Thank you everyone. Yes COM you are right, I hadn't analysed it properly before as I have been feeling completely drained since I took him back yesterday, but you are right, I used my tools of acceptance and quiet in an effective way and the outcome was really positive, and I stayed detached in my head so as not to be drawn into any antagonistic situations. I have been out for lunch with my husband today so that we could talk about the visit and how things are. H saw my son only for the first night but he says that he thought my son was looking a bit more together and seemed calmer. We are both feeling optimistic that this could be the start of us having a reasonable, peaceful relationship with him, now that I have accepted that he doesn't want a normal life and that he is happy living like this and he seems to have accepted without discussion that there won't be any more financial handouts or interference. I think we have to ask ourselves this question before anything else - Is my son/daughter happy with the life they have chosen? In my son's case, I know that his state of mind is really the only thing of importance. His hair could be cut and his beard trimmed and his rags exchanged for neat clothes and his skinny body fattened up, but if he is not ok in his head then those are just surface things of little importance. The only thing that matters, in the end, is whether or not he is ok mentally, because that is the thing that can't be put right easily, unlike all the surface things... and I have to accept that he seems content with this bizarre lifestyle that he has chosen. I still feel sad about it, but I am hopeful that he may one day find a way back and in the meantime I am happy (ish) to accept him as he is. I am also concentrating on looking after myself and valuing my husband and other children and the good things in my life. I have been reading your thread COM (what's happening to me ...)and the ups and downs and optimism followed by heartache. Albatross posted "It seems a lot of times just when things are getting better and we start to settle into that idea -- they find a way to mess it up! " That is very wise and very true and I am going to keep this in mind, because, although we had a good few days, all of us parents here know that things can change and I don't want to be too 'up' in order to be knocked 'down'. But yes, I have made amazing progress and it is all thanks to this site. The future has a possibility to be happy, and that must be true for all of us here.
