My last requirement before going to bed is looking in on the kids. Ashley had done the old stuff-the-bed routine. I awakened Mike, and he drove around for several hours without seeing any sign of her. He told me later he wasn’t going to push his way into Herbie’s apartment, even if he did suspect she was with him, and there was nothing he could do except wait for her to come home. He told me to go to bed and he’d wait up. So when Ash tried to sneak into the house very early the next morning she found her father dozing on her bed as if in expectation of her return. Of course, she had been with Herbie.
Mike let Ashley go to bed, and she slept all day. He was very grouchy with me, feeling that I was responsible for not keeping a close enough eye on her and allowing her to get out of the house the night before. I stayed away from him as much as possible. Maybe I hadn’t been as vigilant as I could have, but I never expected a girl who had been up the night before and followed it with a six-hour emergency room trip to stay awake scheming. I also realized that in order to keep Ashley at home when she didn’t want to be here would require round-the-clock guard duty, and I wasn’t up to it.
My husband spent the day on the phone with various members of her treatment team trying to get her help and discovered there wasn’t a whole lot we could do. Charleston wouldn’t take her on our say-so because the criteria stated that she had to be a danger to herself or others, and sneaking out to sleep with a boyfriend just didn't qualify. Her in-hospital therapist suggested we put her back in the New Hope program, but Mike refused outright. It was what she deserved, but that place wasn’t fit for a dog. Her psychiatrist was leery about strengthening her evening medications without seeing her first, but he didn’t have time in his schedule. It was so discouraging.
Mike and I had already scheduled an appointment to talk to Heidi. It was supposed to be just the three of us, since Ashley was expected to still be at Survivor's camp. She suggested that we bring her in for a late therapy appointment, and she would try to get to the bottom of the runaway behavior.
Heidi talked with Ashley alone for well over an hour and then spoke with us. She said that Ash was simply out of control, angry at the world and refusing to see how she needed parental guidance. At the heart of the matter was the fact that since she was only 15, we were legally responsible for her, and teenagers were supposed to stay put at night. It was classic Oppositional-Defiant behavior, and the sneaking out did put her at risk for a host of unpleasant possibilities. It was also her opinion that Ashley was under the influence, and Herbie had given her pot. A stay at Charleston, Heidi informed us, was what our girl needed to cool her heels a bit. And as a psychologist, she had the credentials to have her admitted.
Unfortunately our daughter was so agitated at this point by events over the past 36 hours that it was unlikely she’d go willingly. Heidi proposed a kidnap plot in which we’d all leave the office together as if the family was returning home, but once in the parking lot, I’d jump into Heidi’s car, and Mike would take Ashley to the hospital. He would have her admitted while Heidi, who would phone Charleston ahead of time, took me to our house. And that is what ended up happening. My last glimpse of Ashley was her shocked face staring at me from the back window.
Mike returned home a couple of hours later, exhausted and depressed. He wouldn't talk to me, didn't want any dinner and disappeared down to his office until very late. I went to bed and laid awake staring into the darkness, worn out but unable to sleep. When Mike finally came in, he sulked in silence and refused to share what was on his mind.
Looking back at this day, I recognize it as a pivotal point in the relationship triangle between Ashley, Mike and me. It was like a decision had been made for one side or the other and Mike had to figure out who was more important to him, me or Ashley. I don’t know why it didn’t occur to him that one didn’t have to be mutually exclusive of the other, but that’s what he settled on. I also didn't know at the time, but he sent an e-mail message to Heidi Cook, describing his emotions and what happened when he took Ashley to the hospital. A month or so later I found it and was surprised and concerned.
Mike recounted how he'd had the chance to actually see some of the "faces" that Heidi had described in Ashley and his reaction to them. In one of the earlier sessions, the therapist had used dolls and our daughter had chosen three which represented her- a small girl, an angry teenager and a competent young woman in control of her destiny. First of all, there was the Ashley who had sneaked back into the house at dawn after spending the night with her boyfriend. She had been surprised to find her father in her room and presented herself as this helpless, frightened, vulnerable child who was unable to protect herself, so terribly sorry to have disappointed him by running off. The Ashley we took into Heidi's office saw herself as an adult, able to hold her own as she saw herself- old enough and capable enough to do what she wanted. But she reverted to this child when she saw me jump into Heidi’s car and realized she was being taken to Charleston against her will. She begged and pleaded with Mike not to leave her there, promising that she’d never sneak out again and would behave herself. However, once they arrived and she realized that her words and tears were not having any effect on her dad, she switched immediately back into an angry young woman. She even threw a cup of hot coffee at Mike, spattering several people nearby.
Mike checked Ashley in and left. But on the way home he began to have a change of heart. Instead of staying strong and recognizing that Ashley had brought this on herself by her reckless behavior, Mike began to feel sorry for her. He identified with her emotions, feeling himself pulled back into his past of the child being bullied by his mother and recognizing kin feelings. Inwardly, he wondered if he had been wrong to put her in Charleston, and he vowed to himself that he was going to be more proactive in her care and protect her any way he could. What none of us knew at the time was that this involved him siding with Ashley and throwing away the rest of the family.
She was only in the hospital for two days this spell, but Mike spent a lot of time with her, visiting both afternoon and evening. Her psychiatrist changed her meds and put her on Elavil to try to even out her moods, and she was given something to help her sleep. Mike and I met twice with Jay McClure, the Charleston social worker who worked most closely with our daughter, and under his instructions, we wrote up a behavioral contract for her to follow. This was so there would be no question about what was considered acceptable or unacceptable behavior. Ashley immediately rejected it out of hand because the incentives we used as rewards for correct conduct, such as going out with friends and wearing what she pleased, didn't look as if they were being restored fast enough to suit her. She still didn’t get the fact that her actions had resulted in a huge breech of trust that wasn’t going to be healed overnight.
Ashley emerged from her hospitalization extremely hostile towards me. It was my fault she "had to sneak out to Herbie’s" because I wouldn’t listen to the inaudible signals she was sending out that said she wanted to talk about David and what happened at camp. I never paid enough attention to her, and as she saw it, the only people I cared about were the other kids in the family. I betrayed her by getting in Heidi’s car and allowing her to be taken to Charleston. I had tricked her, and Ashley accused me of not loving her or wanting what was best. Out of her mind seemed to be any connection to the idea that it was her father who actually put her in Charleston.
I kept silent, wishing with all my heart that she'd stayed away much longer and we could be a normal family. But I was smart enough to look into the near future and realize that trouble would come of it.