Calls and $300K

Every now and then, Jack and I will get a call from a parent.

"A friend said I should talk to you. My teenage son/daughter (check all that apply)..."

• stopped going to school
• lies in bed all day
• doesn't come out of room
• watches videos and Netflix all day
• is defiant
• smokes pot
• can be violent 
• withdraws
• doesn't eat
• doesn't connect with friends
• is on meds that aren't working

"I heard your son had similar problems. What can I do?"

I wish my gut response wasn't: Do you have $300K laying around that you aren't using? Because that is what it is going to cost to get similar treatment for your kid that we got for the Boy.

Ballpark estimates:

• One day in the PBMU at Seattle Childrens Hospital (if you are lucky enough to get in): $5,000
• One day in Wilderness Therapy (11 weeks): $620
• One day at Therapeutic Boarding School (2 years): $300
• Individual and couple/family therapy: $1340 a month or $44 a day

Plus travel to remote locations whose airports have less than 5 gates.

• Airfare
• Lodging
• Food
• Car rental

That doesn't even include my second response, which is "Are you okay with becoming an early empty-nester? Letting someone else finish raising and launching your child?

Back to money. Health insurance only pays for acute care in the hospital and then a minimal amount for the clinically billed therapy for one-on-one appointments with their specific therapist at Wilderness and at a therapeutic boarding school. Nevermind that the therapists hang and eat lunch with these kids. Nevermind there is round-the-clock support so if these kids fall of the rails, there are resources available. Nevermind that these kids need to get out of their current home environment in order to survive.

I wish there was something I could tell these families to make their lives better without breaking the bank. I wish there was a societal collective place where these kids could rebuild their souls and spirits, like a monastery, kibbutz or an ashram where we could send these kids for affordable treatment. I am talking something like YMCA camps on steroids for a year or two, not just two weeks in the summer.

And I am lucky. I am can bitch about how much this costs, but Jack and I (mostly Jack, TBH) can afford it without draining our savings, our retirement, or the equity in our homes. We don't need to ask the Bank of Grandma and Grandpa to foot the bill. We didn't have a "Go Fund Me" campaign.

Nevertheless, if I had known what to do to have kept my kid at home, I would have. What would I have done differently that might have avoided this? I don't know what would have changed the Boy or Jack, but I wish I had gotten into Al-Anon sooner. I wish I would have recognized earlier how I was reacting to Jack's addiction, and that I needed to change. Would that have made a difference? I would have been more serene, but I don't know if it would have changed the Boy's path.