Tina's Daily Blog: Money To Burn

Thursday, September 21, 2006

Money To Burn

I forgot to tell you that I spoke with Julie about her money situation. You see... she's swimming in money right now, and I didn't know why. As her sister, I was concerned. So... I asked her.

She not only has that guy living with her (23 year-old boyfriend) but now she has some other girl living with her, and the girl is renting Kayla's room. Julie said the girl pays $400 a month to live there (for only the room, the girl buys all her own supplies and food), and so Julie has extra money to spend every month.

Now, I think renting a room is a great idea. Her house is really big, and she was alone in it, living only out of her bedroom (which had a fridge, computer, bathroom and microwave in it so she never had to leave). This is a terrible waste of space... and you know how I feel about a waste of anything! So... that part of me is happy that she's got someone renting the room.

I asked her about what she was going to do when the kids moved back, and she said that there is nothing she has to do... that they can all live there just fine. That part of it - as their legal Guardian - I have issues with. But the problem is... it's not "that is against the rules and therefore wrong" kind of problem... instead it's a "that just feels wrong" kind of problem. When the kids move back home, Julie tells me, she's going to move Kayla and Kayte into the same room and rent out Kayla's room.

I talked to Kayla yesterday afternoon about the whole thing, as I was unsure if she knew or not. Julie calls and talks to them mostly every night now, so I assumed she had. However, I was wrong. Not only did the kids not know about it, they are not happy about it. The kids feel that the rooms are 'theirs' and that Julie should be doing nothing other than working to get them back home. I understand how they feel, but at the same time, I need to teach them to respect their mom's wishes. This is a hard one... because they rightfully should NOT have respected her decisions for the past two years - but now they need to try to do it. I guess this is where the 'family counseling' is going to come into play.

Speaking of the Family Counseling... Natasha asked me if I had set that up (when she was here on Monday). I told her that I had not, and that I had not intended to do so. I personally feel that at the least the State should arrange this, and if not them, then Julie most definitely should! But it's not my place to work on setting up, making the arrangements, obtaining the authorization for, and paying for THEIR family therapy.

Ooooo.... and speaking of what Julie should or should not do.... Julie called me yesterday to ask if Kayte could go out to Gainesville (Football game) with Sonya again this weekend. Sonya called Julie instead of me for some reason to ask. Last time Kayte went out with her they didn't get home till like 2 am. Sonya is a court reporter, her husband a retired judge, and she just doesn't understand why the State will not allow Kayte to sleep over her house. I've already talked to Sonya about this... told her that she needs to go through the whole process: fingerprinted, background check, home survey/visit. She knows the answer to that already. But still she thinks she doesn't need to do it (or so Julie tells me).

N-E-ways.... Julie proceeds to tell me that it is not FAIR that the State is "punishing the kids" when they didn't do anything wrong. I tried to explain to Julie what the reasoning was - from the State's point of view. (The kids are now 'property of the State' and therefore they are liable for anything they do or anything that happens to them) Julie said a couple of things that made it sound like it was the "big bad State's" fault. I quickly reminded her that there was ONE PERSON to blame for what happened. And I was on the phone talking to her right now. Yeah... that went over well.

Today Julie sends me a photo of her boyfriend, and tells me how great everything is - telling me that I should realize what a great guy he is and that I should like the fact that he's living with her. I, of course, respond back to her saying that it's not HIM I dislike... it's how she constantly moves men into the house. I bring up the sex addict problem. I bring up how it was one of the three things the kids asked for... for her to stop having men over to either sleep with her all the time or to move in penniless. Julie, of course, tells me that 'this one is different'... he just got a job... and that if THIS ONE doesn't work out, she promises she'll stop doing it when the kids come back home. I tell her she needs to get this help BEFORE the kids come back home, not say 'it won't happen after they move back home'. She also sends an email telling me that she doesn't really HAVE a sex addict problem, that it's the attention she craves. (Then tells me about her sex life with this young guy - yuck, YUCK, YUUUUUCK!)

I was thinking about some things though in talking to her. (Julie followed up by calling me after the emails). She says how it's not fair that the kids are not allowed to go over to other people's houses because there is NO BREAK, - EVER - for Chris, Jonathan and I. And... she's right. She also was talking about all the extra money she now has since she has no kids, works and is renting out part of her house. So..................... I was thinking............. I should tell her that - instead of buying the kids things they don't need and spoiling herself rotten - I want her to start saving all the money, put it into a savings account - and when the kids move back with her, she can buy Chris, Jonathan and I a CRUISE together. Don't you think that's a great idea??? I LOVE IT! **laughing at the idea** Yeah.... mom and Katie know how likely THAT is to happen. But hey... the thought was good.

