Summer

Self harming is an addiction. If you've never experienced it, it might be hard to imagine. But if you have, then you know. 

Cutters, sex addicts, alcoholics - even if you learn to control it, it never totally goes away. 

About two weeks into her summer, she started telling me she wanted to come home. She didn't want me to talk to her dad about it though. She was worried about hurting his feelings. I was concerned, but I try to respect her wishes. 

Sometimes I regret that. 

She came home at the end of the summer with literally dozens of new scars, in two rows down her right arm. Easily fifty new marks. And that's not even counting the ones on her legs. 

When I asked her how old they were, she said two and three weeks. 

I knew she was struggling. I heard it in her voice when she called me. And she called me a lot. Sometimes three or four times a day, even when she was doing stuff. 

The thing is, I did end up telling him that she was struggling. I asked him to make sure she took her meds (which he did). 

But, according to her, he never noticed or mentioned the new cuts. Which means, in her mind anyway, that he still isn't seeing her. 

Several of the times she called me, she told me she just wants to be normal. She thinks her dad would be more present for her if she was. It makes me wonder what he says to her. I worry that he rides her about being normal - or at least about acting normal. 

She's a good, smart, caring person. She happens to have crippling social anxiety. It's part of who she is. We're trying to help her deal with it as best she can, but it's not something she can help. She doesn't choose this. It just is. Making her feel even worse about it is counterproductive. 

My heart breaks when she tells me how much she hates herself, that she wishes she were someone else. That she wishes she were normal. 

My dear, sweet girl - nobody is normal. I hope she understands this, and soon. 

A step back

The girl has recently had a small reversal.
I found some scratches on her arms. Initially when I asked, she said she didn't know what they were from.
Then she admitted that she had done them with a pin. And that she's not taking her meds.
Holy crap. More stuff for the therapist.

I asked the homeschooling group for help getting her involved, and a couple of moms of teens have offered to meet up separately. So glad I live here. We meet one family tomorrow. The other family, we will probably get together with next week. I'm as glad to meet other moms as she is to meet other teens.

My hope is that making some new friends will help alleviate her loneliness. I think that is a factor in her slipping back into bad habits.

This scares the hell out of me. I just have to keep her moving forward, and she'll be ok.
She has to be.

Progress

It's been a couple of weeks since the last incident. She seems to be doing ok.
She's been in fairly good spirits, and laughing and playing with the family.

We're easing into the homeschool lifestyle. And really, that's what it is. This has changed the dynamics of our household significantly; mostly for the better, I think.

We communicate more. We share our thoughts more. We set goals together.
The girl and I are making the decorations for our tree this year. We spend evenings working on them and talking after the little has gone to sleep.
So I suppose some good is coming out of all this misery. My big girl and my little girl are closer than ever. My girl and I have been able to reconnect. We're home, with my husband as a buffer between us and the world. (He's been wonderful about his anti-social family.)
Things are definitely on the upswing. I expect there will be more setbacks.
That's just life. And it hasn't been all that long.
But the future is looking promising, and we have a mellow kind of contentment instead of the constant despair that seemed to loom over us.

Fear

A relapse tonight.
Just one cut, but a bad one. Emergency room bad.
As soon as she did it, she came to me. She kept telling me "I didn't mean to do it", and calling herself stupid. She handed over the blades to me without a hesitation.
I think she scared herself.
She went right through the skin and exposed the adipose tissue.
She scared me.
I tried to get her to allow the stitches, and she agreed, but then she had a panic attack when the doctor tried to put the stitches in, and we ended up having the nurse put steri-strips on instead.
She said she saw the blade, and was thinking about the situation she just got out of, and just did it on impulse.

As I'm sitting in the ER with her the guilt kicked in. I couldn't help but wonder if I somehow made her like this. If I broke her when she was little with my own pain.
I just don't know.