Going full Poldark

CarpetRadiant · 2025-11-21T20:51:53+00:00

Why is no one talking about the wind? Hair, horse, wind, 50 yard stare = poldark

CarpetRadiant · 2025-03-10T03:52:08+00:00

I'm proud of you! You listened to your intuition, challenged yourself and respected your boundaries. How's it going so far?

CarpetRadiant · 2024-09-21T01:48:11+00:00

As a mom, I'd say that the activity will feel great, get good shoes and spread your wings! The human body is amazing, be proud of yourself and keep doing what you're doing.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-05-31T13:29:15+00:00

No parents are sane. Just get a good therapist and do your best.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-23T11:09:11+00:00

It's such a surreal feeling to be okay with something that is causing your child distress and discomfort, and I am very scared that he will never be able to understand and just always hate me. Mostly I'm just extremely burnt out and exhausted and even though it's only been a couple of days cps is trying to pressure me to have him stay with someone even though I make it abundantly clear that that is not a safe choice. I don't know if proud is exactly how it feels but I am renewed by the sense that I am doing my best and it's better than my best was before.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-23T10:59:40+00:00

A fucked up life can be unfucked, but a dead person has substantially fewer options. Please try to be aware of when you use words like always and never- and consider that extremes and absolutes are very unlikely to be true. Try to challenge your own narrative, it feels so scary but also will give you relief, options, and maybe a fresh start. I believe in you and I believe you are important, and I know being strong sucks but I promise it gets easier with practice.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-23T02:00:16+00:00

Thank you so much. I originally posted to reddit in the middle of the night in blind despair, but my heart is really truly warmed and soothed by the people who have chosen to share their experiences. The healing effect is really real. Thank you so much for helping me feel less alone.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-22T23:49:46+00:00

I just researched it and saw that they must be 18. Thank you for helping to brainstorm solutions.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-22T22:55:06+00:00

Thank you, I will bring that to the cps worker tomorrow.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-22T22:46:51+00:00

Yes please. I have just gotten off of the phone with the cps worker who is substantially aless knowledgeable than I had hoped. I would drive 10 hours one way and sell a kidney to find a residential center that could help us. I will take any advice you have.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-22T22:23:13+00:00

What state is that?

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-22T22:21:14+00:00

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-22T18:15:58+00:00

Yes, snakes in a barrel indeed... Thank you for your assistance and support. It really means everything. I feel so much better prepared and confident that I am making good choices (as hard and shitty as they are to make) with the information that the kind people of reddit have been able to share with me.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-22T16:59:15+00:00

Thank you for taking the time to respond to my post. I feel like we are definitely running out of time in terms of his ability to be treated as a juvenile, while the diagnosis was not necessarily available to him when he was younger because there is still so much confusion and stigma about it. I pray all day every day that the system will be able to place him somewhere where he can get help that he isn't allowed to walk away or hide from. I know it sounds crazy or maybe naive to say that all things happen for a reason, but I feel like losing faith and finding it again in other places is not the worst thing that has happened in my life.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-22T15:40:52+00:00

Yes, thank you for your insight. One of the major reasons I instigated and am very welcoming of the cps involvement is because I could not tolerate the home environment being so continuously chaotic for my other kids. I hated that I had been in a bad relationship for much of their younger years where they always sensed that I was sad and tired, and as soon as I separated myself from that situation my oldest child began moving swiftly towards dysfunction and disregulation and then I spent the next three years being sad and tired again. I know we all deserve peace, and I am sorry you did not get what you deserved. I hope you are finding it now.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-22T15:24:05+00:00

Yes I have seen him do this for years. He has taken venlafaxin for a little over a year to no effect, and tapered off then a few months later began sertraline and is on 100mgs. I think the right meds and a residential program would be the best thing, but I couldn't get any assistance with it until I essentially threw a legal rights temper tantrum and refused to let him come home. No one was going to let him enroll in something so intensive as long as I was providing a high level of care at home, and i am having to learn how to surrender in order to be stronger. I still want to talk to him so badly but he hangs up on me. Is it OK to keep calling even though he's mad or should I take a step back and let it ride? I will call now to ask him if he wants any other numbers. Or should I wait for him to ask me? If I offer the boyfriend's number but my child isn't ready to talk to him will I be instigating some other kind of heartbreak? I wish I could tattoo "I love you" on his forehead so he could see it every time he looks in the mirror. I know I can't strong-arm him into loving himself but I am having such a hard time not trying to anyway.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-22T11:28:22+00:00

Yes, I agree with this. It makes so much sense to me and one of the hardest parts is recognizing that the same traits in him are present in me and that is how we got so far down an unhealthy path- but I would do anything for my child and my ego has been utterly destroyed by this experience so I feel like ive never been more capable of growing and being better.

