family updates

I'll admit it: sometimes I'm pretty cowardly. After spending over two weeks in unrelenting anxiety for the state of my parents, sister, and the kids, it was really hard to want to call and find out how everyone was really doing.

Today, at last, I had a real conversation with my mother where she shared with me some "status updates" on how Pedro and Cely are. I guess my dad is taking Pedro to get his anger and depression medication upped. Mom said that if KC's not home, Pedro just goes straight to his room and "goes to bed." She also said again how very much Pedro seems to want to join a gang; he wanted to get little teardrops tattooed by his eye like his cousins used to have. KC had to inform my mom and maybe Pedro too that the teardrops indicate the number of people killed by that person. Pedro's response when my mom (or KC) asked him if he really wanted kill people was a mumbled, "Oh. Not really." How comforting.

Apparently Pedro lies about everything, especially school work, and now Cely has really jumped on that bandwagon, too. Mom's going to try some sort of honesty/trust chart with Cely to try to convince Cely to be honest. They're both going to get some special testing done in about a month. And Cely seems to be suffering from unrelenting nightmares. Poor baby. I wish I could hug her, and honestly, Pedro too, and just try to give them some relief from the struggles they must have. When I'm not worrying about the mental health and energy of my parents and KC, I do feel compassion for the torment P and C must experience. I can only say they are so scarred by the weaknesses of their family. How horrible!

Mom did tell me that apparently Pedro had been adopted before, and it hadn't worked out. It sounded like she (and my dad??) have had a conversation with P about how they don't want to keep him with them if he can't be happy--or something like that. And she said P himself said to her recently that he felt like things were going a little better. But the part that eases my worry the most is definitely my mother's tone of voice. She seems . . . more together, less battered and broken than she did a few weeks ago, more accepting, maybe?? I know I will worry less if I can feel like she and my dad are hanging in there by more than a thread, if they can just have some positive news about their lives right now.

Now if KC can just feel like her life has improved somehow. And if the kids can just feel like it's ok to have a family and WANT to have one. I understand like never before the statement "pray without ceasing."