Ruuuude

I can't believe you actually called me today! (can you see me roll my eyes?) Even after several phone calls and faxes!

(Menacing smile).

You see I’m anal to the point I drive people crazy over how I keep record of EVERYTHING I do.  My faxes, my emails, and my calls logged for just this purpose.

  I have records upon records to prove I’ve called you and spoken to your assistants, and receptionists. I grew tired of “waiting” for you to show some respect and either contact me back, or fax me back.

I made an executive decision and called your personal cell, AFTER HOURS.  

(smiles)

When I heard your voice, I froze, surely my ears where playing tricks.

You couldn’t be…….

Under the influence of drugs and or alcohol? You are after all, a professional drug counselor. Are you not?

First of all, I saw through you (insert HER name here). I saw through your hatred and realized we had an issue when you verbally attacked a family member.

I saw through your scheming, troublesome, mean spirited ways when you address your co-workers.

You had the “IM LARGE an IN CHARGE AND YOUR NOTHING attitude. Didn’t you all go through this program? Where is it written that you’re holier than thou?

You were literally shrieking the other day about YOU BEING IN CHARGE… I heard your co-workers voice (not daring to turn in fear Id be caught in your web of bull*%&$)  

Your tongue is like glass, smooth at first …then razor sharp when your need to show dominance over others.

You’re a controlling and unstable person. I pity women like you.

I can't help but wonder how you’ve retained a job in this field with your condescending ways, your inability to communicate, and your lack of friendliness, affection, warmth,  or tenderness. You’re not cut out for a position of this magnitude.

I was SHOCKED to say the least when my cell phone rang and I saw your business name. You’re “smooth operator” voice speaking sweet, with no indication of your “drunken self from last night” were you worried I would call and report your behavior?

I admit I was tempted. But figure it this way.

God see’s all. I don’t have too.

That age old expression comes to mind.

Give them nuff rope and they’ll hang themselves…

**Beware**

the KARMA bus comes by often.

HONNNNK

HONNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNK

The 3 C's

''You didn't cause it, you can't control it, and you can't cure it”.

I constantly have to remind myself of this tidbit of information. I unconsciously stumble in life thinking I can solve everyone’s problems, while I myself suffer.

Is it suffering? Nah, not so much. I choose to feel sorry for myself and my situations. WAAAAA.

Life can sometimes suck the happy right out of you. It’s those troubling times when you have to pick yourself up, dust yourself off and pour hydrogen peroxide over your scrapes. Nobody said life was going to be easy. Let’s face it.  It ISN’T.

I never thought I’d be where I am.  I never thought I’d have to watch my boy committed to a mental hospital at 23. I NEVER thought I’d have to observe my son shuffle with shackles across a room, hands cuffed to his waist and the sound of chains jingling. Every step he took he struggled and as a mother I wanted to run to him and fix his leg chains and demand they be removed. HOW DARE they do that to my son.

Months have passed and still I hurt. A LOT. This turned my life upside down. I came to rely more on GOD. More on my family. ( a select few )

THEY know who they are.

The others?

Not so much.

I reflect back to a conversation my aunt had with my mom about her son. (He’s gay) and family members (a select few) were uncivilized about it.

(Like they have been with my son)

I remember how hurt she was. Sitting over tea with my mom at her kitchen table, tears in her eyes, talking in riddles.

 “It’s the sisters’ code of conduct.

I tried to follow along, but realized as the riddles got harder and the topic constantly changing.(for MY nosy ears) Their eyes darting around the room, and their sentences trialing off.. I was an intruder. Better left to my own devices… and it WASN’T theirs.

Thinking back, it was like the forbidden sibling room you entered as a kid, the huge red sign hanging on the bedroom door,

(KEEP OUT OR ELSE)

You don’t fit in this conversation and you’re NOT invited, so please stay out.

Awww, the beauty of a sister.

