Expert: Libby Bonner - 1/29/2010

Question
My daughter will turn 20 in March. She was missing for 2 1/2 months, it's such a long story. I live near South Carolina border, which I add so you can see where she's been. She disappeared at 17. She was following some whimsy, alone, no ID, no cell phone, never has had a driver's license. No drug use, no alcohol, we got along fairly well, good student, good relationship with her dad and adult siblings. Biggest issue was lying about stupid things. I found her in Florida, brought her back, got her in counseling for a little while til her counselor left before we ever had a family meeting or any report at all. She graduated high school, wanted to stop lying, wanted to learn to sail (be a captain) (she was found living on a sailboat), wanted to be in a drum corps, go to conservatory, wanted to be a "paid actor" i.e. "escort." Travel, learn languages. She left again after graduation, ditched me really, I left her at a friend's while I went out of town and returned to a note that she'd gone to chase her dreams and not to try to find her. She was 18 so I didn't. She turned up again a few months later on her own, with a boyfriend. Lived with him until they broke up about a month later. She wanted to go to music school in LA, he wanted to be a model in NY. Stayed several months, working on her audition for drum corps (but never auditioned). Left for drum corps in Florida but asked for bus ticket home because it wasn't what she hoped for. Stayed with me several months, looking for a job, working on her application/audition to conservatory. She left in March to live with a "friend" near DC. She did some work for me, I bought her a bus ticket; she took all her things. Her cell phone "got wet" but I used the phone records to try to locate her when her grandmother died. Found some of the numbers were to escort sites. Found out the "friend" was a woman who hired her off Craigslist to be a nanny. Was fired when someone stole money. Maybe she stole it, but that was not her pattern. No criminal record, just this spirit to go and be free. She left half her things there. She stayed at her sister's a week in June, left angry that her sister wouldn't store what few things she had so she threw them away. I asked her sister to retrieve them. There was an unused one way ticket to LA and her Social Sec. card inside. She turned up in Colorado in October. A detective called me wanting to know if she had a history of mental illness, she'd been assaulted but was ok, the phone number she gave turned up on escort sites, her stories were grandiose. They decided she didn't need a mental health eval, but was choosing to live as she did. The only contact I had for her was a gmail address. Last heard from her Nov. 1st, gmail address was closed so no word over the holidays, until a couple weeks ago she called, from a jail in Hawaii, apologizing, promising to make up for things, wanting to borrow $1200 for bail, (she had the money in Colorado), saying her ID had been stolen. I had been seeing a psychologist for only a couple of weeks, trying to grieve for my lost daughter, to learn what to do if she did show back up. I didn't pay her bail. She's charged with trying to board a plane with a ticket purchased with a photocopy of someone else's ID, a felony. My counselor says I'm codependent and she's bipolar. She called a couple more times, the last time to get the number of a lawyer friend here whom I had had call her. Unfortunately I didn't know neither of us could receive collect calls by cell phone when I forwarded my land line calls to work out of town for a week. Nearly lost my mind thinking she tried to call and got the message that "this number doesn't accept collect calls." The DA in HI says her lawyer would have to seek an evaluation, her hearing won't be for 2 months, she'll probably get probation. She's still incarcerated, won't be assigned a public defender until next week. I wrote her a letter explaining about the cell phone, asking her to come home and we'd get some help, but so far she hasn't called anymore. So I have no way to contact her but mail. I will contact her attorney next week to try to get her evaluated. Someone suggested I bail her out to go to inpatient treatment somewhere, but there is no guarantee she'd go or how would I even get her there. It's going to have to come through the court. As you wrote in response to mother of adult daughter, my counselor suggested NAMI, and I haven't been able to go yet. I'm awake at 3 a.m. so I'm writing. Here's my question, I want to write to her, but I don't know what to say. The tough love is killing me, but I think she's safer where she is than turning tricks, although she was staying in Hawaii in an oceanfront motel! Is this wanderlust, ditching a very loving and understanding and forgiving family and a college fund? Do I just go on with my grieving and leave her to her whims? What do I say to her?  

