A LONG Time Coming

I don't intend to go into all the gory details here, I'll save that for my private blog, but Josh moved out tonight.

Since he failed to do his weekly housecleaning last week, I'd told him he would be moving out at the beginning of the year. He has been about as difficult and disrespectful as he could possibly be as a result.

He was sullen and snide on Thanksgiving. He's been shitty and pissy every single day. Last night I told him that if his attitude didn't improve 100%, he'd wouldn't make it in my house till the end of the year.

And then this morning I opened the refrigerator and noticed that the remainder of the beer I'd bought for Thanksgiving was gone.

He was asleep at the time (6 am) and when he woke up at (5 pm) I asked him if he'd drank the beer and he said he had.

"We've talked about this before Josh, you KNOW that is not allowed."

"What do you expect, under the circumstances?"

"Are you telling me that you don't intend to follow the rules?"

"Why should I? What's in it for me?"

We argued and I finally told him to go pack the things he'd need right away and leave tonight.

"I'll pack up the rest of your stuff and move it into storage until you need it, and you need to understand something Josh, this isn't the way *I* want it to be, I love you, but I refuse to continue to provide for all of your needs when what I receive in return is disrespect. I'm changing the garage code and the locks, you're not getting back in this house unless I'm home."

At one point, as I was standing halfway inside his bedroom door he started yelling at me to get out of his room, and as I was trying to talk to him, he repeatedly kicked his door, which bashed into my hip, as he yelled, "Fuck you! Fuck you! Fuck you!"

I reminded him that it isn't *his* room, it's a room in *MY* house that I've allowed him to use and that he's no longer welcome to use it.

I called his father and told him the situation and he said he'd call Josh and tell him to come and stay there. Josh wouldn't answer his father's calls though.

As Josh packed, he became nicer than he's been the last few weeks and when he was ready to go I hugged him. At first he balked, but then he put his arms around me and gave me a hug.

"I love you honey, and I get that you don't believe that now, but I think it's time for you to learn what it means to be a grown man. I think you need to talk to you dad and consider staying there for the short term, just a month or two so you can regroup and decide how you want the rest of your life to play out."

"That's not gonna happen, I'm not living in that hellhole."

"Well, your options are somewhat limited, but I know you'll figure out what to do."

And he left.

His father called me about an hour later and said Josh had finally answered his call and said he was chillin' with a friend, but agreed to go to his Dad's when he was done. My ex called back a little later and said that Josh was there.

I've cried off and on since he left, but I feel better that he's at his Dad's and I've spent the hours since he left walking around my house realizing that my home is finally child free.

For the first time in 26 years.

It's a strange feeling.

What happened tonight is what needed to happen, because I think Josh's older brother has been right all along; that Josh is NEVER going to get it while living coddled under my roof.

When I called my older son and told him that I sent his brother on his way, he said, "It's about fucking time. Congratulations!"

This would be MUCH harder to take were Josh out there in the unknown, but I know where he is and in spite of the fact that his father has dropped the ball badly as the boys were being raised, he related to both of our boys better once they reached their teens. He stands a much better chance of getting Josh to see the light than I do and I hope he's able to get the kid on the right path.

My only fear at this point is that the stress that Josh is under will send him one way or other on the Bipolar pole.

Oh, did I mention that he gave two weeks notice at his job last night and then slept through his shift today? When he woke up tonight, he called them and told them he wouldn't be back.

So jobless and homeless in one fell swoop, only he's not really homeless, he's just in a much more unappealing home.

As The Stomach Churns

Well, I drew that line in the sand for Josh, and my therapist advised me that it was an appropriate line to draw and that I must be prepared to follow through if needed.

It's needed.

Josh failed to clean the house this weekend, which means he crossed the line in the sand.

Monday I said to him, "Well, it looks like you've CHOSEN to not live here next year since you didn't clean the house this weekend."

"Whatever."

He gave me a bunch of excuses, like he had to work all weekend, to which I replied, "You worked all of 8 hours the entire weekend, mostly what you did is play online poker."

He wanted to argue, but I just walked away.