I won’t forget that hurt on my aunties face. The ridicule she must have felt and heard.  (How I wish I had known then) How I’d comfort her and hug her, lean on me I would have said. CRY with me. We’ll get through. Let me say… she DIDN’T cry because her son was gay. She cried for the hurt the others bestowed on her son.

I personally know now just how my aunt felt when her son was criticized over his sexual preference.

Mine too will be judged, just not for his sexuality but for his mental state.

Disappointment plays a major roll. Not in a son who became lost in another world, but in a family as a whole.

I’m not going to sit here and call names. I’m not going to sit here and demand an apology. I will tell you, how much I hurt over your inability to comprehend my feelings, my hurt, and my aguish. My question is.. WHERE WERE YOU?  Where were you when I couldn’t function? When my life came to a fiery crash? Where?

I keep reflecting back to how my aunt held it together that day when I was part of a conversation I knew nothing about.

Now that I’m older, I realize what they were talking about.  I know now, how my mom came to pick up the pieces for her baby sister.

Like what my sister is doing for me.

She’s picked up the pieces. 1 at an a agonizing time. As I bent to pick one up another 2 fell. She grabbed those and glued my heart back together.

I sat at my sisters dining room table and I cried like a baby. When the holidays came and went I shuffled through not wanting to rejoice in any holiday activities. I cooked in a fog, and she brought me through it. One day at a time. I cried as I took a bite of my mashed potatoes.

Hearing my sons voice in my head… (when he was 9) Where’s da gwavvvvy? I smiled and cried…

His lil boy voice echoing in my head.  

I never thought I’d have to experience what I have in a year’s time.  Emergency rooms, hospital stays, a mental ward, jail, and finally a half way house.

Each day I reflect back to:
''You didn't cause it, you can't control it, and you can't cure it”.

I don’t know WHY my son chose to take the drugs he did.  When I asked him to stop, I was told I didn’t know what I was talking about.

I can’t fix him. He has to fix himself.

I’m not responsible for his actions. Yet, as a mother I blame myself.
E- V- E- -R- Y single D- A- Y.

Where did I go wrong?

And my sisters words come into play… PRAY SISTER. Be that mighty prayer warrior you were destined to be. LEAN ON ME. I’ll be your rock.

THANK YOU SISTER!! For getting me through the most difficult time of my life.

I LOVE YOU.

Healed

I wasn’t sure if I’d ever get to write this, not fully sure how much I should say.

A year ago I was a broken woman. Literally falling apart over the health of my older son.

An illness like no other had claimed his mind. Leaving little of the boy/man we all knew.

He was born to a single teenage girl. A little boy who stole her heart at 17. 

A healthy 11lb 7oz, baby boy with sparkling blue eyes and white blonde hair.

He won me over the moment I saw his chubby reddened face. 
It was…

 LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT.

He grew to become a successful man, his goals high, and a plan to be a self made millionaire.

(We wonder if this had anything to do with him turning to drugs).

He anxiously wanted to take care of his dad and myself.

He’d call me with ideas and dreams.

Mom, you will NEVER have to work again. For every dollar you gave me as a child I will gladly give you a 1000!

 I’d laugh; I don’t want your money honey!

I know you don’t, But I want to take care of you and dad.

He became obsessed.

He looked at himself as a failure when we all looked at him as a major success.

Was it mental illness that claimed his mind? Or was it the drugs he took to escape the failure HE thought he was?

Lost in another dimension(s), a world(s) we know nothing about, yet, we knew everything because of his desire to share with you what he saw.

I lost my heart that day. On father’s day. I knew before this break, he wasn’t in reality.

I knew he lived somewhere else. I just denied it…for months. He showed signs, that I chose to ignore, NOT MY SON. This happened to other families, CERTAINLY NOT MINE!

His hands shook, and his personality changed, he was no longer that loving, understanding, caring kid.

He was…dark. Not evil…but DARK. He laughed differently. He didn’t eat the same way he had for 22 years, he wasn’t focused on anything but…drugs, and making money.

He snapped that day… reality was gone and in its place was a man I knew little about.

He spoke of Angels and Demons. Of other places where people lived that we knew little or nothing about.