Answer
It would seem that what to say to her is the least of your problems.  And I'm not clear what your tough love program even is.

Is Dad still at home and/or do you co-parent effectively - is he on your page w/ all this?  Is there money available?

If there is money, I would be paying for a private atty in HI, at the very least.  I would do what you can to get an evaluation - though being mentally ill does not free one from consequences like felonies.  I guess the DA knows what he's talking about, but I'm hard-pressed to see how boarding an airplane feloniously, post-9/11, gets you probation.

What else I would use money for - though maybe hard to do with no diagnosis - would be to see how to get guardianship or anything that let's you, or a court, make decisions for her.

I think nami.org now has material on missing children....don't know whether it is germane to your current situation.

Try also treatmentadvocacycenter.org.  They push for court-ordered out-patient treatment, and they have a page for each state.  Might help attys on either end, if they don't do much mental health stuff.

So - my bottom line is:  forget tough love if it just means that, when she really really gets in hot water, the family stops contact.  I would also spend whatever I prudently could to make sure she is not convicted and to make sure, if possible, that she goes directly from court to treatment, in HI or anywhere. Probably that would be out-patient treatment - we can't know that now.  IF it is out-patient, then it would have to be court-ordered; she is never going to stick w/ a voluntary program.  The friend who suggests bailing, etc., has NO idea of the problem of getting ANY patient admitted to a psych unit.

Also am not sure, should she come back home, even for treatment, that she should live with you without some sorts of agreements, or maybe even at all, for awhile.  Pls buy a book by Woolis called When someone you love has a mental illness.  It will start helping you right now, and you will really need it if she returns. You will feel less helpless AND you will communicate in more effective ways w/ her.  Given how little you can do now, DO THIS.  It has helped thousands.

This is not wanderlust.  Hard to say if it's a mental illness or a personality disorder. And there could be drugs and more behind this.  We think we know, but....  My daughter was an alcoholic [and undiagnosed bipolar] from age 14 - family at the dinner table every night, outings together, and we never knew.  We truly didn't.  No clues to be seen.

I'm also not ready to label you an enabler: kids at 17-20 are not adults, and any loving parent who perceives their screw-ups as just another stage will probably try to rescue them from themselves.   I can't readily see junctures in your story where having left her to deal w/ consequences would have been useful, necessarily.....so don't beat yourself up about that.

If you have a choice of NAMI groups, choose one that also offers a family support group and pls go.  It will save you.  And you'll get good local info on good docs, good therapists, etc.

What can you say to her now.  Remember, her thinking may be very scrambled, so keep it simple, and don't be thrown by screwy responses.  [Woolis will help you here.]  Let her know that you have been in contact w/ HI, and plan to stay in touch w/ what's happening.  Tell her that you love and miss her, and that you hope for better days ahead....that you are always there, that she is in your thoughts daily.  You might contact the jail to find out what things could be sent to her - books, clothes, money for the canteen - and ask her what she wants, or choose and send.

Ask if there is any person there w/ regular contact w/ her to whom you could speak about their impressions.  Is there a chaplain?  Could you talk w/that person?  Perhaps s/he could advise you in a personal way, or take a verbal message directly to her.  [There may be some websites devoted to families of the incarcerated, or even to those in HI.  Could be helpful....]

Remember to take good care of yourself.  It's easy to drown in these problems, but you remain a person who is also cared about.  It's not all about your daugher.  You have a Self that needs you - so take a little time away from this regularly.

Oh - a last thought.  As you maybe take some of these suggestions and get more info, is it time for a family conference?  The older kid/s may need some persuading that she may not be well, but the more people you can get on your, and her, side, the better.  For more info on mental illnesses, see internetmentalhealth.com or nami.org.

If you wish, let me know how things go.