Alyssa and Lanie brushing their teeth together - Lanie wanted to be a big girl and brush hers all on her own like her big cousin was doing!
Loren, Aubrey and Lanie at Fridays - I forgot to mention that Lanie asked the server to have the staff come over and sing happy birthday to her, even though it was not her birthday - they were very happy to oblige, and even brought her a birthday desert ice cream! It was so cute!
Hi readers,
It has been a while since I have posted to the blog, and I apologize for the long delay. Those of you who have been in touch with us know that life has been very different for us lately. In the beginning of March, my sister Loren came to stay with us with hopes of beginning a new life. She is 29, and has a history of codependancy, addiction to drugs, a history of lying, and a poor work record. There is much more to her than that, but you don't need to read an epic novel right now I suppose! Nonetheless... Aubrey and I are far from professional counselors or psychiatrists, and we lack the tools necessary to help Loren to the extent that she really requires to really give her the best chance for true survival and success in life.
In an eleventh-hour decision, Loren decided to bring her 5 year old daughter Alyssa up to stay with us for two weeks. This caused major uproar with Alyssa's father, who is also a drug addict, and an all around terrible example for his daughter. In fact, at one point, he told me on the phone that if I wanted to have Alyssa at our house, he would trade her for a carton of cigarettes. It took at least one visit from the police and finally a notarized letter to allow Alyssa to come here, and convince her father that she would be coming back when we said she would be returned. The story is so much deeper than what I am writing here.
Alyssa is here now, and she is showing signs that, in our unprofessional yet educated opinions, indicate that she is under some severe mental distress and may be in fact mentally abused. Knowing the father and the things I have heard him say in front of her, and knowing my sister and how messed up she has been for so long, it is completely within reason that our opinions could be fact. Alyssa hits herself in the head repeatedly, she punched the car window today. Last night she told us that she only has bad dreams, never good ones, and that she remembers the last dream she had as being one where she "shot her daddy backward...with a real gun in his face...and he turned all pink", all the while, smiling and bright eyed as she tells us this. She goes into fits of rage and screaming which closely resemble what I witness some of the (formally labeled) severely emotionally disturbed children doing at one of the schools I teach in. Something is not right with this poor little five year old girl, and we are going to do all that we can to find out what is happening with her, and how she can be helped. Just now she walked in the room with a ball under her shirt as kids often like to do, but said "See! I drink a lot of beer." and patted her belly. Is this something a 5 year old should be saying? Maybe I am, as my mom said (and I often agree with her on this) too much of an idealist.
In the meantime, Loren has no choice but to leave out house and pursue a healthy course of rehabilitation for herself. With the help of Shirley (Aubrey's mom), Wendy (my mom) and Frank (my dad), along with friends who have offered suggestions and more, Aubrey and I presented Loren with possible choices and direction in which she can pursue with our guidance if need be. Our hopes for her are to have her go into an inpatient rehabilitation program for up to 28 days (or whatever is recommended) and from there, be referred into someplace like Sojourner House ( http://www.sojournerhouse.org/index.html ) where she can continue to work on the skills she needs to live as normal a life as possible.
This is a lot for us, as it wold be a lot for anyone out there to handle. We have our hands full, but are hopeful that the long term outcome of all of this will be good. I will do my best to provide updates via the blog to those of you who are interested in knowing how things are going. I would also be interested in any comments, thoughts or suggestions that anyone out there reading this is willing to provide us.
Thank you again to all of you who read my blog. I know that there are many of you out there who check back often, and that is so nice to know. Thank you for caring!!!
