Today is the day! Long, restless night without much sleep. Miss A was restless too. I suppose it feels a bit like knowing you will have to walk the plank in the morning. We tried to give her lots of snuggles and encouragement, but no matter what we say, this will be one of the hardest days of her life.
Confirmation came for David and I throughout the day yesterday. Parents who had gone through it with their own children called to remind us that there are times we have to make the hard decisions for the good of the group. Even my 18 year old niece, who is also from Ethiopia, called to give her thoughts and suggestions. Normally, that would seem a little strange, except that she has walked a very similar path as our Miss A. She too, struggled to control her anger. In her case, she ended up spending 6 months in Juvenile Detention for assault. A very real potential for Miss A, as the last blow up involved assaulting me and her brother. My niece had some great ideas about how we could stay connected to Miss A while she is away to lessen her feelings that we 'abandoned' her. Things like not forgetting to still make a big deal about her birthday, daily letters to let her know she's not forgotten, and involving her in family events, are all things that meant a lot to my niece. We had already planned on doing all of that, but it was good to be reminded to not let it slack. She really felt like the most important thing she learned while away was how to use positive activities to release anger, instead of bad ones. Practicing those activities daily to make them part of a daily routine makes them something that she would be more likely to choose when feeling stressed, was her advice. I thought that was brilliant and definitely something we would want to work into her behavior plan that they implement in her therapeutic home.
Miss A is incredibly unmotivated! She despises doing anything that takes physical exertion or effort. Therefore, what inevitably happens is that she will sit for hours in a chair near the fire and gradually feel worse and worse about herself and everyone else until she finally blows. Its a pattern we have seen played out time and time again. Any suggestions on our part to get up and do something to derail the train and change the trajectory of the anger, is met by a brick wall of refusal.
As I understand it, this program will be designed around teaching her that she needs to earn the right to do what she wants. In that way, she will need to do a certain number of 'positive' activities in order to earn the right to sit in a chair by the fire. My niece said that it was being forced to do good things each day that got her to really enjoy doing them, but it was a battle at the time!
I know without a doubt that we are not the people that can most effectively teach Miss A those skills. We have tried and tried but it has become a game for her to refuse. She has designed the framework in such a way that she 'has to' push back or accept defeat, which is way too scary!!!! It is our prayer that a change of environment will allow her to change her framework without us hovering over her and watching. Plus, she will have the natural motivation of coming home to spur her on.
Oh, my friends, this will be a day to remember. My heart is aching and I covet your prayers!
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