He spoke to dead people.  I watched the son who was an A student, who had his life together at such an early age, fall victim to Mental Illness.

Or was it?

I honestly didn’t foresee any cure, I admit, I had little FAITH on his healing.

His behavior was bizarre, to say the least, outlandish, insensitive, and at times aggressive,  he’d stare at you, and speak to beings who nobody else could see but himself. Not just a nodding of his head to acknowledge that “those beings” spoke back, but had full on conversations with them.

I’d fall apart then. I would see a small glimpse of his “normal” self at times.  My hope would soar, and in a fraction of a second I’d come crashing back down, sick.  I’d fall to my knees within the shower, crying, sobbing to the point where the water would run cold and I’d still be laying in a fetal position in the bathtub. BEGGING for my son back.

I’d stroke his face in pictures, walk into his room when he’d be out trying to “catch” his angels. I’d lay my face against his clothing breathing in his scent. My child who I knew for 22 years was dead and another person lived in his body. How could a mother plan a funeral for a child who wasn’t dead? Yet, he wasn’t alive?  “It” was a mysterious stranger who possessed MY SONS body.

I was powerless to prevent this being from possession of my son.

I’d take his hand and whisper how much I loved him. At night I’d lock myself in my room afraid he’d try to harm me.

I’m ashamed to admit that. (I hang my head even now a year later) I held out hope when people would tell me “It’s the drugs, you’ll see”. But as the months went by, and I visited him in jail for a crime (he’s horrified to admit he committed) I didn’t see much change.

A worker from the jail called me, (this is another part of the story I’ll later tell) for now, I’ll leave it at; her worry for him was supreme.

He, in his sane moments could win over complete army of enemies.

.

I visited him faithfully 2 weeks after he was jailed. Aug 8^th ~ Dec 15 2011 he sat in jail in a mental ward in total isolation.
Dec 15^th 2011 my son was released to a half way house.

As the months passed, I saw change, November was an amazing month, I saw full glimpses of my son.

December was even better, but depression set in and I was afraid he’d relapse.

The trips to court shackled like an animal. He doesn’t know how blessed he is/was to be in isolation for those many months. How many lock downs we went through due to deaths on other floors by inmates. I’d sit there in the lobby heart in throat praying someone wouldn’t act out and ruin my half hour visit.

I was lucky on some visits they’d forget we were there. The 7^th floor is the “sick” ward.

We paid a high power attorney, a friend of my husbands who knew our boys and knew that our son had to be ill in order to commit this crime. He was lucky not being sentenced to prison time.

I visit him monthly when the half way house allows. I don’t get many phone calls. He reserves those for the woman who silently stood by his side during this/HIS whole ordeal.

I have mad respect for her. I admit to you and even GOD, I don’t know if I could have stood by my husband in a situation like this. I once said…

Why? Why, did you stay?

Her answers were simple… I love him.. and our private vow to each other was/is..

In sickness and in health. I cried then. My shallow thoughts consumed me.

WHAT A WOMAN! And how BLESSED my son is for meeting her. I don’t know if I could have stayed.

She’s taught me a lot, this woman. And I thank God daily for her.

I pray I’m able to visit my son this weekend. It depends on the behavior of the “house” patrons if they are allowed family time or not.

Within this year, I came to rely on my sister, and GOD. I made some friends along the way and lost a few as well.

I think those friends and I, were seeking something neither one of us could give.

I have my FAITH once again, and have become what my grandmother so desperately wanted from her granddaughters. PRAYER warriors.

I never gave up on prayer; I had just given up on my faith.

He’s better by the way… He no longer “sees” into those dimensions. He no longer speaks with his angels.

I was granted a gift once again like I was at 17. Except now I’m 42.

I feel like Im 17 again and holding my baby in my arms. Except he’s a man now

And God granted him another chance.

He’s given me ANOTHER miracle.

I aptly named my son:

Jeremiah 30:17

“I will give you back your health and heal your wounds” says the LORD
AMEN.