My daughter completed in patient treatment and a halfway house. She was discharged December 22, 2010 and came to live with me and her son. We spent six months – glorious months where she was sober and seemed to really “get it” – how to live sober.
My daughter was pregnant and she made an open adoption plan with a really great family who lives not far from me. My second grandson was born January 9, 2011. I was there for his birth.
Once my new grandson was born, my daughter started “going out” on the weekends when her son was at his father’s for the weekend. She said, “hey, I am here all week, taking care of him, getting him on the Head Start bus, making meals for him, and doing all the mom things. But on the weekend I want to be with my friends and be 25.”
Then the lying started about what she was doing on the weekends. That's when I suspected she was using again. When lyikng starts, trouble follows. I started looking for a daycare anticipating something bad coming. I know I cannot make my work schedule accommodate the Head Start bus pickup and drop off and their strict rules of ONLY picking my grandson up from our home – not even a daycare. I started interviewing licensed daycares.
On Monday, February 28, 2011 my daughter did not come home. She was to watch my grandson on the following day because there is no school on Tuesday’s for him. She text me at 7:30 pm saying she was on her way home. She didn’t come home. She didn't call. I tried calling her at 9:30 pm and she had turned her phone off. I called the daycare home I had just interviewed that night and asked if my grandson could start coming the next day.
God is good in bringing us to the right daycare home. This is my grandson’s first time/experience with daycare. He has always been in an early-learning care center, requiring the many therapies. I felt it is time for him to just be a kid and take a break from all the intense schooling he has attended the past two years.
So, that’s a brief update.
What I want to say is how angry and hurt and sad I feel. My daughter has completely devastated her son by once again disappearing. Only this time, he actually remembers his mom and misses her. The previous two years, he didn’t know of having a relationship with her. He is so frightened and anxious and sad. He follows me from room to room – including the bathroom. Although he has never had to sleep with me the past two years, he will not sleep in his room anymore and wants to sleep with me. I’ve been allowing that, understanding he has regressed in his behavior. He is back to having “meltdowns” frequently throughout the day.
I am so angry at how my daughter has hurt her son – all for drugs, and to be “25”. I am 47 and I have certain things I want to do at my age and they did not include being a fulltime parent to my grandson. Yet, I would not want him being cared for by anyone else.
I am in graduate school. This is my fourth attempt at getting my masters. I completed 10 credits and then my mom got sick with cancer and was dying so I had to drop out. The second attempt the county removed my grandson from his parents due to a drug raid in their home and he was suddenly placed in my care when he was 7 months old. The third time I learned my daughter was neglecting my grandson and I filed the order for protection on his behalf and once again dropped out because of suddenly becoming a parent to a child with significant developmental delays. I am nearly finished with my first course and I feel like, damn-it, when is it going to be MY turn to have my life?
I will not drop out again. My grandson is old enough and I he is gone on the weekends with his father so I am determined to complete my degree. I will not give up.
I just want to say (again) how frustrated and hurt I feel. I watch Oprah’s network show with the women behind the prison bars and feel like – yep, my daughter will either be there or six feet under. I feel like I need to harden my heart and keep her away. I don’t want to even hope anymore for her recovery. I feel I went out of my way for her the past six months – believing in her, when in fact she was sober because it kept her out of jail (treatment was a jail furlough) and because she was pregnant. Now that the baby is born, it’s “party time” and I feel like she has said “screw you Mom” and also says the same thing to her son.
I am very hurt and very angry and very sad. I know this will pass, but I don’t think my daughter will ever comprehend the amount of hurt and pain she created by walking out on her family – again.