But can I tell you how hard it is to envision how this young man is going to be prepared to go it alone, and I don't have the available funds to help him. Furniture, household goods, etc, I can help with, but I have no money to assist him, not to mention assisting him financially is the opposite of what this is about anyway.

I'm sure he thinks I'm not serious, I've certainly given him reasons in the past to assume I'm not serious. When I've tried to discuss this with him since our initial discussion, he just says he doesn't know what he's gonna do and drops it.

He intends to take classes next semester, but I don't know how he plans on paying the fees above what his grant will cover.

He's in la la land!

Any advice?

No News is Good News?

Schmadrian asked in a comment on my last post for an update and wondered if "no news is good news."

Actually, no news simply means not much movement is taking place in either direction.

Josh is doing better with his school responsibilities. He currently has an 'A' in one class, a high 'B' in another class, but is struggling still to get his final grade up from a low 'C'.

The adderall does seem to have helped him with his ability to focus and, for the most part, he's been better at time management with his school work.

He's still not doing so well with his household responsibilities and his lack of respect for me continues to be problematic.

I had a need to see our Nurse Practitioner this past week and when we were finished discussing my medical issues, she asked how Josh was doing.

I explained that the adderall seemed to help, but he had failed to put in place any of her other suggestions; a daily multivitamin and additional supplements, better eating habits and exercise.

And I started crying as I explained to her that what was hardest for me was remembering Josh as he's always been, very social, always out and about, and contrasting it to this young man who is content (and he DOES seem to be content) alone in his room much of the time, seeing his friends here and there.

We talked long enough that her Nurse finally tapped on the door to remind her that she had other patients waiting. She hugged me and asked if I were getting help for ME in coping with this.

"Well, I have a therapist and she and I HAVE discussed Josh on occasion."

"I think you need to make an appointment to see her. This is all very hard and you need some support and professional advice."

Prior to seeing my therapist though, I had a talk with Josh. He had, once again, failed to clean the house as agreed upon.

I basically told him that he had until the end of this current semester to 'show me' that he would like to continue living here. I told him that I'm not going to mention the housework again, but if he misses a week between now and the end of the year, he will be looking for other living arrangements when 2011 rolls around. And I told him that his lack of respect would not be tolerated.

"I deserve to live in a calm, peaceful environment. You are a GUEST in this house, and like many house guests, your welcome is wearing very thin."

When I met with my therapist, she encouraged me to call him on his disrespect EVERY single time it happens, but to also find opportunities each day to give him some positive affirmations.

"Tell him, "I really like the way you ________" and make a habit of catching him doing things well. It's not enough to read one of his papers and comment that it is good, point out to him an area of the paper where you think he really nailed it. Things like that will give him much needed confidence in himself, and it interjects 'good' feelings between you so that it doesn't all look like negativity regarding his behavior."

She also told me that I have to be fully prepared to set him on his way, but to be very careful of the wording I use. "You aren't 'kicking him out', he has CHOSEN, through his own behavior, to move on."

We talked about my fears, were he to leave my home, and my greatest fear is that he has isolated himself so much, and to go off and live alone would find him in complete isolation. That could lead to a slide into depression.

"Well, he is a young man who should only move out into a roommate situation. Not only will he not be in isolation, but he will then continue to learn HOW to live with someone else."

But finding a roommate situation for Josh won't be easy, he has no friends who are able to share an apartment with him.

My therapist's final advice to me was to try to get Josh to begin seeing her so he could learn anger management skills and better life skills, but also work through his anger and hurt regarding his father and me.

Josh completely shut down a discussion on the subject though.

When I tried to discuss his work situation he told me, and he's really right, that he has an obligation to pay me $100 a month for his car and $100 a month for his auto insurance, and as long as he is meeting those obligations to ME, his work and money situation is none of my business.

I agreed with him, but pointed out that he needs to keep in mind that his car could break tomorrow, or some other calamity could befall him and HE needs to be prepared for that because as an adult it is HIS responsibility to address life's little problems, not to look to me for money.

