Remember how I said that despite all my efforts, the first abusive group home my sibling was in never actually closed? Because, well, in the 9th Circle of Hell: 1) There’s a chronic shortage of providers (because the state itself effed its own finances and healthcare so thoroughly that no provider can afford to provide decent care, so only the lousy ones seem to stay in the business, but *shh* we don’t mention that part…) and 2) The state regulatory agencies have their noses so far up the providers’ @$$3s that they help sweep abuse under the rug to keep their favorites open? Slaps on the wrist are usually the most one can ever expect.
Well, the second abusive group home – the reason I had to take not-FMLA this summer and basically had a breakdown that broke the last latch on the vault that all my trauma memories were stored in – was closed. I found that out today. No one cares about the abuse itself in the 9th Circle of Hell, but screw with financials in a state that cannibalized its own treasury and sometimes things happen, I guess? Money is all that matters, not compassion or decency.
I think I claimed at one point that I would consider it a victory if ever anything I testified to or reported or uncovered ever managed to help to force even one of the most abusive group homes in the 9th Circle of Hell to close down. I assume I can claim some credit for this place closing. And, it certainly deserved to be closed for its practices.
I just probably should have been more specific about my victory conditions. It should feel like a major victory whenever a horrible place closes, especially in a place like the 9th Circle of Hell, where they virtually never do. It should feel like maybe I did something good in the world. Because, trust me, that place really needed to close! I will reiterate that again just in case a summer’s worth of despondent blog posts hasn’t made that clear enough before. That place needed to close.
It doesn’t quite feel like a victory since I mentioned before that there are basically no placements left anywhere that will accept clients with trauma histories, and now all the rest of the clients previously served by that horrible home will also have to find emergency places. Their substantiated histories of trauma, however, won’t make that easy for them. It doesn’t quite feel like a victory when exposing what’s wrong in the system only leads to the same catch-22 that my family is currently caught in for the rest of that place’s victims. It doesn’t quite feel like a victory when my own sibling was still able to be summarily evicted from the Bedbug Motel because its emergency management didn’t feel like dealing with someone with a trauma history and probably engineered their own loophole conditions to be able to kick him out legally as a result.
It just doesn’t quite feel like a victory since even that place’s closure didn’t actually end the crisis…
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IMO, greed in this country is bringing it to its knees. I’ve thought a lot about why that might be. Is it because people came here for a better life and that DNA has trickled down as a dominant gene and now we are just left with ugly, ugly greed. I’ll never know, but greed, I see it nearly every day and it sickens me. Especially as I struggle and fight for disability while living in a zip code where the average home is $1,123,900.
Victory at the expense of anyone innocent, such as the others in the home, I imagine would be difficult to feel completely victorious.
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“Victory at the expense of anyone innocent” – totally agree.
It’s heartbreaking reading such things, with everything you’ve been through, and to struggle like this. I certainly do think that you should take some credit in the 9th Circle of Hell of hell closing, which obviously needed to close sooner rather than later. x
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thank you for sharing your truths. my heart breaks for all that you suffered. i imagine this is very triggering; please remember to care for yourself.
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Hugs. Thanks for all your replies. My Partner is going to the 9th Circle of Hell tomorrow to help co-guardian try to find a placement now that Bedbug Motel gave us notice. I have another conference this week and no not-FMLA left, so he’s taking that on so I can go. He called the catch-22 of being caught between reporting abuse and the lack of placements for clients if/when that abuse is substantiated a “slow moving hostage crisis.” I never thought about it like that, but I think those might be the truest words ever spoken about the whole damn social services system in America in general- disability, welfare, healthcare, mental health, food security, everything. Here’s hoping November halts at least the trend of the whole nation becoming more 9th Circle of Hellish in general…
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