continued from Part 1... Heaven was missing.
Tuesday Evening, June 27
On my way back to Spokane I felt helpless. With my cell phone on the fritz, I hadn't checked messages since before leaving Butte Monday morning. I wouldn't be able to do anything proactive until I got back home. Considering that I'd spent much longer at Heaven's place than I'd intended, and still had a rental car to drop off, I wouldn't be home until around almost 10:00 pm.
It was 10:20 pm before I was finally back home and was able to check my messages. Sure enough Heaven had called several times over the past two days on both my home and cell phones. Sometimes she'd leave a message. Sometimes she wouldn't. The worst part was when she did leave messages, she was obviously distressed. Unfortunately she never gave me any clue as to where she was.
I began searching by calling the friend she was supposed to go to see in the first place. According to them, she had left a couple of days earlier to go to see her friend Ashley, and they hadn't heard from her since. Unfortunately, that's where the trail would end however. When calling Ashley she surprised me by reacting hostilely, yelling that she had no idea where Heaven was and hanging up. After calling her back, she again yelled that she didn't care where Heaven was and telling me to never call there again and once again hanging up. I tried to call her several more times in the hopes of appealing to her conscience, but to no avail. She never picked up again. So much for her so-called friend. I was not happy.
I retrieved Heaven’s old cell phone and began calling the numbers in her phone book. Most times I got no answer. Of the few that did answer, most denied knowing anything. But one friend in particular surprised me. Although Amber hadn't heard from Heaven in the past few days, she did express great concern over the situation and offered any help she could. She even called back later that night to find out if I'd found her. Amber moved up several notches in my book that night. Unfortunately by 1:00 am, I'd run out of leads. I ended up trying to distract myself with work, but ultimately, I ended up going to bed not knowing where she was. For the record, sleep doesn't come easy when you're that uptight. I just had to believe that no news was good news, and trust that she'd call me eventually.
Wednesday, June 28
The next day, being my first official day back in the office, I was immediately besieged by work issues that had piled up during my absence. I was still bugged by her friend Ashley's response when I called her the night before, so I decided to call again. This time however, a different female voice answered. It was Ashley's mom. According to her Heaven wasn't welcome there because she said Heaven had been doing meth and didn't want Heaven near her daughter. My heart sunk. When I asked how she knew this, she said her daughter told her. I was skeptical, but get this... when I asked where Heaven had gone, her mother said that she had taken her to another friend's house, but it turned out no one was home, so she ended up dropping Heaven off at Albertson's store in the Valley late Monday night. Just so we're clear on this, she drove a 15-year old girl halfway across town and dropped her off in an empty supermarket parking lot at 11:30 at night, then drove away. Let's just say that I offered her an unsolicited opinion of an act that I considered to be both insensitive, and devoid of even the most fundamental traces of parental instinct on her part. I'd have had more respect for her if she'd called the police. She hung up on me. I have a feeling I won't be on their Christmas list this year. Oh well, she's not on mine either.
Finally, around mid-afternoon that day, I got a call -- private number. No one responded when I first said hello. I said “Is that you Kiddo?” There was a pause and then they hung up. Aha!!... It was obviously her. I could feel an immediate decline in my stomach acid levels.
After another hang-up call early that evening I just stayed planted next to the office phone. Finally, just before 11:00 pm, there was a call from an exchange here in the Spokane Valley. It was Heaven. She was very timid and asked me if I would please come and pick her up. Of course.
It turns out she was at another friend's house a couple of miles from here. It was a huge relief seeing her walk out of the house when I pulled up. She came out looking pretty haggard, carrying a big bag, and a kitten. Yup, a kitten. More on that later. She was hungry, so we stopped at Jack-in-the-Box, and then back to my place. Having her sitting in my office voraciously eating her chicken sandwich was a huge weight off my shoulders. She was alright after all.
Now came the time for her to start talking; and talk she did. In short, she'd learned some hard lessons in the previous two weeks. She learned a lot about people, friendship, trust, and the things that are important in life. She wanted things to be different. She wanted me to let her come back.