Chris and I have another busy weekend in store: we were asked yesterday afternoon to sing on the praise team this weekend at church, which of COURSE we jumped right on - love that! Tonight I have to go the pharmacy and fill Jonathan's prescription (which always takes 30 min to an hour) Tonight and tomorrow I have to help the boys with their laundry since it's now the height of a person... they've GOT to get it done. Justin and Chris have a baseball game in the morning. Then Chris and I have to be at church by 4:30 to sing. Sunday... the normal 5-trips... no wait... the high schoolers have bowling instead of meeting at the church. That's worse actually because it adds one extra trip. Now we go to/from in the morning, drop off the middle schoolers at 5, pick them up at 7. Then bring the high schoolers to the bowling alley at 7:30 and pick them up at 9.

Oh lordy... and let's not forget I still have Kayla's physical to do! Oh my goodness, where - WHERE - am I going to get the time for all of this?

Okay.... funny that I'm planning on putting the title of this blog "Money to Burn" because we just got a call from American Eldercare. How do I explain this.... when your parents are old in the State of Florida and in need of a nursing home or Assisted Living Facility, you apply for Medicaid. Doug was approved for medicaid, and the Medicaid office told us how much money we have to pay the ALF. But, the ALF charges more than that, so they have to have a way to make more money. So the State has this 'diversion' program that you have to apply for. The diversion program will pay the additional fee, up to a certain amount. They will also pay for other things... hearing aid if needed, $20 in over the counter products, transportation to the doctors, etc. Great, huh? Well, Doug was with this one company from the beginning, but Central Tampa (his ALF facility) told us we HAD to change his provider because they didn't 'accept' the plan he was on. They told us we HAD to go with this other company, American Eldercare. So.... they just called Chris and told him that they need to have a sit-down meeting with us and talk about what it's going to cost us. WHAT????? They expect to get any more money from us???? Are you kidding me?????? My heart is RA-CING right now.

Ironically, on the other line (holding) is Julie who tells me that I really need to get Zephyrhills water delivery at home and get my nails done. I want to vomit, I'm so sick right now.

I call back the lady, and sure enough - they want more money. I'm like... listen - Central Tampa already gets 100% of EVERY SINGLE PENNY he receives. They take 100% of his Medicare check and 100% of his semi-annual life insurance check. Not 90%.... 100%. WE DON'T HAVE any more money to give you. She said... then we don't qualify.

Great. So I have to send an email to Karim, who is in charge out there at Central Tampa ALF. He's going to be furious... but I'm to the point right now where I don't care. I'm so upset I'm sick over it. And before you even ask... I take care of all of this because - after 16 years of working in the medical field, with government programs, and with insurance - I understand it. And understanding it is half (if not more) the battle.

I'm also sick to think that poor Doug probably thinks I don't come to see him because I don't love him or something. Gosh.... that is SO SO SO SO SO not it. I wish I had an extra 3 or 4 hours in ANY day that I could drive out there and visit with him. I wish he knew the countless hours I have spent dealing with his insurance, with the Medicaid folks, with Karim and his group out there at Central Tampa, with the CARES office, with different agencies trying to get him the best care possible. I wish.............................

I wish when these kinds of things came up with Doug, I didn't feel so very hopeless. Putting someone you love in a facility, regarless of how nice it is, is still a lose - lose situation. Even in the situation such as Doug's where we are physically unable to care for him as he needs 24-hour nursing care, there is still some level of a guilty feeling, regardless of how you know it's the 'only thing to do'. Add to that the governmental paperwork which just adds a TON of stress. And add to THAT how everyone wants to make every penny possible in order to care for him.... it FEELS hopeless. I haven't felt hopeless in a while and I don't like it one single bit.

Wait... as I'm typing this... the woman from American Eldercare just called again. She's spoken with Central Tampa and they have decided to accept us at the SAME amount of money we are paying right now. So we are exactly where we were before, which is good.

God.... did I lose faith in You just now... publicly... IN my blog as I was typing??? Yeah, I think I did. Shame on me. God, I know I put this in your hands a long time ago. I surrendered myself to You not too long ago, and at that time, gave you my worries, my fears, my hopes, my dreams, my life. I gave it all to You, for Your glory. For a moment, it just felt as if it were put back into my hands. Thanks for taking it back out of my hands for me.... or was it that you simply reminded me that You are already in control? In either case, I thank you, I trust you, and I am humbled by your presence in my life every day.

To my blog readers, I leave you with this....
Live as though Christ died yesterday, Rose from the grave today, and is coming back tomorrow.

