Whose Discharge Plan? – August 2008

In late August of 2008 I received a copy of Mary's Forest Ridge discharge plan in the mail, and I was surprised to discover there had been some talk about discharging her. I didn't know anything about this. There hadn't been any discharge plans from the other group homes at this point — at least none that I was aware of. I was even more surprised when I found out that her discharge plan was for her to go to her mom's house and not to my house. This is what the plan said — that she was not to go to her father's house when she came home. I couldn't believe this and at first I wondered if it might be a mistake. I immediately called Forest Ridge and talked to the director, Chad, and asked him why this was in Mary's discharge plan and who had put it there. He told me Mary's corrections officer and social worker had told him this was their plan for Mary because they said Mary's problems were caused by the tension between her parents and that "Mary played her parents against each other." He said their solution was to have Mary live only with her mother.

The Tornado in Our Lives

Too much was going on — too much too fast. A tornado had swept through our lives not unlike a real Midwestern tornado taking with it our home, our car, my job, my children — even my mother. I had to wonder why all these things had happened at the same time, or if any of them were connected. It was hard to believe I had lost both my daughter and my job and harder yet to believe I had lost them both at the same time. I was pretty sure my girls were being manipulated or threatened, and I had a feeling my supervisor, my union, and even the girls' mother was as well.