Hi Everybody,

Me again... Always coming back to post when I have a problem...

We've been through the mill (my wife and I). I have to talk about it... As selfish as i know this sounds, I feel like nobody is really supporting me.

Right after Christmas my kid's mother sent him down south to live with his uncle. She essentially tricked him into it, telling him he was going to be visiting his cousins... but the uncle lives way out in the back woods, no transportation and wouldn't let him go over the cousin's house. The uncle would go to work and leave him home alone with no phone or money. His aunt called me and pleaded with me to rescue him and bring him to live with me and my wife in New York City.

My wife and I agreed, and staged a "rescue" operation of CIA proportions since the kid was underage, had no ID and we had no means of physically going to get him. We got a car service to pick him up and wired bus fare to the aunt to get him to NYC. (you don't need ID to buy a bus ticket)

We were all very excited for many reasons. I for one, with my history as a child of dysfunction - as well as my history as a bad parent - looked upon this as my opportunity to redeem myself and finally come through with a win for my son. My wife and I were really excited about it. Part of my therapy during my hospitalization last year revolved around me accepting the fact that I had a *right* to be a father to my son. I had felt because of my illness and my mistakes that I didn't have that right.

So, I/We stepped up to bat in a big, big way. I got him registered in school. We gave him a room in our small two bed-room (his room had been our office). We bought new furniture for him. We gave him a generous allowance. Everyone told him that he had a wonderful opportunity to start over. Everyone was routing for him. He received all kinds of attention and advice. We even got him into one of the better pubic high schools where he was advised to choose his friends wisely. It was quite an accomplishment because he had not completed any of his course work at his last high school.

He was sent down south by his mother for a variety of reasons: there has been tremendous dysfunction in the family and her resources to care for her other two kids are stretched thin; he is a behavior problem and has been prosecuted for stealing money ($2000) from her.

We felt that we could give him our undivided attention and we felt that since we gave him a nice allowance he wouldn't feel the need to steal.

Everything was pretty good until March, which was when his teachers caught up with me. Apparently they had only just received our contact info. We found out that he had been skipping school regularly and had not turned in most of the assignments for his classes.

We went to the school and met all his teachers. We emailed with them at least once per week. They arranged for him to attend tutoring and make up the assignments. I was *incredibly* impressed with his teachers and only wished my own high school teachers had been so on the ball...

Nothing worked. We took away Internet. We took away his cell phone. We took away his allowance. Nothing. I tried playing mind games with him where I ignored him if he had been bad, and paid attention to him if he had done something good. It didn't work.

He took items from our house, and we were told by his teacher she overheard him discussing pawning the items with another student.

My iPod disappeared. He said he borrowed it. Then he said he let someone use it and forgot to get it back.

We caught him in lie after lie after lie...

A little over a month ago he tried to runaway to a friends house. When we brought him home he threatened that he would hurt himself if he had to come back. We took him to the hospital where he spent several days. Through the hospital we got hooked up with another out patient hospital program. We had only just gotten through the intake (waiting lists... etc... ) and were scheduled for our first appointment last week.

My wife came home early from work and found him in our house with four other kids (including one underage girl) drinking and possibly smoking marijuana. My wife threw the kids out of the house. Later that night, my wife and my son had a fight in the kitchen after he intentionally threw an egg on the floor to **** her off. They started shouting and she told him to get out. He said fine and left. I let him go because I honestly thought one or the other might start throwing punches. That's how bad it was.

He never came back. The police were called/etc (they did nothing). He ended up back at his friend's house not far from where his mother lives.

The friends are nice people it seems... But my kid has them convinced that he is a "good kid" and that all he needs is some "stability". They know all the family history, so they are convinced that his issues are all our fault.

The truth is that my son has had behavioral issues since he was in kindergarten - and that his early childhood really wasn't all that bad... He had two doting grandmothers. I was not a problem in my kid's lives until much later and during their early years I was around quite a bit and things were reasonably mellow. What happened later in the lives, as a result of my illness and actions, compounded by their step-father's offenses is mind-boggling... But, I do not believe it is the cause of my son's personality which seems to almost completely lack the capability for empathy, seems completely focused on immediate self gratification...

I have to figure out what is going to happen now. The friends say he can stay with them indefinitely - which is fine with us at this point... But I wonder if he is really going to change... or if eventually he is going to get bored with them and start using and manipulating them as well... I now have to tie up his loose ends with school and therapy down here -

The limb I went out on to help him was formidable... If my probation officer had come by - or if the neighbors had called to police to report the underage drinking and the girl, I'd be in JAIL right now. Riker's Island. Not the friendliest place for a guy like me.

We warned my son about this. He was *fully* aware of the risks to me if he brought anything illicit into our home.

My feelings range from sadness to anger. I wake up and miss him. At the same time I want to kill him and think it might be better off if he got hit by a bus. I feel suicidal at times myself... At the same time I am in the process of applying to graduate school and just joined a gym near my work.

I just want someone to tell me I tried my best. I want someone to tell me t his isn't fair. I don't get it from my wife. She's devastated too. But all she can think about is how angry she is, and how much she hates my son's mother.

I'm not in a very good way right now and I just need a little support...