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In A Nutshell:

Here is a letter I sent to Dr. Phil which really sums everything up:
I am married to my high-school sweetheart (20 years this August), with two wonderful children (Amanda who is 20 and Jonathan who is 13). I have two sisters, both younger – I call them “my good sister” and “my bad sister”. My good sister is – well, good! Normal in every way. The bad one, Julie, has been in trouble since she was a kid. As a baby she cried all of the time. As a teenager she was in trouble all of the time. At the age of 14 or so I remember that she had run away from home to live with a grown man in Atlanta. This was one of many run a ways. As a teenager, she provided sexual favors to boys in school, as well as teachers. As a young adult she was arrested for prostitution. She’s done drugs ranging from marijuana to crack. She was diagnosed early on as bi-polar with personality disorder. She’s also a serious cutter to the point where she no longer hid the cuts. She’s cut things like “Ronald Cecchinni” into her arm… and “Fuck you Dr. XXX” on her stomach, in large letters. Julie is also a diagnosed sex-addict. She’s also recently (in the past year) begun ‘huffing’. (I honestly believe that this huffing has caused some permanent damage) She is currently 36yo.
Julie lost her husband Ron a year and a half ago as a result of Leukemia and Kidney Disease which the military attributed to his serving in the Gulf War. He left behind three children – Kayla who is now 15, Justin who is now 14 and Kayte who is now 13. Even when Julie was married, her psychiatric problems persisted. She has been hospitalized literally hundreds of times over the years. However, when her husband was alive, he would take care of the kids when Julie was mentally out of control. After Ron died, Julie lost control of the kids and her life. She began to spiral out of control, having pot parties at her home (to the point where the kids said a door would open and a cloud of smoke would come bellowing out of the room), smoking weed with her own kids, having sex all over the house with different men all the time, allowing young men (19 yo) to sleep over with her oldest daughter (only 14 at the time), and allowing Gang members to live in her home (she said she felt ‘safe’ with them there). In addition, she was attempting suicide daily, overdosing on medications hoping to not wake up the next morning. Mind you all of this while she was seeing her Psychologist every week and Psychiatrist once a month. Both of these Doctors knew what was going on at home, neither of them reported it to the proper authorities. I have even been told by one of them that he was told, by Julie, that she ‘heard voices telling her to hurt the children’ but that she was proud that she could ignore the voices. Still, these Doctors reported nothing.
I should add here that it was at some point in this period of time in Julie’s life when her children began suicide watches over their mom… each one taking turns to sit in a room with her at all hours (night and day) because their mom was less-likely to hurt herself while they were here. However, it didn’t always work – Julie constantly took pills in front of them trying to either dope herself up or overdose, and she would even cut herself in front of the kids.
Finally one day, she woke up furious that her last suicide attempt didn’t work. She got violent with her oldest daughter, police were called, and finally DCF was called. (I would like to add that we (other family members) had called DCF in the past to report things, but some of the cases were ‘unfounded’ and one other time the fled the state knowing CF only had jurisdiction in Florida.) DCF removed the children from the home in November 2005 and I gained custody of the Children shortly thereafter.
There are lots of things I could add here about my sister, DCF, and the horrible Foster Care or Custodial Care program we are involved with. However, that is not my main reason for writing to you.
Kayte, the youngest, seems to be adjusting pretty well. She has a tendency to trivialize what her mom has done and the seriousness of it, but I think that is normal given that it is her mom. Kayte was in counseling, but she feels it’s ‘a waste of time’.
Justin, the middle child, is okay. As a young boy I'm told he was a terror. He used to hit his mother and at one point (only 6yo) tried to jump off a building to kill himself. Since then, his anger has turned in to an endless smothering of love and caring. He does everything for his mom… from getting her whatever she needs to rubbing her feet and back. Justin has seen a psychiatrist since moving in with me who felt that his issues were brought on by trauma. It was also at that visit with the psychiatrist that he confided in myself and the Doctor that he had suicidal thoughts often while living at home with his mom in her ‘state of being’ after his dad died. However, since he moved in with me he has done so much better (and continues to improve daily) that she didn’t feel he even needed counseling at this time. He would, however, need counseling before he was reunited with his mom.
Kayla, the oldest, has serious issues. She is also currently in counseling but feels that it is ‘a waste of time’. Kayla has always lied and stolen things. Family members feel sorry for her because you can tell that she doesn’t really mean any ill will by it, but it’s been ‘the way she is’ for a very long time. By far her biggest problems are lying and her need for approval by men (young and old).
Since the kids have moved in with us, my husband and I have set up rules. The kids already had myspace accounts, so we set ground rules for it. 1) We needed the login names and passwords. 2) Profiles must be set to private. 3) The only people they were allowed to have on their friends list was people that they actually knew. When Kayla’s list climbed over 300, and she was found to have inappropriate conversations (wanting to sneak out and ‘hook up’ with young men), we made everyone cut their list down to 30 friends, which included myself. 4) All vulgar language and inappropriate photos would come off immediately and would be monitored by myself at any given time. At times, they try to put up ‘sexy’ pictures which immediately need to come down.