He has decided to meet with the counselor at school and change his major. His senior year of High School he was set on studying secondary education with a desire to be a High School Literature teacher. He's going to find out what curriculum he needs to follow for a secondary education degree.

I've never cared WHAT he does, but I think some focus would be good for him and honestly, he would be an amazing English teacher.

I told him when we talked, and I've told him this all along, that as long as he is functioning well, living in harmony with me and living up to his responsibilities, he can live here until he's out of school, but it's really all up to him.

He's gonna have to start walkin the walk.

Too Soon to Tell?

Josh took his first dose of Adderall yesterday and went to bed just after 11 PM, waking up this morning on his own at 9 AM.

Let's hope this continues.

Maybe Since SHE Said it He'll Listen?

Josh went to see the Nurse Practitioner yesterday and allowed me to go with him. He told her that he thought he needed to get back on Adderall, but gave her no other information about 'the state of affairs'.

So I did.

"Josh went off his Bipolar medication this summer and quickly returned to 'normal', but slowly he's begun to slide into the same patterns he was in last fall when he began slipping towards suicide and failed his classes. He sleeps all day and is up all night, as a result, he's missing classes and close to failing this semester. Basically, he's not functioning well at all, but I'm kind of concerned that taking Adderall might cause further sleep problems."

"Well actually, it might have the opposite effect, people generally sleep BETTER when on this type of medication. But Josh, you have GOT to force yourself back onto a normal sleep schedule. There are all kinds of ramifications to what you're doing. Our bodies respond to the light during the daytime hours and you're missing out on that. This throws off your circadian rhythms and actually effects your immune system and tons of other stuff. You need to establish a sleep routine where you go to bed each night at, say, 11, and then you get up everyday at 9 and the first thing you do is take your Adderall, that will jump start you.

You need to do what we call 'sleep hygiene', you monitor your caffeine intake, make sure you have nothing distracting you when you go to sleep, even the light emitted by your phone or an alarm clock can disturb your ability to get to sleep. You want total dark and quiet, nothing but maybe some white noise.

You've told me before that you don't want to be on 'brain meds', but if you're serious about that you need to get the sleep under control and also work on taking in a very healthy diet, and supplement that with vitamins just to be on the safe side, and exercise, I can't tell you how important daily exercise is for you if you want to avoid brain meds.

I have a friend who was terribly depressed and on medication and she became an avid runner and no longer needs any depression medication, exercise is THAT good."

"So," I said, "let me make sure I understand what you're saying here. You're basically saying that Josh needs to make important LIFE changes."

"Yes, and he's the only one who can do this. You can't do it for him, I can't do it for him. Josh, this is YOUR life and nothing that I'm talking about here is anything more than what we ALL should do to be healthy. Our bodies cannot function normally when we're not taking care of them."

She suggested that for the first few weeks, he take a dose of melatonin before bed, "It's something you can take forever, but I think it will be especially helpful during the first few weeks."

She wants to see him back in one month.

When we left, Josh said that while he was at work that night, he'd think about the best way to reset his clock. The NP had suggested that it might be easiest if he missed one night's sleep, so Josh was going to try to figure out how to work that into his work/school schedule.

We discussed the addition of Wellbutrin to his meds, but Josh would like to avoid that if possible. The NP told him that she felt if he REALLY addressed the things she'd discussed, he could probably avoid additional medications.

Now we'll see what the man/boy does.

History Repeats Itself

Josh is not doing well at all with this school thing. He has missed more classes than he's attended.

HE is very disappointed.....and yet.....he wants to make excuses.

Everytime I have tried to talk to him about this his attitude is that *I* don't understand. Every discussion ends with him leaving the room in anger, only to return fifteen minutes later to repeat the entire exercise.

No matter how gently I try to couch my comments, they offend him.

He feels overwhelmed and I point out that HE keeps backing himself into a corner. I point out that all along I have been encouraging him to GET ON A NORMAL SLEEP SCHEDULE and be militant about maintaining it.

"Yea, but last night I had all that homework to do so I had to stay up and then I slept through my alarm."

