Last night Salinda made it home by her curfew. Said goodnight, I love you mom. I was so proud of her. You would think that I could get a good night's sleep.
But no, the weather had other ideas. Lots of thunder and lightning and then the power was out for 3 hours from 1:15 to 4:15. Bart couldn't sleep (needs a C-Pap for Sleep Apnea) the fan was off, so it was deathly quiet. Both little boys were frightened by the thunder, and were in and out of our room. I was not ready to get up this morning, even though I did sleep more than Bart.
And apparently I slept a lot more than Salinda. When i went to wake her up this morning, her bed was empty. Apparently she had said "good night, I love you" and snuck back out. I'm not sure if she planned to sneak back in before morning and wherever she was staying the alarm clock got shut off because of electricity, or if she never planned to come back home.
I guess she's pushing it to the point where I"m going to have to talk to the police and see if there is anything I can do. She's technically not breaking curfew because she has these stupid guys who will drive her everywhere.
And she no longer cares about anything. She's been pining away for a cell phone and I basically told her last night that if she did it one more time she was going to lose that possibility. All the sudden she doesn't care about a cell phone. She will not have school clothes money. She doesn't care. I told her she wouldn't be able to go with me to see her brother who she claims is the most important part of her world, but she doesn't care about that either.
Once a teenager chooses all out rebellion, I'm not sure what anyone can do. Sure, I can pack up all her things, but the kind of stress that would cause in the family system when she arrived home and found it gone would be tremendous. I am afraid of the way she would treat Sadie especially.
One choice, of course, is to go the route we did with Mike and John where we prove she needs residential care to keep her safe. But I hate to do that when she is successful everywhere but home. Mike and John were never successful anywhere... failing grades, inappropriate in the community, behavior trouble at school, no social connections that were positive.
The problem with residential care is that troubled kids become the peer group and the norm -- and provide a network for life of troubled kids all over the state. John and MIke both had a serious change in their view of life by listening to those who were "locked up" with them. They also learned a lot about how to break the law.
I'm not sure now if I can go on the trip. Bart isn't going to want me to leave when Salinda is unaccounted for. But to deprive John of his only time off ranch this month seems pretty sad.
Yes, she's beautiful. And I wish I could lock her up. But I can't. And she's spiralling downward and getting worse and worse in regards to her rebellion.
But if we've survived Mike and John we'll survive Salinda. And if anyone has any ideas we haven't tried, I'm open to listening to them. Probably going to have to ground her again on top of taking away the financial support. She seems to only be able to be not grounded for a day or two before she's grounded again.
4 comments:
I don't know Claudia, I just don't know. Like I said, we have the same problem with Megan not being able to go more than a day not being grounded. But no matter what the grounding is, it doesn't make a difference. It doesn't make us feel any better when her therapist says she doesn't know what to do either. I don't want to be raising my grandkids. No matter what we said, if we provided birth control she would see it as permission. She doesn't recognise when she puts herself into a dangerous situation. If you ever get an iota of an idea please share it with me.
At her age I was sneaking out, running away, stealing cars, using drugs, and hanging out with boys I had no business hanging out with. I was a mess! My Mother tried everything and eventually contacted the courts to file Unruly Charges against me. It took 13 times in Juvenile Detention for me to figure out it was all really in my control. If I followed the rules, I would have privileges. I was slow to learn but I eventually did and all my poor choices were made while I was still a minor.
I told my Mother once that people learned from their mistakes so I was making them as fast as I could. She said it gave her a new prospective and she was able to keep her sense of humor during a very dark period in our lives. I hope you two find a way to laugh through this, too.
I know you can't lock her up, to be so simple... eh? Do you think possibly homeschooling her and bringing her home would help? Getting her away from the friends that have been encouraging this behavior? Of course, then you'd need to find someway to entice her to stay home anyway... does she like horse? Dancing? Anything you can get her involved in?
I've been told that my 8 children aren't any different than anyone else's (in other words- why can't I control them?)... they are VERY different. They are adopted. They have had experiences that my biological 2 could never understand.
Praying for you all,
Nicole
The friends she's hanging with actually don't even go to her school. ANd she is now quitting tennis -- probably to torture me...
I think probably just riding the latest wave is our best bet.
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