, as we've had many days lately where we've been hanging on by a thread.  Danielle has been very volatile of late, going from extremely sweet to extremely nasty in just a few minutes.

Last night, for example, she called me bad names because I needed to give a friend a ride home.  My friend, who had stopped by for a visit after work, doesn't drive.  We'd decided to continue our socializing until after the last bus, which stops running around dinner time, so we agreed to give our friend a ride home.  When Danielle learned we were all getting in the car to drive my friend home, she was extremely angry about it.

Sorry kid, we aren't going to leave you alone unsupervised, and we'd prefer not to leave you alone with only one adult home if we can avoid it.

We were home by 9:30 PM, so it wasn't as if we'd kept everybody up to some ungodly hour.

Going back to the IEP meeting, one of the items discussed was career planning and transitional services.  It seems that Danielle has some hugely unrealistic goals set aside for herself.  Apparently, when she turns 18, she plans to move out of state and get a job as a waitress.  There, she will save money to go to medical school to become a surgeon, and when she's completed that goal she'll join the military.

Ummm, yeah.

Now I know for most people, it's entirely possible to achieve pretty much any goal.  Unfortunately, Danielle isn't most people.  Her academic delays leave her incredibly far behind her peers, and she's especially weak in the math and hard sciences needed for admission into such a program.  Even if Danielle were to be accepted, she doesn't have the tenacity or independent study skills to be able to make her way through.

As for the military, I doubt they would take her.  She's at least an inch smaller than the minimum height requirements for service members, it is looking quite likely she won't be able to pass our state's high school exit examination to get her diploma, and her mental health diagnoses would also be a barrier to service.

So the school's career counselor is working to try to help Danielle settle on more reasonable goals.  They plan to meet with a military recruiter, and to aid Danielle in researching what would be required to be admitted to medical school.  They are hoping once she's turned down by the recruiter and sees how much time, study, and money medical school will cost, that she'll settle on something more within her grasp.

The school is also quite concerned about the fact that Danielle will turn 18 long before she finishes high school.  Unless she can find a way to accelerate her progress, she will come of age during her Junior (third) year of high school.  She'll have a year remaining, and at this point it's pretty clear she most likely will not be living here.  Although she'd be welcome to stay if she could get her behavior under control, it doesn't seem that will happen.  Even if she were able to get herself under control, she's continually expressing a desire not to be here.

I hope the kid will graduate, but she's so far behind it appears that it may not be possible.  She's 16 years old, and still cannot read your average newspaper with fluency.

More and more I feel like I'm watching this kid slowly collide with an ugly destiny we'd hoped she would avoid.  She's like the proverbial horse we have lead to the water, but for whatever reason, whether it be stubbornness, a lack of ability, or a lack of desire, she simply will not drink.

Should We Push for Early Emancipation?

These days, it seems that all we hear from Danielle are two things: 1) the myriad ways in which her birth family was superior to ours; and 2) how she can't wait until she turns 18 and is able to move out.

I-want-to-move-out-I-can't-wait-to-move-out-I'm-so-gonna-move-out

She rarely stops talking about it, even though my wife and I are completely tired of hearing about it.

I've been asking myself a lot lately if we should just start pushing for her to do the things she needs to do to emancipate early. If she really wants to get out of here so desperately, maybe we should start guiding her in the direction that might allow her to leave the house early.

Now I have to say, it's a pretty tough sell in our county.  The local court system doesn't like to emancipate minors early.  Even kids who are in foster care, who have graduated high school early or passed the GED, and have a job and a place to live lined up find it a very tough sell.  Only the best and the brightest are usually granted emancipated minor status, and even those "lucky" few are rarely approved much before they are 17 1/2.

But I've wondered, given Danielle's continual harping, if we'd all be better off if we started to guide her out the door.  In many ways, it doesn't feel like the right answer because we'd have to act as if we are pushing her away.  I know that won't improve her difficult attachments to us.

Now the truth is, no judge in his right mind would ever grant Danielle emancipated minor status based on her current emotional, educational, and behavioral development.  It's pretty clear to everyone (including us) that she won't be ready to launch early, and it wouldn't be in her best interest.

Still, it it is what Danielle really wants, so maybe we ought to dangle the carrot anyway.

If she was made to think that she has the opportunity to leave early, she might knuckle down and do the necessary work.  She might start pushing herself when it comes it academics, and it might motivate her to get a job, start saving money, and do all the things she would need to do to be successful.

Or, she might follow her regular pattern, which is to get very excited about an idea, but not actually complete any of the steps to achieve that goal.

Still, if it really is what she truly wants, maybe we ought to give it to her.

Of course the real answer to this is that it depends on Danielle.  If she wants to emancipate early, the onus is on her to prove to a judge that she's capable.  She would need to pass her GED, get a job, and have the means to obtain housing.  If she could do those things, then she might be on her way.

Even though the chances of Danielle being able to convince a judge she's ready to move out are basically nil, I wonder if dangling that carrot might put an end to the constant complaining. If we can reply, "You will be able to move out just as soon as you do x, y and z," maybe it would motivate her to work towards that goal.

And then again, maybe not.