home last night

Matthew had a psychiatry appointment yesterday so I picked him up at Healy house to take him.  He didn't want to leave Healy House and started to fuss.

My response to the fuss.........I got sad, I got mad, I got my heart hurt.  His consequence for hurting me? I told him he would have to stay home last night.

I want my son to want to be home.  What am I doing wrong that he doesn't want to be with us anymore?  He claims it is the access to the gym at healy house.  The field trips.  The dessert after dinner each night.  He claims it is the arts and crafts.

I can't hear any of this.  We do outings more than most families.  We have art supplies.  He goes to the YMCA.  Sometimes we have dessert and sometimes we don't.  What is wrong that Healy House is better than home?

This morning since the minute he woke up he has been fighting with Jacob.  Just pick, pick, picking at Jacob, and Jacob has been responding with a whine.  The whine that makes Matthew know that he is bothering him sos he bothers him some more.

Finally, after I was at my wits end, I told him no more computer.   That was the straw that broke the camel's back.  He ran around the house angry.  I told him to sit.  He wouldn't sit.  I told him to sit. He wouldn't sit.  We were like freaking Tom and Jerry- me telling him to sit and walking towards him.  Him screaming NO and running away.

Talk about feeling powerless.  What kind of control and discipline is there in a house when the child runs away and screams?  How can we be successful when I can't even get him to sit to talk and calm down?  How can I parent him? How can I not?

My heart breaks when he is home and it breaks when he is away.  I love him.  He is my first born.  I want him home.  But we cannot live this way.  The little boys have been in my room for an hour while Matthew screams and curses and threatens to hit me.  Matthew, with his little boy face, has called me every name in the book.  I was angry, I tried yelling.  I calmed down, and tried talking nicely.  I asked him to shower to calm down.

He screamed that he wants to go back to healy house where they don't yell.  I want to go somewhere where I get to parent a child with FAS and have staff at home to back me up.  Where we could have gotten him into a safe place and kept him there while we also  looked out for the emotional  safety of the other 2 boys. 

I want Matthew to want to be home.  I want him to realize that home is better.  I am at home.  My love for him is at home.  Home has to be better.  Doesn't it?  Why would it not be?

I am an educator for Fuck's sake!  I can teach most children!  I am a favored teacher at school.  Why can't I reach my son?  What the hell am I doing wrong?  Why doesn't he want to be with me?  I didn't know a heart could feel this hurt and yet have no answers, all while trying to love my son.

If I could take back the drinks that his birthmother drank, I would first make her spend a week with him like this so that she knew the damage that each and every sip of beer or alcohol or wine did to every part of his brain.  No drink is worth doing this to another human.  Nothing is worth this!