However recently I have found that she has multiple website things going on in an attempt to pick up young men. I'll outline a few here so that you understand the gravity of the situation: 1) I found her 'normal' myspace account set to 'public view'. She has over 11,000 profile views(meaning people looking at her pictures and wanting to know more about her). I had reset it to private many times, but she keeps going back and resetting it to public. 2) I have found another myspace account which she went by the name 'Shannon' and used it to pick up young men, tease them, then later tell them that she was 'taken' but refer them to her 'cousin, Kayla'. She'd then give them all of Kayla's information. Of course thiswas also set to public. 3) I have found another social network website that was like myspace in which she had ONLY men (mostly from other states) as her 'friends' whom she corresponded with. The emails back and forth basically said the same thing as all of the others... more on that in #4 - only these were guys that not only did she not know, but they were not even in the area! 4) All accounts that I have found had basically the same thing... her emailing guys wanting to know if she was pretty, if they wanted to 'hook up', talking about going to their 'crib' or meeting up with them somewhere, and constantly seeking approval and affirmation from these guys.
I believe she gets this from her mom. And the sad thing is, if you met her, you would love her. She is truly a GREAT kid… but she has serious issues. I’ve described to you Julie’s behavior and Kayla’s seems to be the same way. Neither can make decisions on their own that are ‘the right thing to do’, and both lack the understanding of simple values, morals and ethics. I could go into so many examples. How do I describe the utterly amazing difference between Julie’s parenting style and my own?
I know... Both Julie and I have myspace accounts set up to ‘monitor’ the kids. To illustrate the difference between Julie and myself, here is something that Julie and I both put on our myspace accounts. You are supposed to put something 'about yourself' by your picture. Here is mine: "I'm 38 years old. I have two amazing kids, Amanda who is 20 and Jonathan who is 13. I have great husband, Chris. I love to sing - and have been singing in Toast of Tampa Show Chorus for 10 years. I'm raising my nieces and nephew (12, 13 and 14). I love God and my family."And here is Julie's: "I am who I am and if you dont like me for me........FUCK YOU........ Plus if you dont like me for me....... Im gunna tell my kids and there gunna kick yer ass!!!!!!!!!!!!"
Here’s the other dilemma we are having; the two girls are in counseling that is costing me $25 EACH in co-payments every time they go. The State of Florida provides NO financial support to me as a relative caregiver, other than providing the three kids with Medicaid. They received small SSI checks because of their dad’s death, but it barely covers the food they consume. The DCF worker, having spoke with the girls and being told that therapy is ‘a waste of time’, has referred me to a clinic that DCF uses for cases such as this to seek mental care for Kayla (aswell as the others). However, the kids have TriCare as their primary insurance because their dad died from Military causes. TriCare requires the co-payment, regardless of the Medicaid secondary. Having said that, please understand that I worked in referrals in a primary care physician’s office for 16 years… I totally ‘get’ what is required for primary and secondary insurances and all the red tape. But because of the uniqueness of this situation, the kids are suffering!
I should also point out here that I have the kids for an indefinite period of time. Right now Julie is doing things that she has been told to do to get the kids back. However, she is still awaiting a court ordered detailed Psychiatric exam to determine if she can EVER parent again. Even if that Psychiatrist feels she can parent again, she’ll most likely need to be ‘clean’ and ‘episode-free’ for 6 months to a year minimum. In addition, Julie is only allowed supervised visits and one phone call a day. This came about because of her inappropriate behavior when she was with the kids and because when she was allowed to call any time she’d call 10 + times a day.
The other problem with Julie ever getting her children back is that… she doesn’t understand what she did wrong. She parents as if she were 15-years old herself. If anyone has ever done something bad and been able to ‘keep’ their kids, she sees no reason she can’t do it. She brought her daughter at the age of 13 in for a HUGE tattoo on the small of her back. It’s Tigger flipping ‘the bird’ with her gang name under it. She was also planning on getting a large tattoo on her 12yo before the kids were taken. Again, she sees nothing wrong with any of her past behavior.
So, you see, I could have these children for the rest of their teenage years. I honestly don’t know where to turn to get them the help they need.
I feel as if I am in a psychiatric nightmare and I just can’t wake up. Eight months ago I was at home, my biggest ‘kid worry’ was if my son was going to get good grades on his report card. Now I find myself in a crux worried about whether or not the lessons I teach them, this late in their young life, are going to be enough to turn these kids around and help them to be productive adults in the near future.

Tina's Daily Blog

Thursday, September 21, 2006

Money To Burn

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In A Nutshell: