This weeks reflection and planning for next week and CAF

Sunday is my day to reflect on the week and work out the plan for next week.
The problem is I'm still waiting for lots of things so I will have to play it by ear mostly.
Reflections on last week...
Well,
Monday was the breast clinic appointment, and Dinky went to school after having 2 weeks off.
Tuesday, met the mind advocate, and Dinky ended up at the urgent treatment centre.
Wednesday, I signed the letter for CMHT, spoke to S too.
Thursday, dinky had a hard day at school
Friday, I found out about the school's decision to hold a CAF meeting for dinky, spoke to the play therapist and with dinky's teacher after school for 10 minutes.
Saturday, my dad came up, dinky was playing with the older kids that only stay here Friday night.

So it's been an odd sort of week.
Dinky's hand is so much better now. They put this special gauze on her hand which promotes healing and gave me the rest of the sheet. I think it has done wonders.
I'm glad the stuff with S is sorted. The breast clinic I'd rather forget about, and the CAF I can't stop thinking about.

Plans for next week...
Monday= Bidding day, if any actionable post comes, action it. Also text the play therapist and ask to arrange a chat about dinky and what I can do to help and ask if she is coming to the CAF meeting. Speak to deputy head to find out more about the CAF meeting
Tuesday, see the play therapist if she is available, check post action anything if it comes.
Wednesday, nothing planned (check post)
Thursday nothing planned (check post)
Friday, blood donation
Saturday, dad is coming up


I spent much of today thinking about the CAF meeting and what it entails. I looked on the local county council website. Basically both the school and I answer loads of questions on the following...

DEVELOPMENT OF THE CHILD
• Section A - Health
• Section B - Emotional and Social Development
• Section C - Behavioural Development
• Section D - Identity - including Self Esteem, Self Image & Social Presentation
• Section E - Family & Social Relationships
• Section F - Self Care Skills & Independence
• Section G - Learning
PARENT(S)
• Section A - Basic Care & Ensuring Safety
• Section B - Emotional Warmth & Stability
• Section C - Guidance, Boundaries and Stimulation
FAMILY & ENVIRONMENTAL
• Section A - Family History, Functioning & Well-being
• Section B - Wider Family
• Section C - Housing, employment and financial considerations
• Section D - Social & Community Factors & Resources

So far I know that the head teacher, deputy head, dinky's class teacher and myself are going to be there. I will ask the deputy head tomorrow if anyone else is attending this meeting.
Just with the three of them there I can see it being difficult. Especially when it gets to parent(s) and family & environmental, we all already know dinky's development stuff.

These are some of the questions to consider in the CAF.. This entry would be too long if I listed all the yes and no answers.... So these are the no and nearly no's and really positive yes answers

PARENT(S)

• Set up and maintain a household and its essential furniture.... HMM, I can do it but don't have it.
• Keep house clean and tidy...... YES AND ISH... My place is always clean but not always tidy
• Protects from unsafe adults... YES, which is why she doesn't see my mother
• Feels mentally well... NOT SO MUCH
• Avoids illegal substances...MOSTLY, I have occasionally smoked cannabis but not often or a lot

Section B
Emotional Warmth & Stability
• Live at the same address for a reasonable length of time... NO, dinky has lived in 5 places in 4 years.
• There is a consistent parent... YES...ME
• Contact is maintained with important family members...YES, I try to make sure it is it's everyone else who doesn't keep up with it

Section C
Guidance, Boundaries and Stimulation
• Manage the behaviour of the child ... NOT ALWAYS
• Want the best for the child... MOST DEFINITELY


FAMILY AND ENVIRONMENTAL
Section A
Family History, Functioning & Well-being
The impact of family situations and experiences
(I just hope they don't want my childhood history)
My dad is physically and mentally fine
Dinky's grandma is in remission from bowel cancer and is recovering still from a nasty break in her leg but is mentally stable

Section B Wider Family
Whether there is an appropriate level of help for the child, young person or parent(s) / carer(s) from relatives and others
• Family has positive relationship with their extended family... NO
• Family has positive relationship with others in the neighbourhood...NO
• Family receives appropriate support from their family...NOT REALLY. My dad sort of... No one else can be bothered.
• Family receives appropriate support from others in the neighbourhood...NO

