Saturday

Today is usually my relax at home, be a lazy slob day.  I enjoy it.  I am good at it.  Not today.  We are going out to celebrate The Kid's birthday.  I am glad.  I feel stressed and sad today.  I am worried about my son.  I cannot call and talk to him on the phone.  Yesterday when I called the person on duty did not really know Joel.  The call was brief.  I said, how is he doing.  She said, fine.  I said, is his speech clearing up.  She said, no.  To me, that is not fine.  We are working off of different scales.  I can lower my scale.  Not low enough to make his speech fine.
Tomorrow Tru Stories and I are making the long drive to visit Joel.  At this point, I cry thinking about visiting Joel.  The other day, I could not even keep from crying in front of him.  He did not notice.  He has enough of his own issues to contend with.  The other part that is hard is knowing how upsetting this is going to be for TS.  Does not matter how old our kids are, we want to protect them.  I wish she did not have to see her brother like this.  I wish none of us had to see him like this.  I hope that having TS there will help him.  I hope it calms him.  The fact is it does not matter how upsetting it is for us to visit.  All that matters is that our visiting helps him somehow.  Reminds him he is still loved.  Reminds him there is still a world outside that he needs to be a part of. 
There is no getting around, this is going to be a hard week.  The other day when I tried to visit with Joel even with his garbled speech he remembered that Bryson's birthday is coming.  He asked me what they were going to do to celebrate.  That was one of the few things he said that I could understand.  At least piece together a meaning of what he was saying.  Thanksgiving day will be difficult.  It was not a day that Joel always celebrated with us.  It is one thing to know he is downstairs in his bed sleeping the day away.  It is way more upsetting to know he will be in an institution with strangers that day.  I am going to visit him in the morning.  We will make sure he knows we are still thinking of him.
I am struggling with how many people do not understand how terrible this is for my family.  We have family members that have not even called for an update.  There is family that I see that do not even ask me how Joel is doing.  I have people that I was close to that do not seem to care.  I think most of it is due to the nature of mental illness.  If my son was fighting cancer, I do not think people would be so cold.  Course I could be wrong.  Maybe this is how people are.  I have watched a few people that I love die from terrible illnesses.  When I see my son, he looks as bad as the people I lost looked fighting and losing their battles.  When I left the visit the other day, I left with the feeling that what the doctors are doing to help him, could kill him. 
I will still find blessing to count this week.  I am starting a list in my head.  On Thursday, I will remember our family still has blessings.