"OK, but Josh, you left campus on Thursday knowing what homework you had to have done for Tuesday. You knew you had to work all day Saturday, which means you had all day Sunday and Monday to get it done. But you slept all day Sunday and Monday. This is a time management/sleep schedule problem and the 'answer' to it is really very simple and totally up to you. Sleep everyday from Midnight to 9AM and do your homework in your next available time slot. You act like you're being asked to climb Mt. Everest. Honey, there are lots of people who take 5 or 6 classes and work full or part time. You are taking THREE classes and working about 15 hours a week."

"It isn't just that though Mom. I sat up all night TRYING to do my homework, but basically just spinning my wheels."

"Yes, and you don't want to hear this, you get mad when I even approach the subject, but I think ALL of this is Bipolar related."

"How? How is this Bipolar related?!"

"Josh, if you were sliding toward the manic end of the pole, none of this would be a problem. You'd be buzzing around, busy as a bee and creative as hell. You still wouldn't be sleeping worth a damn, but you'd be productive. You are sliding toward the depressive end and in THAT mode, nothing is easy. It isn't easy to motivate yourself or stay on task. You sleep too much, and everything seems overwhelming. I hate to point this out to you honey, but one year ago TODAY? You were right in this same spot, functioning the same way. I BEGGED you to address this over the summer BEFORE school started and you promised me Josh, you PROMISED me that if you went off your medication and you began to struggle, you would get to the doctor and begin the process of finding the right medication for you. You are about one month away from sitting in the bathtub again with razor blades honey and you are deep in denial."

"Well, I told you I think I need to get back on Adderall."

"Yes, and I told you to try that....I encouraged you to get to the doctor and get a prescription for it, because if that's ALL you need, you'll know it really quickly. And if it makes no improvement, than I would think you'd have to consider Bipolar medication."

"Well, you never made the appointment!"

"You are NOT a child Josh, I asked you several times to call and make the appointment, so don't blame me. Pick up the phone and do it."

So he has an appointment Tuesday afternoon, but I'm pretty sure Adderall isn't the answer.

"Josh, a year ago I told you that it wasn't too late to salvage the semester, and I'll say the same to you today, BUT, you have GOT to act. Get the adderall, give it a couple of days, that's all it will take to see if it helps, and if it doesn't, you need to get back to the doctor and get on something for Bipolar."

"God Mom, remember what that medicine DID to me? I'll definitely fail if something like that happens again."

"I know honey, and maybe if the Adderall doesn't work, you need to consider biting the bullet and dropping out. Yes, you'll have to repay your grant, but that isn't the end of the world. Maybe you need to drop out and address medication and get stable on it and give yourself a year of just working full time, you can live here as long as you're working full time and doing the things you need to do. Pay off the grant and a year from now reapply for school and try again. This isn't a matter of you failing because you're stupid, you are failing because you're not functioning well. And you never know, the first Bipolar medicine you try, could be the right one."

Josh had to go to work, and he has to work till 2 am on inventory and he has to work tomorrow night, which means he really will not have the time required to get his assignments done. So yes, he has created a terrible set of circumstances for himself AGAIN. And he seems to want me to produce some magical answer to solve all his problems.

And I think I HAVE the magical answer, he just doesn't want to hear it.

This is a post I wrote on my private blog October 15, 2009...almost exactly a year ago.....


I am very concerned about Josh....about this depression which manifests itself as sadness, inability to sleep at night, inability to get up as necessary in the morning for class and basically not functioning well with his responsibilities.

I've cried a small river (does that mean I cried a creek?) of tears this afternoon. I talked with his brother, my sister and various friends in the blogosphere about this situation.

We all agree that medication is called for, but Josh is an adult and after meeting with his doctor several months ago, he refused the medication that the doctor suggested.

At 3:oo, before I left to go to the gym, I woke Josh up (well, he was awake, but still laying in bed buried under the covers). I was crying, and I told him that I'm very concerned about him, about the fact that he missed class again; that he isn't functioning well. I told him that I'm sure that he is as upset as I am that he overslept again. He agreed. I told him that I would be home by 4:15 and that I wanted him here when I returned so that we could talk.

