I heard the traffic reporter on the radio today claim that she was too blessed to be stressed. I ran the words through my head over and over until I realized that in spite of my very bad attitude lately over the huge battles I’ve fought in getting mental health services for my kids, I feel the same way.

Just physically making it through each day ought to be indication enough for me, adding in all the other outsides stressors and challenges, but then meeting each one head on, often with a pretty good resolution, reminds me of how blessed I really am overall.

I spent all day today again in my truck moving my seriously disturbed son from a crisis respite center three hours away to a psychiatric hospital finally. A battle that I’ve fought hard now for two months, finally resulting in getting him accepted there. Kind of like getting into an exclusive college with a B average, so impossible lately has this seemed.

We had to again sit through a therapist meeting and one with a psychiatrist. I immediately liked them both, very astute, to the point, and on-target in their assessments.

The psychiatrist seemed to be interested in the fact that Jose may have a brain injury. Brains are injured to some degree or another prenatally by expectant mothers who drink and do drugs. His birth mother certainly partied.

Jose was very fixated on coming home, “How long will I be here?” was his constant line of questioning, rarely listening for much of an answer. The psychiatrist explained that it was up to him, questioning him in such a way, that he then used Jose’s answers to formulate the response, using Jose’s words about himself to guide where the therapy would start and what it would cover. After resolving all those identified issues, then he’ll get to go home.

The psychiatrist will start with neurofeedback, a brain mapping program that will indicate areas of damage. This is scheduled for next week and I’m very interested in learning the results.