The Mindstorm

Category: residential

  • Yeah, Not So Much

    Suicide Bridge by K(ittenhotep) So, the transition to the new school is not going as smoothly as I’d hoped. He had about two good weeks, then the agitation began, fueled by teenage housemates who have figured out that pushing his buttons is excessively easy. He had a particularly bad day last week – we know…

  • RTFM

    Tim is coming home this Sunday for a few days. This is his first home visit since his transfer to Allendale, thirty days ago. The honeymoon is already over at the RTC. Last week he hit a classmate, slammed a door so hard it hit a teacher’s aide, and threatened a housemate. Sigh. But what…

  • He’s All Moved!

    We got Tim successfully moved from OTDC to his new RTC the week after Memorial Day.  It was quite the Memorial Day Weekend.  I drove up Saturday and picked up Tim and a mountain of crap so high I couldn’t believe he had it all in his room.  We checked him in to ODTC just…

  • Time Is (Not) On My Side

    96 days. That‘s how many days I have left until Tim turns 18. That’s how many days in a row I’ll be freaking out as we try and get things set up for the arbitrary change over from him being considered a child to being considered and adult. I didn’t freak out like this when…

  • Pdoc-Gate Update: Resolution and Research

    So – after that second email letter, and a phone call yesterday, and another phone call today, Tim will finally see a psychiatrist that, amazingly, not only works for the RTC but has her office on the grounds of the RTC Saturday at 1 PM.  This doctor will be able to monitor him until they…

  • Latest Letter to RTC In No-Pdoc-Gate

    Greetings: I understand you have made an appointment with a psychiatrist employed by your sister company for Tim this Saturday at 1 PM. I have a few questions I would like to ask: 1) is this the psychiatrist who will be regularly monitoring Tim until you hire a permanent doctor? 2) is this a child…

  • Six Freaking Months

    Tim had a bad day yesterday, and I fear we’re seeing the start of the usual Winter cycle.  Apparently he asked for his PRN in the morning because his voices were “loud,” but by 3:30 in the afternoon, they’d worn off.  He got in to it with a new staff member at his group home,…

  • Growing In To It

    Two years, three months, and 11 days ago, we sent our son away. We didn’t want to, and we did. It had been 11 years since Tim’s first diagnosis. Over those years there were 12 hospitalizations, 27 different med combinations, seven therapeutic day schools, one suicide attempt, six broken doors, nine different doctors, and a…

  • Deja Vu All Over Again

    …My son Tim, who has a diagnosis of Schizoaffective Disorder, turns 18 in eight months, and he will age out of his current RTC placement. He won’t be graduating high school (read here about the Super Senior program), but we will have to decide whether he should come home or we should find another residential…

  • Irritated and Debating

    Tim’s caseworker called a few minutes ago, with Tim in his office. Tim’s had a bad second day in a row where he is argumentative in class about doing work independently.  Yesterday he was also scheduled to get a flu shot and he HATES needles. I had Tim describe what was going on with him.…