And this is basically what I said to him:

First of all, I want you to know that I'm not mad at you; I'm concerned about you. I know that when you wake up, long after class is over, you are upset with yourself. I can see it in your eyes and your demeanor. And that's the whole point Josh...I know you WANT to do better, your intention is not to blow off your classes, but you are unable to DO better. (this is where he started crying)

I love you and I care about you....I want you to be successful, so we need to find a solution to this problem. You have all the symptoms of true clinical depression Josh (which I listed for him) and when you saw Dr P and discussed this with him, he felt that medication could help you.

I know you're opposed to medication, you don't want to be a "zombie", unable to "feel anything". But I have to tell you that your perceptions of what this type of medication does to a person is not really valid. I'm not a doctor, I can't begin to explain to you how it works or why it works or even what it might make you "feel like", but I can tell you that the people I know who take medication for depression swear that it changed their lives. There are people out there who suffered, as you are, for years, and I hear them say that their only regret is that they didn't take medication sooner.

This is what I know for sure. Dr. P is the first human being to ever touch you, and he has been your doctor ever since. He has always shown such caring and concern for the three of us. I trust him....literally....with our lives and I always have.

I trust him in this too. If he feels medication is called for, I trust that he is making that recommendation out of a desire to help you.

Add in to all that, the fact that *I* care about you. I know you better than any other person on this Earth, and *I* think that medication could be the answer to what you are struggling through. Let's face it, you have knuckled down over the last couple of weeks, determined to do better....but you're not. Doesn't that illustrate to you that possibly this is out of your control? If you don't trust Dr. P as much as I do, don't you at least trust me?

If you don't want to consider medication, than let's talk about other possible solutions together because, bottom line, I can't stand to sit by and watch your future go up in smoke.

He and I then talked about medication a bit more and I ended the discussion by saying that perhaps he shouldn't make a decision about the medication right now, but should agree to go talk to Dr P about it again...express his concerns about medication, have Dr. P explain how the medicine works, why it works, what he might experience were he to take it.

In the end he agreed to do that...to go see Dr. P again and discuss the options. He does not want me to go with him.

He left to go see his brother, and as he was leaving, I walked to the door with him and gave him a huge, gigantic hug and told him that I love him.

"I love you too, Mom."

And he was gone.

I'm still crying...I can't seem to stop.

The difference between last year and this year is that I'm not sitting here crying. I'm upset, but not consumed with worry. Because one thing has changed during the last year. I've realized that nothing is going to get better or easier for Josh until he gets a clue. My role in this is limited. I can talk. I can point out this and that. I can encourage. But I can't really own the problem.

I've made some progress since last year. Let's hope that Josh will do some growing too.

Laying Down the Law

I have been going around and around in my head, fighting with myself trying to determine where the fine line is between 'enabling' Josh and offering appropriate help and support.

I find myself often worried about him, but worse, I find myself doing things for him that I'm pretty sure I shouldn't be doing, like waking him up to get to class on time.

I struggle because all my 'normal' reactions to any situation with Josh, are followed up with the thought, "BUT, he's Bipolar!" I find myself excusing his behavior simply because he's Bipolar.

Other areas of my personal life have put me in front of my therapist a couple of times lately. She asked me how Josh was doing and I told her about my concerns.

He's back in school, but not functioning as well as he should be. While his general mood is good, his sleep schedule is still upside down and he often goes out with a friend late in the evening and doesn't return until 5AM. This is not conducive to getting up at 10:30 and getting to class. He's also struggled with the basic workload, missing the due date for his first written assignment.

I told my therapist that Josh and I had an agreement; he is to clean the house each Friday in lieu of paying me $50 a week in 'rent'. I established that agreement at the suggestion of Josh's therapist as a way to begin making him more responsible for himself.

Slowly over the last several weeks, the house hasn't gotten cleaned.

My therapist encouraged me to take a hard line with Josh about this issue. "If you allow him to just blow this off, THAT is enabling him, don't do that."

So that day (which was a Friday) I went home and told Josh that I would be going out of town on Saturday, returning late in the evening. "When I get home tomorrow night, one of three things better have happened. Either this house is cleaned as we agreed to, OR you leave $50 on the kitchen counter for me, OR your bags are packed. I don't care which one you chose, that's up to you, but one of those three things better happen."

