Friday: My wife got into what is called a sobering unit at 6:00am this morning. It is a transitional unit prior to a transfer upstairs to the detox unit. She moves to the detox unit at 6pm when a bed becomes available. They hold her ten days in detox and then she is transfered to a 45-day inpatient treatment center. That was the plan. Here's what happened:
6am she is supposed to be there. She is being brought in by a member of the mental health team on our reservation. We are Native Americans... so soberlicious, the whole 'sort of' response to the Baker/Marchmen acts....we're on a reservation, we're suppose to be sovereign...some things fly - others don't. Sort of. Anywho, I was waiting outside the sobering unit at 6am...okay 5:30am to make sure I wasn't late. They arrived at 8:30am because the driver stopped at her house with my wife to feed the dogs, the chickens and the get the kids off to school. Let me be clear here - this was not a favor to my wife, the woman's full time job with the tribe is to bring people to their medical appointments...she just decided to make a two and a half hour detour for personal reasons.
I give my wife a hug and tell her I love her. I'm informed that she can't call while in the sobering unit but she will be able to when she goes upstairs to detox. Okay, 6pm isn't that far away. She calls at 10am...I can hardly understand her as she's sobbing uncontrollably. 10:30am I get a call from the Emergency Room at the hospital...it's a friend in recovery, my wife has just been brought in. When I get there she's...I don't know what to say, I've seen rough detoxes in my life...she's in trouble. They medicate her and decide against admitting her (there were some legal benefits to not admitting her) and release her back to the sobering unit at 3:30pm with a pharmacy worth of drugs.
She calls me at 3:42pm...they aren't going to allow her to go to the detox because she has a warrant out for her arrest. Her Parole Officer is out until the 18th, the sobering unit can only hold her twelve hours. I called the addiction team... this was their plan after all - they knew our situation and this was their recommendation. Nothing they can do then. I blew up. She didn't report because the addiction team told us they could get her into treatment... now there is nothing they can do? Her response? "Well do you really expect anyone to believe that you didn't know she was using until just a week ago or so?" I hung up.
I've spoken with detox and got them to agree to allow her to move up until Monday morning when her Parole officer returns. At that time, it is our hope he will squash the warrant and allow her to finish the treatment plan. I'm off to a f2f meeting.