With the uncertainty about whether Tom would be leaving the hospital I went to work in the morning. Meanwhile mia_mcdavid went to a meeting about James, at his school. This went OK, but was long and stressful for her.

Midmorning she called me, asking if I could meet her at Tom’s hospital at 12:15 for the move. Fine. I took the Light Rail two stops south and walked over to meet her (the train has been very handy for my hospital visits this past week). The hospital, and Tom, were quite prepared for his departure. I was expecting an hour of bureaucratic fuss, but everything was quickly settled (we are very impressed with this part of Fairview-Riverside hospital) and we were on our way to where Tom will live for the next few weeks.

This is a crisis center in West St. Paul, which is just to the south of St. Paul. We had an intake meeting there which took a while. Two of the staff were present, also the manager of his group home, his social worker, and someone from the State(?). These are always difficult–we have to repeat again all the dreary stuff about the problems of our child. On the upside we got to see that the staff seems quite good, and ready to take on the challenge that is Tom.

Tom sat with us for a while, playing with some of his toys and occasionally providing demonstrations of his behavior which we interpreted for the staff. When these got to be too much one of them took him upstairs to his room, while we continued talking and signing a zillion forms.

Eventually we left, but not for home. We had to drive into St. Paul, and all the way across Minneapolis, to his group home. We had to pick up some of his prescription medicines there, and more of his clothes. Then back to West St. Paul to drop them. The staff said Tom was doing OK, so it looks like we have managed this transition. Then back to the park-and-ride lot where I had left the other car in the morning. Then we finally got to go home.