The End is Near

Last Friday E informed me he wanted to go spend a week at his grandparents. I thought, "Great. Another week he's not going to look for a job." But instead of harping about the job, I decided that we needed to work on the "family budget" that night.

Over the course of the summer I have exhausted my savings and most of my available credit trying to keep him in meds, counselors, food, etc. So when my work offered a class on money management I decided to sign up. One of the first things they went over was creating a budget.

So E and I sat next to the whiteboard and started writing down categories. We made special categories for him and I that were for things ONLY related to us: cell phone, gas for our respective cars, etc. I was killing two birds with one stone. 1) He could see how much he was costing me each month; 2) He would have a working budget when he got a job. I tried to emphasize that sharing this information with him was not to make him feel bad. We just needed to make some decisions and since he lived there I thought he should be involved. I thought it was a very good discussion. Then we played a game of checkers and he kicked my ass.

Last night I had to pick up two of his meds. (I've got him down to 3 pills, btw. Well, he should also be taking something for his acne, so four if he ever gets to see a doctor again.) The lady says, "You know how expensive these are?" I figured they were just as expensive as his other meds, so I said, "Yeah, I know." Then she rang up the meds, "That will be 5 hundred..." WHAT??!? Turns out his new "SUPER expensive" med was $459 for a one month supply. Let me say that again: $459 for a ONE MONTH SUPPLY! (Anyone still confused about why healthcare is screwed up in this country?) I felt like someone sucked all the oxygen out of the room. The other med was "generic" but it still cost $50!

After this trauma I get home and E is... I couldn't come up with a word to describe it, but JL, my friend at worked hit the nail on the head when she said, "manic." He doesn't like living in the middle of no where. He doesn't like living in between the family in TX and the family in KS. He has no friends. He was feeling suicidal again. Something happened at church that he was very nebulous about. He didn't want to try another church because HE'S BAPTIST! He doesn't like his therapist because she's a woman and he can't really talk to her. Oh, and he's not sure he wants to be an auto mechanic anymore. That was almost as distressing as the suicidal comment. He had called and left messages with his dad, Big D, and his grandpa. No one had called him back. He was STRESSED!

And then to top it off, he got a letter from NTB. He had applied for a job there and the manager said he had the job, but he had to take the drug test. But the drug place was only open... whenever the hell they wanted to be open. It took him about a week and a half to finally catch them on a "open" day. They were closed every other day he called.

This letter was from the company that does the pre-screen for NTB. Basically they had flagged E as non-employable because they hadn't gotten his drug test results in 3 days. AND they ran a credit check on him!!!

I left a note for him to call me when he woke up. When he called, he said his heart was set on moving back to TX. I reminded him that he wasn't doing very well there. He wouldn't have his own room because they were in a smaller place. He just said, "Yeah, I don't know why I was like that back then."

He wants to sell his truck and give me the money. I think the whole budget discussion really freaked him out. Its just too coincidental.

If he goes back there all my hard work / money / time / effort / etc. is down the drain.