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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Scent of Cedar *" data-source="post: 660110" data-attributes="member: 17461">I don't think we do, Copa.  We incorporate it.  We take what meaning we can and find there isn't any.  Ours (mine) is an ugly story.In so many ways, an ugly story.A fact; nothing more.So you saved one another there, Copa.  We posted a little yesterday about loving someone and learning that loving them healed us in some deep and complete way.He is not out of your life, yet.He still lives.He may die.  And that will be part of the story.  But the way the story ends does not change the things that went before the ending.  I learned that Copa when we believed our daughter was imminently dying.  All at once, when I was so sure the story was over, I realized that however sordid the ending (and it was bad, Copa), we all had lived what we had lived.  The baby and the toddler and the young girl and the pain of everything and the hope that turned into anger and despair and accusation ~ when we were sure we were losing her, none of that mattered at all, Copa.  Only that I had known her mattered; only that I could laugh with her, hear her voice, remember not how much she loved me, but how much it meant to me to have loved her, however it turned out.But you know what happened next?  Our daughter pulled through somehow.  And wound up passed out in snowbanks and being thrown out of shelters and drug use and multiple surgeries and pain pill addiction and all at once, we were caught up again in crises not of our making.But I have never forgotten what it meant when I had indisputable proof we were losing her for sure this time.We cannot say what the future holds, Copa.  To love a child is never wrong.  Please stop accusing yourself of nefarious intent, Copa.You gave your son his life; you gave him all he would need to create such a wonderful life, Copa.  But you do not have a say ~ not anymore ~ in what he does with it, now.These are quotes from St Exupery's Little Prince, Copa.<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2180358-le-petit-prince?page=3" target="_blank">http://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2180358-le-petit-prince?page=3</a>We felt that way too Copa, as we came, unbelievably enough, to believe in our child's psychiatric diagnosis.  Which just actually happened yesterday.  I kid you not.  So we are trying to figure out what to do about this new thing we finally cannot not believe.That is what we said to one another:  She never had a chance from the beginning.  But like our child Copa, your son had what he had from life.  And so did you, from caring for and giving and protecting and loving, him.It is an ugly story.I don't know what to do, either.I hear you loud and clear on this one.I am having a look at that this morning, too.  And now, they do not.A fact.But your son's life is his own, Copa.  You taught him well. That is all a mother can do.  It is a hard choice facing you, Copa.  Take your son in knowing he will continue to self-destruct, or not.  Choosing not to take him in is destroying you.  It would destroy me, too.  Choosing to take him in will destroy you in a different way.There are no other choices, Copa.It is what it is.  Very hard for us, Copa.There is no right answer.  We can though, acknowledge that we have made a choice and that we can always make a different choice.  We can recognize when we are catastrophizing ~ when we are writing the end of the story before it has happened.  We can recognize guilt and shame and self-accusation and stop doing that to ourselves, though it is very hard.To me Copa, the only way I could function through these past years has been to require myself to learn to like myself and to cherish myself.  You know how hard that has been for me.  I need to be strong enough to function in an upright position.  That is why I elected to heal areas of unproductive pain.  I need every ounce of energy available to me.  I refuse to turn bitter; I refuse, with all my heart, to stop loving or risking for those who matter to me and to whom I matter.  I am learning to let go and let God regarding things over which I have no say.  I am harboring my strength.I will need it, all of it, very shortly.Things are not going well with my daughter.Her illness is real and boy, I hate that.It is what it is.  For me, and for you too, Copa.It is one thing to know and believe so strongly that the limitation will win that we focus everything having to do with our children on whatever the limitation is.  I accuse myself that way too sometimes, regarding FOO and especially, regarding my daughter's illness.  But here's the thing, Copa.  It is another thing entirely to accept that our child has some differences, some limitations, and to believe they can live beautiful, productive lives despite them.  We focus on the good things, in preparation for that life we believe in for them, instead of Master Sargenting and mini-managing and confronting and making their lives all about their limitation.And that is all I know about that.  I wish I had understood my child's illness instead of denying it.I wish that with all my heart.But we have had our triumphant moments Copa, that were not colored by that specter of illness that colors everything, now.It is the situation that is wrong.  Not me.  Not you.  Not our children.  We do the best, the very best and more, that we know or can learn.And there doesn't seem to be anyone who can pick us up or even, hold us up as we walk through this with our kids, Copa.So, we have to stand up on our own, as best we can.  And we do it too, Copa, for our kids.It's just really, really hard."And now the nightmare has begun."  Another fact.It is a living nightmare, Copa.  But it also is what it is.  You (and I do too), need to be strong now, Copa.  I don't exactly know what I mean by that, either.  I don't know what will come, what will be expected, how bad it is going to get, this time.  There is no hope Copa.  For me, it is happening again.  Despair will not help me.  It will not help you either, Copa.  It just is what it is, despair.Just a fact.We would not be sane Copa, if we did not feel hopeless, if we did not feel despair.  It's just that these feeling states are not helpful to us, now.Snip.Out they go.Wise, wary, watchful, loving, honest, compassionate.  Always aware of what the options are regarding community placement or assistance.  Alert to our own emotional states, aware that we cannot have them home without destroying us all, keeping these true things foremost in our hearts and minds lest we lose track of ourselves and our purpose.Those are the things that will help us now, Copa.There is nothing else.I'm sorry, Copa.  Broken.  Alone.  Without hope.That is a place to begin, Copa.Nothing left to lose is a place to begin.In a way, that is why we are engaging here on this thread as we are.  To address the times we were victimized into brokenness, and to reclaim the resilience that is ours by right and that our abusers hurt out of us.Resilience; flexibility; breath.  Those things are the tools we need now, and those things, we can achieve.Life has been impossibly hard for each of us; we started off at such intensely disadvantaged places.  That wasn't our fault or our doing, Copa.  Neither are these events we must gather our forces to address now.  Still, because one way or another, we will be required to respond as their mothers ~ at some point, we will need to do that, Copa ~ we need to learn how to see and respond and stay steady state in the face of impossibly painful, hopelessly pain filled, sometimes ~ too many times ~ pointlessly hurtful, realities.We are their moms, Copa.They have only us to fight for and love and believe in them.  No one else in all the world sees them as we do.That is important, though it seems not to be, sometimes.  But imagine what it would have meant to us, to have had mothers like that.Cedar</blockquote>

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