Our Summer was very difficult. But because I was taught to save face I have kept my mouth shut. I made sure that people only heard about our fabulous accomplishments, our new baby that was on the way or how great our trip was to Ky Down Under. I think all Summer those were the only 3 things that I was completely thrilled with. Eli was a complete and total disaster. Toward the end of the Summer I finally took the advice of his therapist and sent him into the crisis unit for 10 days to get a break from us and visa versa. About 3 people knew I'd resorted to that. Not being able to handle your child is embarrassing. I told a few people that sending Eli to the Unit was like swimming in a ice cold pool. When you stay in the pool for a long time you get use to the cold water. Getting out and getting back in is misery. You are better off to just stay in the water as opposed to getting out and warming up then jumping back in. This was exactly what those 10 days done for us. We had time to warm up..........then had to jump back in the water and it was even colder then it was before. He has a appointment the 28th of this month and I'm hoping we make some changes that helps. Even though the situation with Eli sounds terrible he is actually the least of the problems this Summer.
15 year olds will drain the life out of ya. They will backtalk, test your patience, disrespect you, lie to your face, get picked up by the law for sneaking out at 2 a.m. on a side by side to visit a girl, talk nasty about you behind your back and find every single way to twist an turn a punishment until they still get their way. And being the oldest they are paving the example for the rest.
I had Peyton when I was a kid. Had it not been for my parents in his younger years I would have been up Crap Creek. After his Dad and I divorced I was single parent for many years. I mean no disrespect to his Daddy. His Daddy will attest that he was no help. And even still, these days, he wasn't one to follow through with my punishments because he didn't want to punish the few days a month he saw him.
For 12 years, anytime Peyton got in trouble here, he threatened me with the, "I'm going to my Daddy's" BS. Then after he got older he threatened me with, "A judge will let me live where I want to". These spats of ours usually passed and he would be fine for a few more weeks as long as he got his way.
Last Sunday morning was the straw that broke the camels back for me and him too apparently. I have rules. No stricter then anyone else I don't think. He wasn't allowed to just come and go as he sees fit. He wasn't allowed to speak to me nor any adult or his brothers nasty. He had a curfew of 11p.m.. and he had a few chores. Mowing, trimming and keeping up his room. That's it. As long as he didn't get to big for his britches, he pretty much got to do about whatever he wanted. Now last Sunday morning he woke up ill. Maybe because he had been fishing till 1030 with a friend the night before at a pay lake (now mind you he was supposed to be going with Eli but wound up inviting a friend and threatening Eli to secrecy about it along with the smoking he was doing there as well). He didn't want to go to church and made that known by sulking and stomping. He didn't want to clean up in the tub because the shower was occupied and made an ass out of himself again. And then he decided he was gonna hope on the side-by-side and go to his grandparents without asking. BAM!! I'd had enough and so had Danny. Danny preceeded to give him a speech about asking permission. One he's heard 1000 times before. Peyton mouthed your normal 15 year old responses and then informed Danny he WAS'NT HIS DADDY AND DID'NT HAVE TO LISTEN TO HIM. That was when I intervened.
Danny took on a plate full when he married me. Eli was 19 months old and Peyton was 6. Peyton's Dad was not exactly in the picture much yet and Eli wasn't exactly sure what a Daddy even was yet. Danny took them both under his wing and gave them what they needed. He wasn't great at the Daddy stuff but he was great at the provider role. My kids never wanted for anything. The Daddy role came in time. So to hear Peyton badmouth someone who took care of him when no one else would was like a spit in my face. Thankfuly Peyton's Daddy met and married and changed his thinking about most things and she made him a better parent.
Now history has proven when Peyton behaves this way there is a girl involved. He is the only male I have ever seen turn into a complete fool when he's involved with a girl. I asked to see his cellphone in hopes it might give me a clue as what on earth was causing his foul mood. He refused to let me see it. Ya see.......I stopped paying his phone bill in June and made him start odd jobs to fit the bill himself. Now, because he paid his own cell bill for 2 months, he decided that I had no right to anything on his phone. He even had the guts to say that. TO. MY. FACE. And then ran out the back door.
Now. I'm pregnant. I'm pissed off most of the time. Matter of fact I can't think of one person I care much for at all right now.........so when these events started to unfold last Sunday morning I imagine my blood pressure was somewhere borderline of a cardiac explosion. It was pouring rain. I was already dressed for church. And I took out the back door after this disrespectful brat like stink on chit.
Our disagreement over his phone and me wanting to see it, continued outside. He mouthed and mouthed about the phone. About Danny not being his Dad and about how he was leaving and going to his Dads because my rules and this house was too stressful. I think I gave him one more opportunity to hand his phone over when he told me again I had no rights to his phone at all. At that point I slapped the ever loving words right out of his mouth and he threw his phone and busted it at my feet. I then grabbed him by his shirt collar thinking I was going to lead him back into the house and continue his racking when he done some sort of matrix move and had me dam near on the ground with what I thought at the time was a broken forearm. Game Over. I then had to retreat to my corner for help before he seriously injured me.
This escapade continued for at least an hour. Danny retrieved him from walking down the road and brought him back home where he ripped his tail repeatedly for touching a woman. The game changer was when Peyton started blurting out suicide threats and saying if we didn't let him move in with his Dad he would simply call the cops and tell them such lies he'd never have to live here again. I think that comment earned him another jab to the mouth from me. This child had never acted nor spoke this way. I can't even remember all the nasty things he screamed at me that day before his Dad picked him up nor do I care to recall all of them. I still to this day don't know why except that he truly hated it here. Hated my rules. Hated Danny for helping me enforce them. And wanted to live with his Daddy because over the years its been nothing but fun and games and getting his way there. And he will be an only child. So, on Monday I made the choice to let him move. Call it giving him his way. Call it being a wimp. Call it bad parenting. I don't care what you call it. I just know I couldn't do it anymore. I couldn't argue with him. I couldn't fight with him. And I sure couldn't run the risk of him snapping and hurting me or one of his siblings again. You see this wasn't the first time he had threatened terrible things. I found out last week he'd said things to neighbors over the Summer that should have earned him a terroristic threatening charge. And he also got rather rough with a teacher last year when she was restraining him from "killing Eli" (his words). I took up for him at that time and actually thought she was in the wrong for laying her hands on him. I know now she must have seen a portion of what I finally saw Sunday morning.
I don't know what else to say about this except that I am lost without all of my kids under one roof but he left me no choice. He knew what he was doing. He backed me into a corner and gave me no choice. He said before he left that there was no fixing what he'd done although An apology would be nice considering all the times I've had his back and given him the benefit of the doubt when I should not have. But, I have yet to get that. At this point all I can do is hope that his Dad can "fix" him like he claims he can. Clearly I can't and not even going to pretend that I can. I suppose I was so busy with Eli that I somehow missed the oldest kid was also dealing with his own demons.
So.........."you don't know how I do it".............do you still feel that way after hearing I kicked my child out of my house?
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