Section C
Housing, employment and financial considerations
Housing
Whether the accommodation has everything needed for living healthily and safely
• Lives in a house that is big enough.... NO
• Accommodation is weather and water tight...YES
• Accommodation has water, heating, cooking, toilet and bathing facilities...YES
• Accommodation is clean, hygienic and safe... MOSTLY
• Accommodation is not shared with another family/household... NO
Employment
• Parent has regular employment ... NO
• If unemployed are actively seeking employment... YES

Section D
Social & Community Factors & Resources
Explores the wider context of child's neighbourhood and its impact on the child, including details of facilities and services available
• Lives in an area that has good transport links... MOSTLY
• Lives in an area that has good age appropriate facilities i.e. youth clubs and sports facilities..YES
• Lives in an area that has easy access to schools and shops... NO, well not to dinky's school, and it's a pain in the backside to go to the shops. Especially seeing as the road from the hostel has no pavements and it is always a battle if dinky plays up to feel she is safe of that road.



hopefully it won't be too bad. I just have to make sure I know who is going to be there so there is no shock on the day. It would help if the play therapist is there because she has already asked me all my history. It would certainly make it easier.

Who is supporting who here?

So this morning was my last appointment before S goes on holiday for 4 weeks.
Somehow I ended up reassuring her that her patients would be fine for a couple of weeks. Reminding her I'm low risk for self harm and suicide, and the other patients will know that there is other help out there if they are in distress, gps, walk in centre, mental health line, Samaritans, the recovery team, duty mental health workers ect.
She even cut me off when I tried to mention my family. And we ended up discussing books she could take on holiday! Not to sound selfish here but surely it isn't right to discuss a holiday reading dilemma with a person who has no home this Christmas and a 4 year old who will spend the holidays in a hostel?
We went back to her worrying about her patients, and me reassuring her again. I'm not the neediest person but it would have been nice to have some reassurance that dispite the circumstances Christmas would not be a major disaster in the hostel for dinky. Guess I will have to reassure myself instead... Sometimes I wonder why I still go...
Oh yeah that's right... I need to get myself straight for dinky, but I wonder if S is actually going to get me there? On the past 6 weeks I doubt it.
However I don't know what to do....

It can wait until after Christmas...

Bidding day... How it all works...

Bidding on social housing properties from the local authorities is different in different parts of the UK and so is the criteria.
Some areas work on a points system, which I think is fairer as priority goes to those who rack up the most points.
Here we have bandings,

A persons’ current housing circumstances means they will fall into one of the following bandings:

Band A+ Emergency or very urgent priority

Band A Very High Priority

Band B High Priority

Band C Medium Priority

Band D Low Priority

It is fair to say that if you join the housing register and you have been assessed as either band C or D your chances of being offered social housing from the council are very low.

Housing is allocated by banding first then by priority housing date (the date on which the housing application was made) those with the earlier date will be considered first.

Dinky and I are in band A, to get into band A+ we have to have been in the hostel/bed and breakfast for 12 months or more. We don't qualify under any of the other criteria for A+. We were in the bed and breakfast for 12 weeks (double the amount of time as set out by government legislation) and been in the hostel for just over 4 months, so we have been in band A for 7 months. Only 5 more to go until we go up a band!
Most people don't get housed until they are in A+.
There is something new in the pipelines, 3 hostels were shut down and have beenundergoing renovations to turn them into temporary accommodation 1 and 2 bedroom flats, in which a person/family can stay for up to 2 years. This was mentioned to S (my mental health nurse) and I will be considered for one of the 2 bedroom flats. Here is the rub... Do I move into temporary accommodation and then move into permanent housing, so that for a period of time we have more room.... Or... Do we stay in the room, get moved faster into permanent housing and reduce the need to move twice? The estimated completion on the renovations is early 2013. We will be moved to A+ in April 2013.


As far as bidding goes once you have a banding you get a bidding number and bidding commences on a Monday from 12am and ends Thursdays at 5pm. Bidding can be done online or through the property store in the town hall.
Thanks to my iPad and smart phone I can bid at home, it saves a trip to the town centre.
Today is bidding day!
There were 2 eligible properties today.. One not in the right area for dinky's school, and one in a better area to get to school, so I bid at 9am. It gets rather depressing when before I even bid I read that there are 11 people in front of us on the list. So I bid anyway, got to show willing, right?
I check the status of last weeks bids and find I finished 20th on the list and my bid was obviously unsuccessful. Again a depressing outlook, I have to wait for the 19 people in front of us to be housed before we get to the top of the list. Even then, it all depends on what areas in the borough people are bidding on. Unfortunately Dinky's school is situated in the most popular area, so more people bid for that area.

