where is that damn off button?

A warning in advance. This is just middle of the night, written cogitation...a mental chewing of the cud, so to speak. And it's about as pretty and interesting as cud, so you might just want to move on and read something else.
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I fell asleep around 11. As I start to write this, it's 1:53 a.m. Do you suppose that'll be enough sleep? I wish I could remember where the off button is on my brain.

This evening was Younger's 8th grade award ceremony. There is no real graduation; this is it in the way of pomp and circumstance for these kids. And if you didn't win any awards? You shall have no pomp at all. That part of the day was lovely. Dinner out with the family before. Mom and Dad are here. Eldest was cooperative. Yeah, it was 1.5 hours in a middle school gym to experience Younger's 30 seconds of fame. But it was worth it.

The work part of the day was also good. A new case came in the door. I filed an emergency brief of sorts based on the new law set forth in that Ashcroft v. Iqbal case issued by the Supremes Monday. ("Iqbal"! Tee hee. It's fun to say. I'm so immature.) Stressful work...but the good kind of productive, work stress.

I bet you can guess, because I'm writing at 2 in the morning, that it wasn't all sunshine and roses. I'm getting to know you, and I know you're smart like that.

On the way home from work, I checked on the status of the residential list for Eldest. She's third on the list.

"Um. So sorry, I know we estimated Memorial Day weekend. But the kids we have right now just aren't reaching therapeutic levels and it looks like we aren't going to have the opening projected for next week. We're looking at four or five more weeks."

And actually, the guy first told me he really couldn't make a "good guess" about when a bed will open. I got the four or five week projection when I asked if he could give me a "bad guess" and told him I knew he wasn't making promises.

Do the quick math...that's the third week of June...which means she's out 90 days later...the third week of September. Which means she misses at least the first five weeks of her Junior year. She misses the first five weeks of retaking Geometry, the first give weeks of Chemistry, the first five weeks of American Sign Language (she's dropping Latin and switching language because she's too far behind). Which means? She's totally set up for academic failure her Junior year. Oh, and if she doesn't do langauge her junior and senior year? Well then, she won't graduate because you need two years of a single language. This, of course, also ignores the fact that she'll still need an additional 1.5 hours of classes to graduate on time.

Oh. my. hell.

I don't mind her taking five years of high school. I think it might actually be smart, but I'm not even sure how we make that happen. Maybe Eldest comes out of residential understanding these decisions we made for her. Or maybe she discovers that she's so far behind in school that she gives up academically. She is fully capable of carrying through with her threat to drop out. And just what do you do when your 16-year-old quits school...something she CAN do? I mean seriously? Anybody know the answer to that question? What do you do with them? She can't drive, so can't get a job. (Our community has no public transportation.) Ugh. I can't even think about that scene.

The hospital administrator assured me that she would be in school while in residential and she could just transfer in. Yeah, right. You can really successfully transfer into Chemistry after five weeks without it. And, sure, you can miss the first 5 weeks of a new language and still successfully learn it. And, no Eldest can't do her St. Pricey school work in the hospital because she won't be allowed access to computers, so she can't keep up with the online course load of St. Pricey. And I know that's true from my experience with the hospital this spring. They basically let her sit with a book and read all during "school time" because her reading level was WAY beyond the other kids there and the only math they were doing was mental math...and well, Eldest still hasn't learned her multiplication tables, so they didn't bother.

Shit.

Oh, and as for the public school option I mentioned before, that's really no longer viable because we told Younger that we'd keep Eldest at St. Pricey. She was openly relieved. We didn't tell Younger this, but in all my reading about borderlines, one mother of multiple kids advised that she wished she had been able to send the younger siblings of her borderline to a different high school to save them pain. When I read that, it tipped the balance of our public versus St. Pricey debate, and we now feel --or at least did until that phone call--it is not only best to leave Eldest at St. Pricey, but it would be good to let Younger forge her own life at the public school.

A bizarre aside here...WOW. (That's a "wow" of the spooky kind.) I go back and read the linked post and, gee, guess I'm in a different place than I was then, eh? (Sorry, I'm apparently channeling my inner-Canadian. Where did "eh" come from?) But seriously, that prior post? I re-read it and I see that I knew something was wrong with Eldest. Mom-stinct is spooky sometimes. I just didn't know what was wrong. I suppose there is some sort of strange comfort in knowing my devil?

I know nothing more mocking than a devil that despairs.

~Goethe

Ugh. This is just all one gigantic losing mess. I was already struggling enough with the residential decision but the way it will mess with her school is truly a mess. Now I don't know the "right" thing to do at all. And I don't know who to turn to figure out the answer. We don't have an established relationship with a new therapist. I mean we've identified her. And Eldest had that first stupid sit-in-the-lawn session. But she doesn't know us or Eldest. Ugh.

Sorry. I just went on a little trip in my head and I realized what I'm doing. It is very much in my nature to solve a problem the minute it is presented to me. I want to figure this out RIGHT NOW, dammit. I don't want to spend the next month figuring it out. But that's what I'm going to have to do, isn't it? I can't know the answer. I've got to just live this life...face Mr. Music...with an unsolved dilemma and wait to figure out what's right over the next month. Oh goodie. Living with indecision. This sets me off kilter like nothing else.

I guess I will be one flapping-in-the-breeze, can't sleep a wink kind of gal. A house off kilter, if you so please.

Well, at least I figured out that I can't figure it out. Blogging can be all therapeutic, can't it?