Tina's Daily Blog: My Hero

Thursday, December 21, 2006

My Hero

I’ve had a migraine headache all morning, so I apologize in advance if this blog today is scattered.

Justin had his first therapy appointment on Tuesday night with Dr. Vergeese (who is also Julie’s therapist). It went…. okay. There were a few things that came up that I can talk about here. One being that the doctor asked Justin if he could think of any lessons that his mom taught him that were right or wrong. Honest to goodness, Justin could not think of one single lesson. In discussion we realized that I parent differently than Julie; that I teach him things – such as what is right and what is wrong – and Julie just… didn’t. I try to tell Justin what he should do and why, what he shouldn’t do and why, and talk to him about his future and what he needs to do to make what he wants in life come true. Julie on the other hand is a friend more than a mother. The therapist then reminded Justin that sometimes his mom was teaching him without actually talking to him, and then he used the pot experience… he asked Justin how his mom reacted to the fact that Justin was using pot. Justin responded that his mom really didn’t care. The doctor asked Justin what kind of ‘lesson’ that was teaching him. Justin was just quiet about the whole thing. I’m sure he ‘got it’, he was just embarrassed. The doctor also asked Justin how he would feel if he lived with us forever, and Justin said that he would be fine with that… that he knew his mom needed a lot of help. He hoped to go home to her some day, but if it wasn’t possible he would be okay.

We had a big meal on Tuesday night… it was Kayla’s boyfriend’s birthday. His parents don’t do much to celebrate, so we cooked him dinner, had the house decorated and had a cake for him. (Chris did all of this while I was at the doctors with Justin – what a guy!) We had 8 people total for dinner…. It was Taco night at the Rhocchini house. We cooked… get ready for this…. 5 lbs of ground beef, went through 30 taco shells, 10 soft taco shells, 3 boxes of rice and a big can of refried beans. PLUS an entire cake. Good LORDY these kids can EAT! In a way I kind of hate nights like that… when we plan one dinner and actually go shopping for just that meal, because then you know just how much that one meal costs. We spent $85 at the grocery store for that ONE meal. You simply can’t imagine how much food these tiny little kids go through. They are on Christmas break and I noticed when I got home at lunch today that we were completely out of food. Milk, bread, cereal, pizzas, crackers, peanut butter, Jelly, sandwich meat, kool-aid… all gone. Sigh………

Speaking of eating… let me tell you a story about Justin and his eating. I know I talk about his poor eating habits often, but it’s just so amazingly horrible and I’m at the end of my rope trying to figure out ways to TEACH him some manners. He had cake along with everyone else in the house. He ate it as if he hadn’t eaten in 5 days – just shoveling it in as fast as he possibly could – grunting and slurping with every bite. Just NASTY. When he was done, Chris and I were both sitting there looking at him, slack-jawed, not believing what we just witnessed. Mind you – they had just eating TONS of dinner! We talked to him about how he just ate, and he didn’t ‘get it’. We told him to look at his plate, top of it COMPLETELY covered in icing and leftover cake – we’re talking every inch of the plate. He didn’t see any big deal. Then we ask him to look at the BOTTOM of the plate… yes folks, he had cake and icing all over the BOTTOM of his plate. Not just a little…. A LOT. How does that happen?? I watched it and I couldn’t even tell you – it was just pure panic-stricken fast-and-furious eating. Unreal!

I think I’m going to have him start eating like this… take ONE bite, put down the fork, chew, swallow, then pick the fork up again and repeat. We’ll see how that works.

Julie just called and she and I had more ‘discussions’. Arguments is more like it. She is talking about coming over on Christmas Eve again. This time she called the KIDS and got their “permission” on what she wanted to do Christmas Eve. She wants to come over, have cake to celebrate Ron’s birthday and watch a video that has their Dad on it. Now, the video I’m fine with, the cake/party I am NOT okay with. I talked to the therapists and was told that having a birthday party for a dead person is NOT okay. Funny… my phone here at work recorded that entire message as if it were a voice mail… let me tell you parts of the conversation:

Julie: They want me to bring the video of their dad on Christmas Eve. I asked each one of them. We’ll have a little cake and put “Happy Birthday Daddy” on it and let them watch a video of their father. The kids were worried you were going to say “but it’ll make them cry!” But I told them “do YOU want to see it because it’s YOUR decision” and each one said “yes”.
Tina: The problem is that I’ve talked to the kid’s therapist said that having a birthday party for their dead father was a bad idea.
Julie: Okay, whatever, they want to see
the video. We are going to see the video.
Tina: Good
Julie: If you don’t want a cake for Ron that’s fine but we have always gotten him a cake
Tina: But Julie, the therapist thinks it’s morbid.
Julie: Morbid? To have a cake for….
Tina: Their dead father… yes!
Julie: That’s not morbid.
Tina: Well, what do you want me to say… their therapist say it’s not good for them.
Julie: People always celebrate…
Tina: … Birthdays of dead people? No they do not.
Julie: Morbid?
Tina: Yeah.
Julie: People always celebrate the….
Tina: … Birthdays of dead people? No Julie they do not
Julie: Okay whatever.

Sheesh! She’s ticked. The fact that she took all that time to ‘clear everything’ with the kids before she even TALKED to me…. Now my blood is BOILING. Grrrrr Oh my GOD... to make matters worse, after I told her no, she called Ron's parents to get their approval. Now who looks like the bad guy?? I DO! But now... if I allow this morbid birthday party to happen, it's against the wishes of all three kids therapists - so I'm in a LOSE - LOSE situation. OMG... I HATE THIS!

Since I’m not feeling all that well today – I think I’ll just tell you a story rather than talk about how upset and terrified I am about tomorrow’s court hearing or continuing to VENT over Julie's behavior. I’ve got a feel-good story about my husband. We’ll call him “The Hero” and I’ll tell you why….

It was about 15 years ago, and this story is from memory, so I apologize to Chris if I get any of the details wrong. Chris had just gotten out of training to work for the Department of Corrections (DOC) and he was now employed at a State Prison somewhere in South St. Petersburg. Because he was new, he had to work the crappy shifts. He was getting off work – it was about 1 AM and he was headed up the Interstate to get home.

He was traveling through the ‘rough’ section of town. South St. Pete at that time was racially hot and tempers often flared between blacks and whites at that time. Chris has always paid attention to his surroundings but did it even more-so after his training with DOC. He noticed a car ahead of him, pretty far away as he could just see the tail lights. Another car raced around Chris’s at a high rate of speed, but slowed as it was passing the car way ahead of him. Chris noticed a flash in the fast car… and thought that perhaps the guy had lit a cigarette and the flash was from his lighter. Chris then noticed the other car pull off onto the shoulder of the road.

A black male got out of the car and proceeded to try to flag Chris down. Chris is in his DOC uniform, and he’s white – really white – in this section of town – at this time of night. Should he stop?? What could the man possibly want?? Back then everyone didn’t have cell phones, so he couldn’t have wanted that. Chris – for some reason – decided to stop.

The man told Chris that the guy passing them in the other car SHOT into his car for no reason, and the bullet pierced through the back seat and into the side of his neice. Chris examined the girl and could not find an exit wound, but she was badly bleeding. He checked for a pulse and she was still okay. Bleeding badly, but okay.

Again, nobody back then had cell phones so calling for help was out of the question. The roads were barren as it was so late at night and they were on a highway so walking to get help was out of the question. The grandmother was in the back seat hysterically screaming for help. Chris put her to work, asked her to get a pillow case, put it over the gunshot wound, and then HUG her as tightly as she could.

Chris grabbed the little girl and put her into his truck along with her Uncle and grandmother. They rushed to the hospital, breaking every speed limit and safe driving laws as they went.

The girl ended up being okay, thanks to Chris. Without question, he saved her life. When Chris was at the hospital, he gave the police a full description of the man, the car and anything else he could remember. Because he had just gotten out of training he had the memory and details of a cop, so the police were able to catch the guy. They actually found him in his car, under an overpass on the interstate, RELOADING his gun to go hit more cars. So… who really knows how many lives Chris could have saved that night!

He was later awarded a heroism award from the State of Florida for “Heroism Above and Beyond The Call Of Duty”

Yep… my man… my hero!

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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, December 21, 2006

My Hero

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