9/04/2007

Baby Breakdown

Friday 10 called me at work ...... she was hysterical and I couldn't understand her even after she repeated it 2 or 3 times. I told her I'd call her right back from a different phone - thinking it was a prob w/my cell. I called her right back and still could hardly understand her. When I could ~ it was something so far from whatever I imagined it could be.

It could have been that she hates it when Aunt is over taking care of her because all she does is watch tv. It could have been that Daddy gave her a list of chores to do. It could have been that she wasn't allowed to do something. It could have been any of the every day things that might usually cause a 10 year old to overreact and act like it's the end of the world.

But it was big. It made me speechless. I stammered through my response just dumbfounded and profoundly saddened at how awful she was feeling about herself. I did my best to talk her through it and she seemed remarkably calm.

She called again a few minutes later and then I said "I'm coming home right now." I couldn't care less about work now.

Mean time H comes home and calls me and I fill him in - but don't tell him what she said, just that I was coming home to be with her and to talk to her about a personal issue. He calls back to say she confided in him and they also talked it through but she still wanted me to come home. I was halfway there.

I get home and hug her and tell her it will be ok. Then I find out that my sister also dug in. That actually pissed me off. At first I thought 10 just sought her out, but I came to learn that Sis would not let it drop until she heard what was going on. WRONG person to tell. Now Grandma will know and Uncle, etc. But, still I'm glad that she had so many people to talk to. I just wish she'd stayed out of it.

So we took a walk, we went for a swim, we read together, we hung out. She said now "she felt free."

But it continued. Each day she would confess something - some miniscule thing, maybe from over a year ago. Some dishonest thing or inappropriate thing. She kept saying how she felt like she wasn't telling us everything, but she didn't know why. She didn't know why she felt like that because she couldn't think of anything that we needed to know.

I mean, she was in tears confessing to having "taken" a tiny (1/4" at most) plastic figurine from the home of a friend of the family because she was jealous of their two little kids. It was literally not anything special - it was a piece of junk. Some plastic toy accessory thing. She felt so horrible.

Ok - at first I thought she really had felt horrible about the first thing....which I'm not going to explain. But then I came to realize that she didn't know why she felt horrible. But she'd felt such relief, although temporary, from the first discussion and confession, that I think she was hoping to get rid of the feeling altogether if she just kept confessing things.

Then I figured out that this is Anxiety. This is a true anxiety disorder at play. Anxiety can't be pinned down or explained and so a person tends to apply blame to whatever occurrence or situation or circumstance that seems plausible. In her case she feels horrible about herself for no apparent reason so she's coming up with everything she could ever have done "wrong" and confessing to it to try to overcome the horrible feelings.

Note to self: I should explain that if you do something that you know is wrong, you should feel bad. That's how you know it was wrong and not to do it again. But not forever.

Today was the first day back to school. Last night she was up until almost 11 continuing to confess to me about everything. We had talked about the possibility of therapy to learn tools to deal with and overcome feelings of anxiety. We talked more about it then. She seemed to feel better.

This morning she seemed fine and then....she broke down. She couldn't face school. She felt disgusting. She felt sick. She had this stinging feeling in her head. Couldn't she skip, just today?

No. I knew if she skipped today, she'd still feel it tomorrow. So I said I would stay with her as long as she needed. I did. I also talked w/her principal and her teacher to give them the heads up about how badly she was feeling. An hour into class she was happy and settled and waved me away.

But now I'm a mess. Now I'm so worried about her.

I hate working.

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