Tough love

I hang the laundry in her room and the reality of her absence hits like a gut-punch. She’s gone and she won’t be coming back.

The last time she came home was two months ago. She’d failed to take her medication that day. She was dysregulated, stressed, refused to let hospital staff into the house.

It was awful.

I had flashbacks. The old days, when she screamed and swore and dragged me by the hair. It wasn’t as bad as that the last time — not at all. In fact, she spent at least an hour just sitting quietly in the front yard, chatting to staff, having lunch, playing her cello. But this calm was book-ended by emotional squalls that left me shaking by the end. The ritualised spitting, the extreme swearing, the agitation at entering and leaving the house. The rituals are absurdly elaborate: jump up and touch the tree outside the front door, squeal an incantation, leap over various cracks in the road or sewer grills. Or (gross), put a hand directly on the sewer grill or in the earth or somewhere else it’s not meant to be because OCD wants to punish over and over again.

It was genuinely awful and so, no surprise that home leave ended then and there, and hasn’t resumed since. In fact, her whole discharge plan completely changed. Gone was any suggestion that she might return home. The plan was — and is — to send her to a placement somewhere in the UK. Somewhere where she can carry on with some kind of therapy (I won’t hold my breath), education and just learn how to regulate her emotions and fight her OCD. That’s the theory. What will actually happen is anyone’s guess.

Fast forward to now and she’s so much better. The rituals are still there. The anger is still there. But everything is a bit muted now. A bit more tolerable, though (let’s face it), only because she’s in hospital and not here.

Imagined lives

When things are good during our community leave, they’re great, and I imagine all kinds of scenarios of normal family life: cooking together, going out, playing bat and ball in the garden. But the threat of violence or extreme verbal abuse is ever present. It doesn’t matter where we are. I could be in the middle of a shopping mall, and she might shriek: “HURRY THE F*** UP, C***!” And then, within minutes, she’ll turn to me and touch her forehead to mine and whisper, “I love you, mummy.”

She can’t manage her emotions. She can’t cope with stress. She’s on two types of medication, but has had no therapy at all for months. How’s she supposed to cope, really? I have to keep reminding myself that no matter how much progress she’s made, it’s not enough, and coming home would mean relapse. She can’t come home. She desperately wants to, but she can’t. I’ve had to accept this.

It’s a tough kind of love. Tough for both — all of us, because Ben’s also in the picture. He accepted this reality months ago. It’s taken me longer, much longer, because I can’t let go.

I sit in our house and am reminded of her. The books, the photos, the broken cupboard door, the dings in the walls. The impression of her — good and not so good — all of it is here, embedded in everything, palpable. How must she feel, knowing she can’t go home? What will she feel when she finally realises she’s lost her childhood to this illness?

This is an exercise in the toughest kind of love. A love that has to accept a radically different configuration.

How do we rescue ourselves from this atomisation of our family? How do we make ourselves whole again?

I’ve been trying to hurt you
I’ve been holding you tight
I’ve been learning to love you 
Am I doing it right? 
How are you still breathing 
With my hands all over your heart? 
How do we start healing 
If we can’t keep out the dark? 
Are you for real tough love? 
Do you want to feel tough love? 
This could be real tough, love 
I’ve been feeding you fear 
You’ve been keeping me thin 
I’ve been trying my best to feel you near 
Without me disappearing 
How do you still see me? 
With my hands all over your eyes? 
When your friends come calling 
Do they ask you with a sigh 
Are you for real tough love? 
Do you want to feel tough love? 
This could be real tough, love
 - Flyte/Laura Marling