Gettin’ Wild Here

The backstory: since my daughter’s extremely bad choices in January, she’s been on, basically, lockdown. We’ve gone through lots of counseling, I’ve relied on my friends to keep her in the company of responsible adults at all times, she can only see her friends if they visit under my supervision† and so on.

You might guess that constantly supervising a 15yo has resulted in some serious disruption of our lives. So when the behavioral health place offered us respite care, I jumped on it.

It’s marvelous. One weekend a month, she goes to spend a few days hanging out with kids who, like her, have made some bad choices. They’ve all had the consequences of their actions, in one form or another. And they’re supervised by people who maybe have made those mistakes too, but who NOW have their lives together. They get to do fun things like go swimming, go to Air Time, go to the movies, and they get to help cook and do chores, cleaning up after themselves before they leave their weekend home.

And I? I get a weekend that feels like a vacation.

No kidding, the first time she went I had a thousand and one plans and I ended up sleeping the entire weekend. I was so annoyed! But I guess I needed it. Subsequent weekends have mostly been spent with one small splurge (say, going to the cheapest sit-down restaurant we know, having desert and sitting in their AC using their wifi and drinking their coffee for HOURS, something housemate and I love to do but my ADHD princess prevents us from doing) and then a quiet weekend at home.

This weekend, though…this weekend the housemate was gone too. She’s catsitting for a friend.

Have you ever been alone? Like, COMPLETELY alone? For most of a weekend?

Believe you me, I have lived it up. I’ve run around in my underwear a couple times. I haven’t put the dishes away. I moved my stuff to the living room last night and marathoned Blue Planet (all that water made me feel cooler) while sorting a half-ton of paperwork and old photos that I’ve had in my closet for at least four house-moves now. And on top of all that, I fell asleep in the living room. I don’t think I’ve done that since I lived alone.

I’m just a party kind of girl, I guess.

† In related news, teens who are solely interested in getting high in whatever form possible are not likely to submit themselves to supervision. Who could have guessed?