- Still Standing
- What I Saw the Day of the Family Photos
- The Downward Spiral of My Son’s Behavior
- How Do I Talk to My Adopted Kids About Their Birth Family?
- The Day We Told Our Son About His Past
- I Called the Police for My Own Son…and I’m a Good Mom.
- The Worst Father’s Day…but it Wasn’t
- What It’s Like to Take Your Child to the Hospital for Mental Health Care
- What It’s Like When Your Child Needs Inpatient Mental Health Care
- What Visits Are Like When Your Child Gets Inpatient Mental Health Care
- What Life is Like When Your Child Has Mental Health Issues
- When Grief and Hope Come in Waves
- Attachment Therapy: When a New Start is Scary
- When You Beg God for a Miracle
- Tough Vacation Decisions for Kids with Special Needs
- When Kids Take Medication for Behavior
- Water Balloon Therapy: A Fun Approach to Attachment Therapy
- When You Are Humbled
- He Goes to the Park
- How to Measure Progress in Tough Situations
- When My Adopted Child Cries for His Birth Mom
- The Two Equally Important Jobs of Every Parent
- How to Shift Conversations with Challenging Kids
- What to Do When Your Kids Lie to You
- Dodge and Weave
- When the Life Has Been Sucked Out of You
- Every Test in Your Life Makes You Bitter or Better.
- Mornings, Bedtimes, and Other Routines for Kids with Trauma History
- What Happens to the Sibling of a Special Needs Child
- I’m the Most Stubborn
- Watching Miracles Unfold
- How to Find Peace…When You Don’t Get Your Happy Ending
My son’s attachment therapist and I are sitting on the front porch swing discussing my boy, school choices for next year, and how to advocate best for what my son needs.
I’m so exhausted.
This is a bone-weary exhaustion that runs long and deep. I go to bed tired and I wake up tired.
When my son first came home from his hospitalization, we braced ourselves. I couldn’t get my adreneline up high enough to deal with his behaviors. I was already exhausted going in.
I’m not blind to the fact that this therapy for my son is as much parent-training as child-training.
We are good parents. We’ve been good parents for a long time. I am humbled.
This type of parenting, it doesn’t require good. It requires way beyond good. Parenting these children requires exceptional skill.
Aaron and I have discussed on several occasions the possibility that Medicaid could pull the funding for his therapy. Aaron’s work is expensive because what he does is intense, and naturally Medicaid doesn’t like to pay for intense.
Insurance runs in crisis-mode not prevention-mode.
Aaron tells me that what could happen is that if Medicaid pulls funding, he will have to see my son less, and the chances are high that my son will end up back in the hospital. The other possibility is that if we get the school option we are advocating for, Medicaid will refuse to pay for the therapeutic part of the day-treatment school.
I break down and cry as he’s talking.
I just can’t keep doing all of this. I AM SO FREAKIN’ TIRED. When is someone going to cut us some slack here?
We are trying to save the world from a person living in it without a conscious. Do they realize this? Do they realize we are trying to raise a good, decent human being?
Do they realize the dangers that await if we do not? Could someone please help us out a little bit here? Geez.
I can parent like this — mostly — or I can advocate for this crazy stuff, but good grief, both are full time jobs.
Aaron tells me, “Your advocating for him is just as important as your parenting of him. These are the two equally important jobs of every parent.”
Still Standing
Bible Verse
For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.
Galatians 5:1
Journal Prompt
How are you called to advocate for what is right in your life today?
- Still Standing
- What I Saw the Day of the Family Photos
- The Downward Spiral of My Son’s Behavior
- How Do I Talk to My Adopted Kids About Their Birth Family?
- The Day We Told Our Son About His Past
- I Called the Police for My Own Son…and I’m a Good Mom.
- The Worst Father’s Day…but it Wasn’t
- What It’s Like to Take Your Child to the Hospital for Mental Health Care
- What It’s Like When Your Child Needs Inpatient Mental Health Care
- What Visits Are Like When Your Child Gets Inpatient Mental Health Care
- What Life is Like When Your Child Has Mental Health Issues
- When Grief and Hope Come in Waves
- Attachment Therapy: When a New Start is Scary
- When You Beg God for a Miracle
- Tough Vacation Decisions for Kids with Special Needs
- When Kids Take Medication for Behavior
- Water Balloon Therapy
- When You Are Humbled
- He Goes to the Park
- How to Measure Progress in Tough Situations
- When My Adopted Child Cries for His Birth Mom
- The Two Equally Important Jobs of Every Parent
- How to Shift Conversations with Challenging Kids
- What to Do When Your Kids Lie to You
- Dodge and Weave
- When the Life Has Been Sucked Out of You
- Every Test in Your Life Makes You Bitter or Better.
- Mornings, Bedtimes, and Other Routines for Kids with Trauma History
- What Happens to the Sibling of a Special Needs Child
- I’m the Most Stubborn
- Watching Miracles Unfold
- How to Find Peace…When You Don’t Get Your Happy Ending
Praying for your family, Sara. May He make you lie down in green pastures, lead you beside still waters and restore your aching, weary soul. Thank You, Father God, that you see Sara and her family and that you will never ever leave or forsake them, that your blessing upon them is a Promise and a strength that will carry them each step of the way. Hear their cries, LORD.
Oh friend… praying for an extra measure of grace and favor for you all (and an extra power nap or two… or four!)
Oh, and, the system SUCKS. Why is that? How has it come to this? Has it always been to bad? Aggravating.
Both of your full time jobs are over-stressing, over-exhausting, overwhelming, and so on. Your struggle real. Thanking God for goodness, grace, hope, faith, and unending unconditional love. Keep on keeping on, you are not alone.