I'm A BAD MOTHER!

About a month ago Leahness started to pull at her eyelashes. She did it so much that they started to fall out. She had pulled out most of her eyelashes when I really started to freak out. We talked about why she was doing it and started to notice it was when she was bored or frustrated. This was in November. After A LOT of talking about it and telling her my Christmas wish was for her to stop pulling out her eyelashes, to which she responded, "But mom, you can't wrap my eyelashes!", she stopped. It has been a month and a half since she stopped altogether. I helped her to remember that doing that won't help with anger and won't make it better. I helped her to think of better ways to get out her frustrations or emotions. I let her know it is OK to cry, something my dad always would tell me. He would tell me to grab a pillow and cry into it until I couldn't cry anymore. It helped me a lot and I think it is helping her. ...but i don't know...

I just received an email at work from her teacher, Ms. Perez. here it is:

"Hello Melissa, Leahness had a rough morning. She was getting upset with the other kids at her table and couldn't do her work so I moved her to my table. She continued to get upset with her self saying she is not a good kid and that she is a creep. I talked with her to see where this was all coming from and she said it was on Charlie Brown. I talked with her to let her know she was smart and that everyone liked her. She went back to her table and ended up stabbing herself with her pencil. I sent her to the nurse and I talked to her about being safe with our pencils and scissors. Then she told me that the lady on Snow White pricked her finger and that's what she did. I just wanted to let you know what was going on. She has been a little different these past couple of days. She seems to be getting easily upset with the other students and she has not been getting her work done. She just really sits and stares. I will send home her work again that she did not complete. I did test her reading level and she did improve, however, she is below where she needs to be. I will start sending home new books late next week after I finish testing all the children. Leahness does understand concepts when we do them one on one, but if I have her do them independently she doesn't seem to know what to do. Thank you."

I'm a horrible mother. Why would my child stab herself. Her anti-epileptic medication have a warning: MAY CAUSE DEPRESSION AND THOUGHTS OF SUICIDE. How can my child feel this way? It is quite difficult to not blame myself. I try so hard to be everything she needs and then I get an email like this one.

She is at school most of her day. I see her for 2.5 hrs out of her day. Homework takes up to one hour of that time. Reading 1-2 books to her nightly, another .5 hrs. How is this not enough? I know she can read fine when she wants to. Is she really going to be one of those wasted potential kids like me?

My first instinct is to take away all movie privileges. done.
My second instinct is to read to her non-stop until she gets it. done.
My third instinct is to quit my job and home school. not quite do-able.

pray for me, light a candle for me, think of me in good thoughts, whatever you do to make positive things happen, do it. please.