I confronted her with the meth accusation her friend had made. She reacted angrily and although she quickly admitted to smoking pot constantly while she was gone, she flatly denied using meth, and expressed shock that I’d even consider the possibility. Clearly she doesn’t understand the fragility of trust.
Now the only question was, what should I do? From my standpoint, there are two issues. First, is she being truthful about her drug use? A drug test would be the first order of business. Second, where is the best place for her to live moving forward? Given what I’d seen the day before, Heaven's mom was obviously in no condition to properly care for her, and given her living conditions (in the middle of nowhere with no heat, electricity, running water, or telephone service) Heaven didn't want to go back there. Her father wasn't in the picture, and with what I'd gone through trying to help her before, I wasn't convinced it would work any better having her back again. Even if I wanted her to stay with me, it wasn't my decision anymore. I'd brought her back to her mom's to live just 2 weeks earlier, and she had legal custody. Truth is there was no avoiding it; we were going to have to face her mom next.
She spent that night back in her old bed at my place with her kitten curled up nest to her.
Thursday, June 29
That afternoon, I took Heaven to the drug counselor to get a drug test. She was eager to prove herself, so I took it as a good sign. We wouldn’t have results for a couple of days, so we scheduled an appointment for the next Tuesday.
From there, Heaven and I went to Idaho to talk to her mom. I was worried that she would go ballistic on Heaven, but thankfully it really didn’t go too badly – actually she seemed pretty rational for a change. I took her mom aside and went for a ride so we could talk while Heaven stayed behind. We sat and talked about the options and I suggested that at least temporarily Heaven come back home with me -- but with new restrictions, and more severe consequences. It was clear to me that not only was Heaven not ready or willing to live with her mom, but although I thought it was important for her mom to take a more active role in Heaven’s life; she certainly wasn’t yet in a position to provide Heaven the stable environment a teenage kid needs.
In relating all that had happened to Heaven’s mom, including the meth accusations made by Ashley, she was adamant that Heaven would not have done it. If only I could have been that certain. My biggest issue was my complete lack of trust in Heaven. It’s funny really. I still had faith that she was still a good kid at heart, but I simply couldn’t trust anything she said.
After some lengthy heartfelt discussion, her mom agreed that I would take Heaven back on a week-by-week basis to see if things could in fact be different. We came up with a contingency plan if things didn’t work out this time, but the biggest change was that I really wanted her mom to be more proactive in Heaven’s life moving forward, so we came up with a plan that included her input. Each week both her mom and I were going to evaluate the situation based on how well Heaven was adhering to the rules we’d set, as well as considering independent input from sources such as Heaven’s drug counseling. If things didn’t begin to turn around immediately, the next step would certainly need to be more drastic.
I took Heaven home that night with a clear plan in place. The next milestone would come the following Tuesday. Test results.
Friday, June 30 thru Monday, July 4
Heaven was great the entire time. She was obviously humbled by her experiences, and was no problem to have around at all. Then again, being that she was grounded indefinitely, it would be pretty difficult for her to get too far out-of-line.
She was doing everything expected of her, and seemed eager to prove herself. I was optimistic, and she was deservedly proud. But that said, we were both apprehensive about Tuesday’s meeting with her mom attending.
Tuesday, July 5
This was going to be a hectic day. I had to baby-sit my niece Meagan for the first half of the day. Then I would be relieved by my brother-in-law at 1:00pm, so I could immediately drive to Idaho and pick up Heaven’s mom. We’d then return directly to Spokane, pick-up Heaven, and go straight to counseling in time for our 3:00pm meeting. By the time the meeting finished and we returned from driving Heaven’s mom back home it would at least be 6:00 pm before I could start work for the day. It was going to be a tight schedule in order to make the appointment on time. It’s a 50-minute drive to where Heaven’s mom lives, north of Spirit Lake, Idaho.
I hate days like that. (It’s a *** being responsible)
Babysitting Meagan was fun as usual, and I also spent some time doing some maintenance on my sister’s computer. As it neared 1:00 pm, I was still running some lengthy diagnostics on her system. Since my sister lives fairly close to the counselor’s offices, I figured I could drop off Heaven and her mom and drive back to my sister’s quickly to close down the test I was running, then drive back to the counselor I figured 15-20 minutes at most. It seemed simple enough.