If it went on the points system I would bet I would be higher on the list given my mental health issues, dinky's referral to CAMHS, and dinky's education. Most of the families that have been in the hostel who have been housed have had children under 3 years. So an extra month wouldn't be so bad but we have to travel from one end of the borough to the other for school Monday-Friday. We leave at 7.30 am and get home at 4pm. By the time I give dinky her dinner and do her reading and practice her letters there isn't much time for wind down and a bath before I get her to bed at 6.30pm. This gives her the opportunity to have 12 hours sleep providing she goes to sleep soon after going to bed, and providing the woman downstairs doesn't shout at her kids to shut up and stop crying at 4.30/5am and wake dinky, which she does probably 4-6 out of 7 days. So on average dinky is up at 4.30/5am gets to school at 8.40am, gets home at 4pm, goes to bed at 6.30pm, and finally falls to sleep around 7pm. So the least amount of sleep she gets is 9- 9and a half hours a night. At her age (4) she should be getting 11-12 hours a night.

So every week I check which houses/flats we are eligible for and bid on them. I try not to get my hopes up because we are still not high enough on the list.

Although we have gone from 35 on the list of properties bid on, down to 20 in the last 4 months. Which is progress, and progress should not be dismissed, but slightly celebrated.

We have got permission from the hostel managers to decorate the whole hostel for Christmas! So at least we can make the place feel more festive! It is going to be hard, but I have to make this Christmas as good as it possibly can be for dinky! So I have brought every thing on her list, and spent a fortune on decorations.

I can't get too down about Christmas because even though the situation sucks, I at least still have dinky to celebrate with, if she is happy, I am happy. (which is why I am not happy about being here because dinky isn't.)

On the upside, there is benefits to being disowned by your entire family, apart from the lack of arguments and family tension,there is also a big financial benefit! So all the money I would have spent on my 2 younger half siblings, my niece and 3 nephews can go on making Christmas special for the only person that matters.... Dinky!


I had better stop blogging, and get on with the washing and cleaning before I have to go get dinky from school.....

The subject of diagnosis

I know I have blogged once already today but this is bugging me and has done for weeks.
When I was referred to CHMT it was because the short term counsellor had written a summary report of the sessions to the GP and had highlighted possible PTSD. Something another two Counsellors had highlighted but nothing had ever been formally diagnosed.
So why is it bugging me? Well it would be nice to know what is going on in my mind and it doesn't make it any easier for me when housing and housing support workers want to know of any mental health problems, what do I say? Well, nothing formally diagnosed, but I am seeing a community mental health nurse called S who thinks I may or may not have PTSD. Then what... I fall out of the criteria for any assistance or considerations. I must admit partly my fault for having the attention span of a goldfish at times, but S said there could be a personality disorder not dissimilar to bi-polar but they don't like to diagnose them because of the stigma. Now I might have missed something but isn't the point to get a diagnosis so that I can get the right treatment. Although I never asked if I would be entitled to different treatment with a diagnosis. All I know is that I can't live like this much longer. I've done ok, spent 10 years holding it all back but time doesn't heal mental health issues, if anything I'd say it makes it worse. I can't for the life of me work out why she put me on antidepressants back in October, I mean I know why at the time and why I accepted them at the time. I felt really low and thought it was in dinky's best interest if I wasn't around. I stopped taking them for the same reason I said I would only take them if she thought it was an absolute necessity, which is, I am not always depressed or low in mood. And never for long enough for the antidepressants to actually do any work. The longest I have been low in mood or depressed is a couple of months. Then I revert to holding it all in laughing and joking and sometimes I get a little hyper. I mentioned a friend of mine saying I had very similar ups and downs to her bipolar friend even I do my best to conceal it. S said if I was bipolar then I would have been hospitalised by now, but it could be something not too dissimilar then she mumbled rapid cycling.
And there ends the discussion of diagnosis. I'm scared to bring it back up. But now I'm at a loss as to what the appointments are actually for as she won't refer me back to counselling because I'm apparently not mentally strong enough at the present time.
So here I am, a single mum to a challenging but awesome 4 year old, living in a hostel with no home comforts (our room just about fits in 2 single beds, a wardrobe a chest of draws, a sink with 1 metre of work surface and a sink and a fridge freezer), every week brings more stress, I'm up and down more than the detonator ride at Thorpe park, I am having the horrible side to the PTSD symptoms I'm there for in the first place and I'm barely holding myself together.
I think in the last appointment on the 5th before she goes away for a month, I need to ask her some questions. Like what are we actually doing? and where is this leading? Because if nothing is going to come out of it I might aswell call it a day, and let her go on holiday knowing when she gets back that's one patient less on her list to catch up with... Plus if two weeks has lots of crap, I wonder what will happen over a month with Christmas three quarters of the way through?

