Visit one

This weekend was the first "transition" visit with our son.



After 3 years and 4 months ...The plan, according to the ISP, is to visit and attend therapy every week and then move him home in June, after school is out.



Sounds easy enough...



However, we have 10 y/o ds in a PTS melt-down over the return of his brother,, alternately planning his escape and controlling every breath we take.

Friday morning was a comedy of errors! I had been immobilized by a stomach virus the day before so had missed the email from therapist about the delay of our appointment. Mr. T has risen early fighting his own queasy stomach, and gone to the other side of the county to pick our middle one up from school. We were supposed to check him out and take him to the therapy appointment then back home for a fun-filled weekend for five! The plan hit it's first snag right out of the starting gate when the school decided to look at the actual sign out card to see if the child's father was on it....... and he wasn't (so even though we had attended numerous meetings and had checked him out twice before, it was a no-go). At that point Mr. T became suspect number one in a one suspect child kidnapping ring and was the subject of great hostility and steely-eyeball stares until we could reach the foster parent so that she could come to the school and check out the child and hand him over the the would be kidnapper... enter snag two.... Where oh where has the foster parent gone, O, where O where can she beeeeeeeeee......... after a few tries it turned out she was in the next county but would be right there to check the unsuspecting victim out. Meanwhile, it has been decided to cancel the therapy appointment because we can't make it... so we cancel. Enter snag three... we are told that whileit really is no one's fault, our son has no medication and we must now ALSO go and get a prescription from the pharmacy... that is, unless we just want to go without medication for the weekend. So, Mr. T goes ahead and brings the middle one home and we begin our visit.

The rest of the day actually went pretty well. The boys played outside and some neighbor boys joined them.. well, until Bright-Eyes freaked out and got controlling and bossy and scared them off. That may have been three years worth of trustbuilding and social skill practice out the window. Time will tell.

Saturday was pretty much the same. But we began to see the usual tiring of routine that shows up about 24 hours after Middle one is home. He is bored and wants to watch everything everyone is doing and no one wants him hanging over their shoulder watching and he refuses to do anything on his own... it's a vicious cycle. Since we were celebrating Ebear's 16th birthday he didn't lose it, but let us know that he wasn't happy. Any talk of Ebears birthday was added to by Middle one's "self" talk. If Ebear talked about his birthday cake then Middle one talked about the bigger and better cake HE would have... if Ebear talked about his gift then Middle one talked about the bigger and better gift that HE would have (his announcement that we were getting him a car brought gails of laughter). As you can imagine, this tires one rapidly.

We had to one injury of the weekend on Saturday. Both the younger ones were playing outside and Mr. T was watching them... unrelentlessly and aggressively watching them... then they asked if they could go into the woods. Mr. T said yes, but just on the edge and he followed them to the edge and stood just feet away... then he turned his back. Just for a minute... and he was right there after all, but the screaming penetrated the house and I ran outside hearing Bright Eyes yell "STOP!!! STOP!!! STOP!!!!" Mr. T held up his hand and simply said "I've got it, it's fine"... it was a moment of deciding to choose the marriage and stuff the mother down into the nearest driveway rut. I swallowed, looked to the sky and said.... "umm... ok" and went back inside. A while later Bright eyes appeared with a bloody gash on the side of his head. I cleaned him up and bandaged as best I could. Mr. T told me what happened and I knew it could have easily had been me who was at the edge of the woods and him running out of the door.

Sunday was a different day. The boys were up at daybreak. Wandering the house and whispering until we woke up, long before the alarm was set to go off. They were playing video games, we told them "no", They were in the way so we told them "go". We had lost our proactive edge and were reacting and there was no getting ahead of them.

We did manage to get ready for church, eat breakfast and get on the road.

After Sunday School we were to meet up with the older boys for church. However I couldn't find the older boys. I located Ebear in the coffee shop and asked him where Middle was... he pointed and I saw my son at the counter about to purchase something... the world went into RADmotion... I asked "What is he doing?" Ebear replied that he was getting a hot chocolate... I asked "Where did he get money?"... Ebear pointed to another boy who innocently smiled at me and said "Don't worry, he didn't ask for the money, he (pointing to the other boy) just gave it to him"... the other boy nodded sweetly and I KNEW that I KNEW that I KNEW, with every fiber of my being that the poor child had just been had. I dashed to the counter just in time to stop the transaction and announce "No hot chocolate for him", to which the server looked up and asked me incredulously, with shock in her eyes... "He can't have a hot chocolate?"....... the whole coffee shop screeched to a silent halt and all stared at me as if I was the most horrible mother ever to walk the earth.... I could hear the whispers, feel the icy stares... I swallowed hard, met her questioning eyes and said "no". Retrieving the conned child's money we returned to the table where middle one reluctantly handed it back to the now confused boy and grudgingly followed me and Ebear from the coffee shop. Mom 1, Middle one 0... the game was on.