(no subject)

[gansje]

It has been one hell of a night. And it's just keeping on being a hell of a night.

We put emmabovary's idea to work (thank you!!! <3) and selected a password with Jo. Jo decided on a pass-phrase (which I should keep to myself in case she ever questions if I told it to anyone else) and then she needed me to use it not two hours later. She also went to the psychologist (the rotten one, but at least there was some therapy of some kind) and reported when she came home that she now thought the psychologist was an alien because while Jo was telling her about her thoughts and beliefs, the psychologist had a "weird look" on her face. I explained that she probably had a look of concern for Jo. Whenever someone makes an unfamiliar face now, Jo immediately suspects them of being an alien.

At bedtime, she lay down in her bed while I started storytime, and then she looked over at the tank that (used to, prior to its unfortunate expiration) hold her gecko. She asked me if I saw "U Pay" written in it. At first I thought she was seeing letters (from the titles of two books behind the tank) magnified in the glass, but when I went to look, I couldn't see anything at all. She was scared of it, and I moved the tank. Then she told me that she'd seen the words, "kill Jo" in her mother's car's rearview mirror on Monday (thank you, Shasta, for not telling us, good lord), and the word, "Die" written in our basement (she said that Lawrence had seen it too and thought that probably another kid she plays with had written it for some reason). She also told me that she'd seen a sign outside SuperCuts when I took Henry and Adam for their haircuts last month. The sign said, "You're Next," and she believed it referred to her imminent demise.

I rubbed my face, thinking, "God, please don't let this be child-onset schizophrenia," whereupon she said I'd never made that face before and demanded the pass-phrase.

She also has a rather juicy cold and is coughing a lot (we just gave her cough medicine, so here's keeping our fingers crossed she sleeps through the night) and she asked me just before I ran downstairs to tell L we have a problem, "If I get scared in the middle of the night, can I wake you up to sit with me?" Which has been a behavior we thought had finally passed last year. What Jo means by sitting with her is sitting in her room while she takes several hours to fall asleep and then several more after she wakes when you tried to tiptoe out. Which, given our current needs for sleep and my current mental state, is very bad. She's already woken once and L sat with her from 10:30 - 11:30.  I know more is coming and I'm taking that shift so he can sleep -- he has a meeting in Princeton tomorrow and needs a lot of solid sleep.

Guys, I'm scared. I'm really scared. Can I wake you up in the middle of the night to sit with me? 

Comments

[flw.livejournal.com]

I didn't mean to be critical or anything. You know best, better than anyone. Whatever you do will be right. I am just concerned, in general. You know how harmful labels and diagnoses can be. They are misused, in my opinion, in general. I think diagnostic categories should be used as guides for therapists and psychiatrists. And then only at the very beginning of a therapeutic relationship. Most therapists agree with me, I suspect. The fact these criteria and labels have escaped into the general world is regrettable, I think. But that's all abstraction.

This must be so draining. I hope you are taking care of yourself.

[gansje.livejournal.com]

I agree with you in the abstract, absolutely. In the particular, I want to know what the fuck this is and get her the right help fast, though I also know from my research in mental health that the right help is hard to come by and pretty much everyone's in the dark when it comes to anything like this.

I know just enough to be terrified.

It's really, really draining, and it's all coming at my busiest time of year work-wise -- this is the month we all work about 60 hours a week every week -- and of course I have to plow through all that too and not let on to anyone what's going on. I'm a nervous wreck.

[flw.livejournal.com]

It is all very troubling, the lurid imagination, the seeing words stuff, the strange face stuff. Hopefully it's just the result of a fast growing brain that is making millions or billions of new neural connections daily. Kid brains work on overdrive for years on end. You know best. I have complete faith in you.

I do not like how our society burdens women in this way.

[gansje.livejournal.com]

Can you come onto gchat? I'm really terrified and could use a friend.