As expected, my brother-in-law was on-time, so off I went. On the way to Idaho traffic was light. Things were looking good. Then I got to her mom’s house. No one home. This should have been the first sign of trouble.
I’d made some good time, so I just decided to park and wait for a while. We’d clearly discussed the appointment time for Tuesday, and she should have been expecting me to pick her up. Yet there I was, sitting in her driveway listening to country music on the radio, waiting for her to come home.
As it neared 2:10 pm, I was considering leaving in order to get back on time. Just then, a strange car finally pulled into her driveway. It turns out she’d gone to the lake for the day with friends. She was defensive about having forgotten about the appointment, and was embarrassed in from of her friends. To her, it was clearly my fault and didn’t hesitate to let me know about it.
In retrospect, this should have been the second sign of trouble.
After rushing around to get herself changed and together, we hurriedly hit the road. Luckily no state troopers were encountered and we got to my place to pick up Heaven at about 3:00 pm exactly. I’d called Heaven along the way and had her call the counselor to warn them we’d be a bit late. When we picked up Heaven, her mom’s mood picked up considerably. Luckily we live about 5 minutes from their office, so we we’re too late as we pulled up. Seeing them walking up to the front door together as I pulled away, I was optimistic things would go well.
After running over to my sister’s place and back, it was about 3:20 pm. But as I opened the door to the offices, I realized there was something terribly wrong. All I could hear was yelling – almost all of it from Heaven’s mom.
Normally you have to sign in at the counselor’s office, even if I’m only there to pick up Heaven. But this time was different. The receptionist obviously saw me coming up to the door and uncharacteristically greeted me by gesturing franticly and pointing down the hall. “They’re in the conference room!” she shouted. Signing in was obviously not a priority given the commotion.
As I walked in, Heaven’s mom was cursing and yelling. Heaven was cursing, yelling and crying. The counselor just looked dazed. I’ve had lots of experience dealing with Heaven’s mom in situations like this over the years, but this was easily the worst I’d ever seen her. It took another 20 minutes or so to get her calmed down enough to listen and get back on point so we could actually have a discussion. Once we did, we got to the point of the meeting. Although it was nearly 3:40 pm, it turns out that they hadn’t even discussed Heaven’s test results yet. So that became the first order of business. Heaven tested positive for pot – as she admitted, but negative on everything else. Finally, good news. Heaven gloated (deservedly so). Unfortunately Heaven’s mom wasn’t as impressed as me. Although she was no longer yelling as much, she continued throwing out threats and insults at a staggering pace. Once the meeting was over, we drove Heaven home in silence. From there, I argued with her mother the rest of the way to her place. Although Heaven had done everything we’d expected of her, her mom had spun it completely negatively. I’d never seen her so irrational. She’d always try to turn the situation back to how it affects her. It’s always about her; not Heaven.
Heaven was still pretty angry at her mom when I finally got back home. I did my best to positively reinforce her accomplishments for the previous few days and do damage control on the rest. We spent most of the evening talking about nearly everything.
It was a Tough day indeed. It's only been a week since returning from my walk about and I need another.
Moving Forward
Although it really hasn’t been that long since what we now refer to as “Black Tuesday”, Heaven is doing well. We’re still taking things a week at a time, but she’s doing everything that’s been expected, and her attitude has been super. The only times things get shaky are when I bring her to see her mother. She gets pretty anxious before, and sullen after.
I’m trying to get her lined up for an alternative school program at her high school, and Heaven actually seems to be looking forward to it. But frankly I just think it’s an accomplishment that she’s potentially going to be starting school this year at the same school she finished with last year. I don’t think that’s happened to her since she was in about the 4th grade while living in Arizona.
Overall, I feel much better about things now than I did back in June. It’s been a bumpy road the past couple of months, but things seem to be pointed the right direction now.
We’ll talk about the cat later…