One year ago I wrote a post titled Fire is Hot. Fire is indeed hot. You know what else is hot? Just about any place south of the Mason-Dixon line in the middle of June. You know what makes those places even hotter? No air-conditioning and a cast on your arm.

Sofija was accepted into an outpatient treatment program at Kennedy Krieger Institute. For the next several months we will spend two days a week driving to Columbia, MD for two hours of attempting to turn her into the best version of herself and then climbing back in the car for a two-hour drive home with an unhappy-to-be-in-the-car (not so) little girl. We prayed for this. We asked you and everyone you/we know to pray for this. We are masochists.

Before we dive into the actual treatment part, the doctors need to know more about what motivates her aggression, self-injury, and other destructive behaviors. These things are learned through a process called a functional analysis. It’s a painful process that involves trying to trigger behaviors. This week’s functional analysis was all about discovering why she constantly aggresses towards her Daddy.

In the first ten-minute assessment she was given blank paper and a box of crayons and told that her Dad had work to do on his phone and that she didn’t have to draw or color, but she could not talk to him. As I sat in an observation booth with three doctors watching my baby girl and my hubby, I noticed he was scowling. I sent him a text message asking why. He simply responded, “Check your email.” So I did. I wanted to vomit. After forty-two months of waiting for the Army to tell us exactly what it is he was accused of in December of 2011, we had our answer. He had just received a GOMAR (General Letter of Reprimand) and he was given one week to file a rebuttal.

What that means is that after a three and a half-year witch hunt, the Justice Department and the Army’s Criminal Investigation Division haven’t found any evidence to substantiate pressing charges against him or taking any type of judicial action. But because they have never asked for nor received any evidence to rebut the accusations, they have recommended that his commanding General just write a letter saying that he did those things and place that letter in his permanent military record, destroying not only his career, but his chances of getting any job connected to the military when he retires. A GOMAR is referred to as the “Career Killer”. Without ever having a voice in the matter, a letter was written to destroy my husband’s career.

The letter stated that he was accused of giving contracts to family members, participating in a conspiracy, and accepting bribes. There was a second email with a link to the 149 pages of investigation notes that we would not be able to open until we were home. Like I’ve already said, I wanted to vomit. I sat in that observation booth, with my mind spinning a million miles an hour, bursting with anticipation knowing that as soon as we opened those investigation notes we would know EXACTLY who started this hellish season of our lives.

With my brain and stomach churning, Sofija and my hubby began the next assessment. This one involved placing a demand on her. She was given a tub of towels and shirts and asked to fold them. When he unfolded a shirt and asked her to fold it correctly she jumped out of her chair and began swinging at him. As he put his forearm up to block her, her fist caught his pinky finger and left it hanging at about a 70 degree angle to the side of his hand. It was ugly.

We made the two-hour drive home before he went to the emergency room and discovered he has a comminuted fracture (the bone is broken into several pieces just below the knuckle). Did I mention it’s his left hand? And that he just happens to be left-handed?

The ER doctor put in an emergency referral for him to see an orthopedic surgeon and sent him home. By the time we were done with attempting to get him comfortable, we decided to try to sleep and save the investigation notes for the next morning. A man’s capacity for pain in a day has its limits.

We awoke the next morning to a phone call from the orthopedic surgeon who had already scheduled an appointment before the end of the week. With little sleep, lots of pain-induced vomiting, and a not-so-little girl trying her best to get to her Dad’s splinted and wrapped hand, we dug into the investigation notes. With the exception of a couple of people who made false statements, it wasn’t all that surprising. The two people who made the accusations and the two people who lied to back up those accusations, have all made A LOT of money in the three-and-a-half years that my husband has sat at home watching his twenty-four year, stellar military career, disappear. All of them needed him and his big mouth out of the way in order to make all that money. We were given one week to prove it. EVERY SINGLE PART OF ME wants to blast their names all over the internet, write letters to their wives, and start looking for a lawyer who will sue them for slander and libel. God’s going to have to do some serious work in me. Yea, yea, I know. “Forgive so that you can be forgiven…” I also know that the Bible says Christians shouldn’t sue their brothers in Christ, but I’m pretty sure none of these guys are in the family.

With his one hand and my two, we have spent the last few days searching, writing, praying, and fending off Sofija. Two days ago we saw the orthopedic surgeon. They x-rayed his hand again and put him in a cast. They will x-ray it again next week and if the bones have shifted, he will have to have pins placed. We’re believing that they will be properly aligned, healing, and he will not have to have surgery.

When we returned from the ortho appointment it was REALLY hot in our house. By the next morning we realized our A/C was dead. Just lovely. Three hands, a deadline, a broken baby girl, and a really hot house are not things I would wish on anyone. Not even the guys who destroyed my husband’s career. Maybe God is working on my heart already. 😉

This week has been crap. Hot, stinky, yucky… CRAP. So many of you have messaged and called to ask what we need. Here it is…. We need God to make this crap holy.