He argued with me that he had to work Friday night and Saturday night and he had that past due paper to complete.

"Not MY problem Josh, figure it out."

I came home that Saturday night and the house was spotless.

That was encouraging. "Hmmm, there's something to this being assertive thing!"

The week progressed with lots of things going on in both our lives. I found myself worried about the paper Josh was working on, but instead of asking him if he was working on it, I'd ask him if he was still struggling with it so badly.

When he had starting writing it, he had complained about his inability to focus and gather his thoughts enough to write it. He had done the research, he just couldn't get the information out of his brain, onto the page.

He thought maybe he needed ADD medicine, I encouraged him to explore that and if THAT didn't help, perhaps he should explore a Bipolar medication.

But of course, he has been unwilling to actually call the doctor and make an appointment.

He was up all night working on the paper Monday night, so he could turn it in Tuesday. When I got up Tuesday morning he asked for my advice for his conclusion paragraph. I went to work and when I came home mid afternoon, he was gone to class. I was very curious about the paper he had written, wondering if the end product was disjointed and unorganized. I pulled it up on my computer and read it, and it was, without a doubt, the best paper he's ever written.

That was encouraging. That even though he struggled so badly with it, he WAS able to produce it in the end in a well thought out, cogent fashion.

When I met with my therapist this Friday, I asked her if we could discuss Josh for a few moments. I told her that her advice about the house cleaning had worked very well and having that work so well, it made me realize that I need to stop enabling Josh in other ways, but that I was always hesitant to totally 'let go and let Josh' because, after all, he's Bipolar.

"Well, doing things like waking him up for class and stuff IS enabling him. In the end HE has got to run his own life. And that includes learning to manage his Bipolar."

So last night I told Josh I had a couple things I wanted to discuss with him.

"Josh, you have been very vocal about wanting to 'live your own life' and that is exactly what I want you to do too, but I find myself doing things for you so you don't suffer negative consequences; like making sure you get up to go to class. I'm going to stop doing those things. That means that this is ALL on you, which is the way it SHOULD be. I hope you do whatever it takes to be successful in school this term. I want to see you succeed, but whether you do or not is entirely up to you. The ONLY thing I'm going to be monitoring from now on is your general mood. If I see you sliding one way or the other (depression or mania), I will sit down and discuss my concerns with you and we'll figure out what to do, but I'm not spending one more second of my time worrying about the rest of your life.

But listen to me Josh, if you fail out of this term, you will then be working full time and living in your own place, because if you're not a student, then you will become completely independent of me.

It's important for you to not just manage your work schedule and school responsibilities, but you also need to be very aware of how you're doing overall and get medication if you need it.

And one more thing, it's Friday at 5 PM and this house isn't cleaned yet. Because you have class on Thursday and Friday, I'm going to change our arrangement a little bit to make it more manageable for you. From now on, this house needs to be cleaned by Sunday evening, OR you can pay me $50. So manage your time to make sure that gets done."

So we'll see. But I feel very good about taking this position and realize that it's a stance I should have taken long ago. The thing about having a child with Bipolar is that it's all so terribly frightening. You've seen your child at both ends of the spectrum, and that's not pretty, and you live in fear of having to live through one of the poles again.

The reality here though is that Josh is very stable right now. No, he's not functioning the way he should, but he's not depressed or manic. While it would be hard to set him out on his own if he were in a bad state, the fact of the matter is that he's NOT in a bad state right now and so I've told myself that now is the perfect time to turn it ALL over to him.

I'm not terribly hopeful about the outcome, I'm pretty sure that Josh is not going to be able to get it together. I hope he surprises me, but more than anything I hope he remains stable because in THIS state, it would be very easy to push him out of the nest if he fails out of school.

And if he becomes unstable, we'll deal with it and then pick up the pieces and move forward.

I do feel that he WILL get it eventually, but it might take failing out of college and getting out in the real world to do it, and I'm finally OK with that scenario.