Thank you for your response to "What Do You Do?". You are right, it is very heart breaking. My heart felt for her so much. I couldn't imagine what she must be feeling, even today.
The family came over yesterday evening and updated me on the situation. The two members that came were her sister and brother-in-law. They wanted to know what had happened from my perspective since everyone was so very upset and I was on the outside so-to-speak. They also explained some significant family history with some very old school, generational dysfunctions. This poor girl, being the youngest in the immediate family at 20 years old, has become the scapegoat/target of the family's dysfunctions. This has been going on for a very, very long time. All that in addition to her being born possibly a drug baby.
She has never had any real support. The family really seems to be in denial of her symptoms i.e. possibly biopolar with signficant depression and major anxiety. Their expectations of her is that of a 20 year old when in reality, emotionally, she may be 12 or 13 years old. Therefore, they would need to expect her to have the behavior of a young teenager and not a young adult woman.
I spoke with the family and pointed out these aspects. The sister and brother-in-law understood and decided to create a plan of taking her to live with them in order to provide her with some guidance and to allow her feel secure and loved. The other members of the family were quite angry and maintained their higher expectations of her while making fairly extreme accusations.
This is only a crumb in this child's experience. I can not begin to tell you some other aspects of this child's experience in this family. Ignorance comes at a high price to those on the receiving end. It is a sad situation when human beings are incapable of learning new skills to help, not only themselves, but those loved ones that are very close to them. In the end, they all suffer. The family system is quite dynamic, both positively and negatively.
The hope is that, once she moves in with her sister, she will take steps and make progress towards healing. It will not come overnight, but she has to start somewhere. The permanent relocation won't happen til June, however, they want to pick her up this friday and keep her for a few weeks, and periodically, until June. There are some things that need to be straightened out before the final move.
Keep the prayers coming for this family and many others who are going through the same experience.
Much Love!