Should be interesting!

Where we are at...

So this is my first post...

My life is never simple... I said that to S (my mental health nurse) when I first saw her back in September but I think she took it as a depressive statement rather than fact. Everytime I see her there is a huge list of events that suck. 

For example... I saw S on Thursday, in the two weeks before...

I phoned CAMHs to see if they got dinky's referral that was sent in October, they hadn't.

So I phoned the GP practice only to find it was awaiting my signature and for me to fill in my section.

I go down to fill it in and sign it, only to find the referral section filled by the GP was copied and pasted from August, and no relevant info was on there.

So I arrange a GP appointment to go over the referral and hope it can be redone so that dinky can get some support. 

The GP appointment was a nightmare, the GP was condesending, patronising, jumped to conclusions and raised her voice at me. Of course I didn't take it well, I shouted back and walked out. 

I wrote a complaint and saw a practice partner who was also a GP to discuss the referral. While we were there Dinky managed to pull the cover of the scales, get herself stuck under the bed, and pull the cuff off the blood pressure monitor. She was also highly disruptive, kept interrupting and when playing was very loud. So the GP did the referral properly. 

I signed it and it was sent. 

We are on the first floor of the hostel and the woman under us has two kids.. A 2 year old and a 2 month old. The week or so before she had started putting the heating up to 26 degrees celecius. I am not a fan of heat. It makes me very irritable. So we got into this I turn it down, she turns it up, I turn it back down, she turns it back up battle. I asked others if they were hot and each of them said yes, it was too hot in the hostel. So I researched temperatures and babies rooms are supposed to be between 16 and 20 degrees as anything higher could increase the risk of cot death. I wrote a note and stuck it to the thermostat. She came pounding up the stairs. Apparently her 2 month old had a blocked nose and a little cough so it must be flu... I know... Hypochondriac in the house! I told her what the NHS website recommended and she ignored it and began shouting. I was not in the mood so I left it. Over the course of 5 days we had 3 discussions. She let slip that she always had her window open and that she didn't put blankets on him. I felt like I was banging my head against a brick wall. I lost my temper a little and said that if she wanted to put her kid at risk because she was too stupid to close the window so be it. Then she said "I feel like I'm being picked on... Is it because of my colour?" I almost hit the roof! I am white, she is Asian. But that never crossed my mind! I told her "I don't care if you are White, Black, Asian or pink with polka dots for that matter... If you wind me up and make me uncomfortable I will say something!" 

Racist? I have never been racist, I always had this saying when confronting racists 'everyone is human, cut us and we all bleed the same colour'. I can't and won't tolerate racism. The same as I can not and will not tolerate being called a racist because I disagree with someone who just happens to be a different colour on the outside. 

Dinky started play therapy at school that week too. And I had parents evening, the teacher was nice, but said Dinky needs to listen more, pay attention, do as she is asked, stop talking constantly, stop using the toilet as an excuse not to do school work, and she can get angry and aggressive so much so the teacher (Mrs N) has learnt not to touch her and to remove herself and other children from dinky when she gets angry. Dinky also is very concerned about the welfare of her friends and is becoming increasingly worried about where I am which is the complete opposite of what should happen as children settle into school. 

Nothing I didn't know but it is still hard to hear. All of these things are on dinkys referral to CAMHS.

So when I told S about the fortnight in between appointments she was slightly taken aback. She conceded that I was right and that things never are simple in my world. I seem to spend the hour every fortnight just going through all the crap from the previous 2 weeks. She could not understand how I laughed about it all and how I seemed happy especially after being down the previous 2 times I saw her. I told her I am used to it. 

I only have one appointment left in two weeks before she goes on holiday for Christmas.