I'm sorry

"Oh I, I gotta lot to say.
I was thinking, on my time away..
That I miss you and things aren't the same..
'Cuz everything inside,
It never comes out right,
And when I see you cry,
It makes me wanna die...
I'm sorry I'm bad.
I'm sorry you're blue,
I'm sorry about all the things I said to you,
And I know,
I can't take it back.
I love how you kiss.
I love all your sounds,
And baby, the way you make my world go round,
And I just, wanted to say...
I'm sorry.."

Buckcherry  "Sorry"

Intellectually, I know that it isn't my fault.  Of course, I am starting in the middle and you are probably thinking "What the hell is she talking about?"....but bear with me.  My son, my beautiful baby boy, was admitted to a psychiatric hospital January 27th.  He was then admitted to the residential unit February 13th.  Now, I am not going to lie to you, in some ways, this is a very much needed break, for me and the rest of us. And this is an opportunity for him to get the help he needs. Both the break and the help are desperately needed.  The guilt still exists, however.

The guilt.  The all encompassing guilt.  You take the normal parent guilt, and then multiple that times 1000...because your child isn't normal.  And even though you did everything you were supposed to do, you cannot help but wonder if this is somehow, some way, your fault.  Was it the coffee you drank and the cigarettes you smoked before you knew you were pregnant?  Was it your resistance to the vacuum extraction, and your insistence on continuing to try to push for 2+ hours, before you finally accepted the medical intervention?   Was it your choice to go ahead and vaccinate?  Was it the abuse you suffered at the hands of your ex-husband for 4 years before you finally got the gumption to leave him?  Was it the poverty that forced you to move 7 times in as many years?  Was it the fact that you buried your head in the sand and didn't take your child to a psychiatrist until he was 8 years old?

Or was it just a bad roll of the genetic dice?  Now, if one of my friends was expressing the same thoughts that I just did, I would be the first person telling them that it wasn't their fault, and that shit happens (up close, in their face, loud and personal, if need be).  I just can't seem to convince myself of this, however.  How do you separate yourself from your child?  How do you accept that you couldn't give him what he needed?  How do you make peace with the fact that you gave him his meds, and you hauled him to the psychiatrist, and you hauled him to the therapist, and you gave up any semblance of a life outside of his needs, and that still wasn't enough?  How do you escape the fear that this will be a cycle that repeats itself over and over?

I wish I knew the answers to my own questions.  I wish I knew what to say, or what to do, to make my baby boy healthy, and happy.  I wish I knew how to make up for lost time.  But, until I figure out the answers (if I ever do), all I can say is...  I'm sorry.

What to do now?

Pain.  It hurts.  At this point you are probably thinking “duh”, but hear me out.  I had to admit my son to an inpatient psychiatric hospital last Friday.  There was no choice, really, he was a danger to himself and others.  He was experiencing suicidal ideation, and he was kicking the crap out of me and his dad multiple times per day....














You can read the rest over at my friend Chrisa's blog, The Mindstorm.