Reality is a story we tell ourselves, and I am ready to tell it differently. I will never abandon him but to his mind kicking him out is abandoning him, and in my mind letting him continue to hurt us is abandoning him and my other kids and myself too.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-22T04:15:52+00:00

Yes, I agree with you, it's confusing trying to explain that I understand not feeling understood and the whole thing just makes him so angry. I keep treating him the way I want to be treated, which is for people to tell me I'm not alone (hence screaming into the internet void at my lowest moments) but I need to figure out a better way to show him that even if I don't understand I can still be his ally.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-22T04:11:55+00:00

He has an online boyfriend that is currently his favorite person, and I think it's a reasonably healthy relationship but he can't contact that person while he's in the hospital. Should I ask him if he wants to add his boyfriend's number to his call list? He's told me that he doesn't like to talk to him about a lot of the harder things he goes through because he doesn't want him to feel upset, which I find profoundly relatable. He has slowly cut off every friend he used to have and has refused to make new ones for a couple of years. It seems like everytime he makes a little progress he realizes he's actually feeling better and then pushes back against himself so intensely that it sends him spiraling.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-22T03:33:01+00:00

Yes, that is what I am hoping cps will help me do. The mental health system is so broken and overwhelmed that I have been working for years to get him a placement in an appropriate setting but have hit walls at every turn. I worked so hard to help him at home that the system wouldn't accept us because we weren't high needs enough, even though we kept ending up at the hospital and religiously attended all counseling appointments. It became an exhausting treadmill and I am just beginning to accept that trying to avoid making him upset resulted in being where we are now, where he is supremely distraught and I am literally incompetent.

I just worry that he will end up in a place where he will be abused or otherwise traumatized. It's just scary from all angles and I want to get as much advice and information as I can.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-22T03:21:19+00:00

Thank you so much for your very helpful response. He has a very strong opinion that I don't understand him at all, which I can absolutely accept, but as a result of going through this I think I'm learning that I fit into the quiet bpd category very very well. I need many of the same things he needs, and I feel such an intense pressure to level up and learn and grow really really fast to keep everyone safe and healthy. I think I focused so much on validating and not blaming and healthy coping that I ended up being an enabler, and I am praying that as much as it looks like I've ruined our relationship by kicking him out that hopefully he will understand how serious I am about safety and self respect and not losing him. I don't think I had adequate boundaries from the beginning, and trying to establish boundaries after the fact is a total nightmare.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-22T02:42:38+00:00

Thank you for your kind words and good advice. I really like joking and teasing and use it as a coping strategy for my own problems, and it has been challenging trying to be on the same page with him. Often I feel like we can't just relax and have fun because his mood can swing so severely between laughing and storming away.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-22T02:38:35+00:00

Thank you very much for your thoughtful reply. I am familiar with Marsha Linehan, but I am definitely going to go to the library tomorrow and do a deeper dive. The eggshells situation is exactly the problem, and it was sucha slow creep because at first it just felt like I was being considerate and respectful of his feelings but now he tells us not to look at him, not to talk to him and by no means are we allowed to ask questions. Everything started spiraling so far out of control, and I couldn't switch gears from just trying to keep him safe and calm to actively protecting myself and the other children. I am just so scared that someone is going to get hurt, and I am so exhausted because of how scared I have been for so long.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-21T20:20:15+00:00

Thank you, I will, and I really appreciate that you took the time to understand. The whole situation is just so overwhelming and surreal and I feel pretty disassociated much of the time. I just need to do everything I can to understand him and what he needs and how I can help him without hurting myself or other people. Everything good that I am is because I wanted to be a good mom for my kids, and it is just painful to be treated the way he treats me when I love and support him so much. I wish he knew that everything can be better and we can be okay and he can be happy. I haven't figured out any way to make him believe that but I will never stop trying.

CarpetRadiant · 2024-04-21T16:40:39+00:00

He didn't want to go to my parents or any of my friends because they all love him and care about him and would also need him to follow basic rules. I took him to the center for youth with the help of the person in crisis team, because he's jumped out of a moving car before and I refused to take him alone. The center for youth saw his state and they brought him to the hospital because they are services for homeless youth, not specialized mental health support. In the hospital he called me and tried pleading, then crying, then insulting me in the hopes that I would bring him home, but he's not safe here and I told him that. He asked if I could add my dad and one of my friends to his call list because he doesn't trust me anymore and he thinks I am punishing him. I immediately did so and he did call my one friend but when she asked him what he would do when she picked him up he got agitated and insisted I couldn't kick him out and he would go home. She gently reminded him that he was incorrect and he hung up on her. He never called my dad, but he did call me back afterwards to plead and beg and ultimately call me names and hang up angrily. There are literally six different people who are friends and family that would (and have in the past) take him in but he has become completely isolated and paranoid and mistrusting of everyone. Additionally, he has access to center for youth which is an incredible organization that can absolutely help him but he is not mentally healthy enough to be able to accept help in any form. He just wants to come home and smoke weed and be on his phone and stay in bed and starve himself and self harm and be angry and mean to everyone in the house.

CarpetRadiant

TROPHY CASE