It is now over two years since Patricia’s arrest for violating her probation by making numerous suicide gestures/attempts.

            I missed the hearing last week as I was out of town on business and my information comes from our son Glen and the assistant district attorney.

            I am not sure how many of these hearings spread out over the last two years, at least half a dozen. I was thinking half a dozen, but the court website says eleven. This number does not include the three we traveled down for and the court cancelled at the last moment.

            This hearing differed from the others. First, it took and hour and a half before they could get Patricia into the court room. The ADA states she was ‘combative’. Glen says she was in tears for the subsequent half hour until they took her back out.

            She agreed to the recent finding of competency. The ADA stated a plan to send her to an out patient program in Las Vegas, New Mexico to finish out the remainder of her probation. The judge scheduled another hearing for December 2, 2009.

            As I understand it, Patricia faces two choices. If she agrees to the DA plan, she would leave for Las Vegas as soon as arrangement can be made. If she does not agree then their will be a trial on the merits sometime after December 2. At the end of this trial, Judge Murdoch can send her to Vegas, send her back to jail in Grants, send her back to probation in Albuquerque, or even release her with a discharge from probation.

            My calculation for her husband’s release date seems to have been short, I thought Mr. Lopez would be released by now but he is still in jail for his own probation violation (DWI arrest number eight).

            I really did not wish to hear the word ‘combative’. It is an indication that little has changed, Patricia is unchanged.

            People ask how the children are doing; honestly I am so proud of them. Glen feels genuine sorrow for the events; sorrow not to be confused with pity, trust, or missing contact.

I believe Jessica has dismissed her from consideration and her life. She did not have to assume some responsibility for her mother as Glen was forced to at seventeen, thus I believe her position is natural and rational.

Montie worries a little, and shares the sincere desire with his father that this would simply end.

Someone asked me yesterday how does this end, it has been ongoing since February 2002, my thirteen year-old son was five.

My response, “It ends one of two ways, she recovers or she does not”.

“If she recovers, it is a miracle to be shared with the world, a time of rejoicing and attempts to heal”.

“If she does not recover it could be years of this chaos as she fights the world until all energy is drained out of her soul and body”.