WellStop first visit

Well we went to the appointmet with this place. It went well. The process is long, but I am quietly confident that we may get the help that is required to help my son further, from here.

WellStop are an organisation that is funded to help sexual predators rehabilitate. That is about as simple as I can put it. It also helps people who ‘may’ offend to change their thought processes and behaviours before they offend. The latter is why we wanted our son to attend.

I believe that some behaviours can be genetic. Even though ninety per cent of how we behave is environmentally ordained, there is that ten per cent which is inherited through ones parents. Earlier this year, I found out that my son’s father is a predator. A convicted predator even. In all honesty, this news did not come as a surprise to me. The news did make a few things clearer to me and I felt like a complete idiot for not realising this when I was in the relationship with him. As they say, hindsight is a wonderful thing. It’s just a pity that I am too blind to what is going on around me to see things while they are actually happening.

During the course of the initial meeting, which took in excess of two hours, we filled in many forms. These forms were disclosure consent, mostly. Finding out which organisations we had been involved with, who we are involved with right now, and what measures we have taken to ensure the childrens safety.

We explained our ‘The big wall’ rules. These are basic rules where we ensure that personal space is maintained at all times between the children. A reinforcement of the words ‘no’ and ’stop’ and that these words mean exactly what they say they mean. If one says stop or no when they are playing or conversing with each other, then this request/demand is respected. We also have a few more rules on the list, but, to me, those are the important ones to mention.

During the form filling we also did the interview. This is where a thorough history is taken from the parents (and usually the child also, but this time we did not take our son) as to how we came to be in this place. This part of the process took us over an hour to get through. The therapist was exceptionally patient with us while we went through every occurance that we deemed to be inappropriate. He also took a lot of notes, which I think is great. With notes you can see what you have missed, or what you still may need to gather.

After a couple of hours, we made another appointment to bring along our son so that the rest of the initial stage of the assessment could go ahead. This appointment is coming up on Monday. So I shall look forward to writing more then.

My initial thoughts of this organisation are positive. If you have a child that has been traumatised by sexual molestation, you really need to seek help from people such as these. However, if you do seek help, expect it to take a long time, intially, because there is a lot of groundwork to be put in place.

Whatever happened to our child did not happen overnight. It came from years of abuse, that has only recently come to light to us as his parents. It would be naive and stupid to think that these problems, along with the PTSD problems will fade away overnight and that someone can fix them in one session.

Wellstop seem to me to truly want to help people in these situations. And it may take some time, but I am looking forward to being involved with these people, as I quite seriously think they can help us to help our son progress further along his travels.

My next visit with the pain doctor

Yesterday I braved the elements and went to my appointment with the pain specialist. In all honesty, I was not looking forward to this visit. For the past week I have had the flu, and every time I cough it feels like someone is reaching in and ripping my spine right out of my back. Add to this the seering pain that eminates from my chest. Together with the thought of having my back injected was not looking all that good for me.

We got to the appointment an hour early, so we went to have a look around the shops while we waited. Finally, it was time to head back and face the music.

Got into the room with the doctor, and he asked how I had been coping. The report from us was favourable until I mentioned that since I have had the flu I feel like death warmed up.

The doctor decided I did not need injections right at that moment, and possibly not again. Although, I do have to keep an eye on my back for the next couple of weeks. If the pain is still this bad after I get rid of the coughing then I have to make another appointment for more injections. For me, this was a huge step forward in my pain management.

Then came the age old question, how was my sleeping going?

I explained that I had not been sleeping all that much. The doctor explained that the body is like a battery case, and it holds all the energy in it. Like batteries, the body needs to be recharged. The body recharges itself when we are sleeping.

He showed us a little graph kind of thing which he had drawn himself. In the graph it showed how much energy is restored as we sleep. If a person sleeps for up to six hours at a time, the body manages to recharge roughly quarter of the energy it needs to operate effectively. However, if one can sleep between 7 and 8 hours, this is when the body does the most recharging. Up to 75% of the daily energy required to operate is regained during the last two hours of sleep. But the body needs the first six hours to get to the right place to enable it to do that quick charge.

I found all of this information exceptionally interesting. So now all we have to do is keep an eye open on my back pain and see if I actually do need the injections again or not. I am hoping not, because for a couple of days those things really hurt. More as it comes to hand.