Love from A Horrible Father.

As the Joy of the winter holidays is about to begin this season, I am about to be segregated from my son during them for the third time in so many years. My son and I have been very close, since his conception. His development, something I had used as motivation to show the world around me, the best of my abilities. Any insecurity that I felt, anything I felt incapable of overcoming lent me to look to the past and to refine my ability and focus to lift away the superficial and solidify my own foundation by my own actions. While my son was in utero, I had the opportunity to get to know and include a woman, who, under normal circumstances would have never introduced herself into my life. I, in my own right, began to open myself again to feelings of love, and respect and compassion, that for a time had been made dormant because of trauma I and a friend had suffered a year prior. Together, we shared the intimacies that a pregnant couple share to compensate for the fears that arise from such internal transformation. I felt very detached most of the pregnancy, as if I was supposed to wait, with nothing to do until he came out. I was surprised to find out, that at 5 months, a person would move inside his mother's belly, and at 6 months was interacting with the outside world. These moments most of us do not consider, or speak about often, but they are the earliest memories I have of accepting that being a father, no matter how hard I perceived it to be, just happens, whether you want to be good at it or not. When my son was born, I made pancakes and held his mother's hand the whole 14 hours she was in labor. I made sure at the end, it was her effort that brought him into this world, not a doctor's incision. While we had no way of preparing for his introduction into the world, within three weeks, all three of us had adjusted to everything that needed to be considered to meet our own needs. With little sleep and time to take care of personal needs, a shower, a new outfit and some love making made the previous month and a half of no sleep and the bare minimum simply wash away. A liberated woman, his mother still wanted to be, my time at home after work, lead to diaper changing and baby entertaining till bed time. We lived comfortably for almost a year, baby had enough clothing and people to care for him, as mothers around us provided hand me downs and infrastructure to make sure both mom and babe were cared for, I worked to pay bills, and utilities. We didn't have much, but the time we spent together will forever show a validity in the worth of what you do have, not what you think you can get. I lost my job, when he was three months old, and so had a tremendous time the next year spending most of our time together, exploring and figuring out how to move around and understanding the world around us. My son and I spent every waking moment together. Those were our most important contributions and because most family time is done in the house, very rarely do others have the opportunity to do anything but look in and admire it from a much more distant point of view. It's not easy raising children, it's isolating, it's self-defeating, and with no rules it's impossible to know what's the right way to do it. Unless you throw away everything you've ever been taught about the right way to do things, you will never understand why I enjoyed it so much. When a child comes into the world, you have a clean slate, literally. You can't deny your own mistakes, or shortcomings, but at the same time, you have the opportunity not to repeat anything that you know wasn't effective when you were growing up. I grew up with both of my parents in my life, they are still married after 39 years. I understand the importance of respecting your partner, supporting each other, and maintaining open communication with those we are closest to because of them. They rarely ever put a hand on me, but made sure that I understood the boundaries they set for me so that I was not confused about what was acceptable and what isn't. My sister and I found opportunity at certain times to speak openly with them about what our needs were and how to work better at meeting them. Growing up, I was not sheltered, but given every opportunity to understand how things worked around me and what it was like to live other places besides where I lived. Drugs, not a huge problem in my neighborhood, showed their effects and the lack of other assistance across the city I would travel through everyday to school. By bus, by subway and by train, I would see the effects of abandoned houses and the versatility of the people who lived in impoverished areas to make ends meet, and still add some beauty and ownership to they're living there. I did not have the opportunity to look away, or to be disconnected like in the suburbs. It was up front and personal, everyday and undeniable the lengths people would go to make ends meet and find something better in the world. These are the sort of things I must live up to to feel like I have contributed to the things shared with me growing up. I have never been able to find much worth in hiding and never been able to keep myself quiet for very long. In light of this, I have been ingrained with certain ground rules that I follow to show how I do not control others actions, nor will I take responsibility for them. Something I have great pride in for providing me with the opportunity to making meaningful contributions and sustaining positive growth in whatever I have participated in. As Mahatma Ghandi would show through out his life, sometimes not participating is the best way to show how to do something better. A year and almost 3 months ago, I left Philadelphia and 2 weeks after arriving in Southern California decided to establish residency. I had just spent 14 months separated from my son for all but two hours a week for a supervised visit that was established and maintained to keep my son safe from any harm I was alleged to have committed by his mother. The actual events that the court was requested to monitor had to do with allegations I had made about abuse, while my son was in his mother's custody. I alone found signs of abuse that his mother would not acknowledge for weeks, if not months, and so decided that putting my son in harms way was not acceptable for me to turn a blind eye and not do anything about, any further. I made a formal request for a social worker to see my son, something I do not see any worth in doing, but one of those evils that no one has the right to diminish the need for. After weeks of not seeing one, at a time that the City office was under going great scrutiny for its inability to keep children out of harm's way and the size of their social worker's caseloads, I found a Child Therapist who was willing to meet with my son and I. In three hours, he observed not only my anguish for the well-being of my son, but also began to map out a progression with him about what was being done to him, what he could emulate about his aggressors and what he thought was wrong about it. I watched my son transcend these experiences in a three week period. We spent a week and a half well beyond the confines of even its emotional impact on him, at which point he turned to me and said, "Thank you, daddy. Thank you for letting me be a little boy again." Nothing can or will ever compare to being able to provide this opportunity for my child. By the end of the week, I stood before a judge in a courtroom and was reprimanded for separating my son from his mother. In the eyes of the court, no harm can come of a child in the custody of the mother and I had done nothing to prove that I had not interfered with the sanctity of mother and child. His mother is very good about being quick to answer in situations she could be cornered. I never could do much more than deny her allegations except with what defined the circumstances around actual events. I did my best to do this, so it is clear I have had no intention of belittling the efforts she does put forward, but as to protect myself from false accusation. This is something I believe is in contrast from what we perceive normally, and may have confused the court into thinking circumstances were different from what was presented. When I decided not to return home, I was fed up with the nearly impossible task of opening the court's ear to the circumstance that in anyone else's observation was easy to see up front. I had a hard decision to make, I had the opportunity to wait around somewhere I was familiar, where people know me, but without any reason to believe circumstances would change. Instead, I found find myself around people I love and being able to have physical separation away from the abuse I had endured just to try to share with my son why its important to support each other and not be quiet about what is done to us. I finally had the opportunity to force the issue by not participating any further, until it got better. It took three weeks, after I didn't return, for his mother to call me up and blame me for being horrible for not being complacent. I hung up, and not until ten days of not allowing her to speak to me disrespectfully, was I allowed to make it clear what I expected before I participated any further. To protect the progression of events I was forcing the issue on, I tried to dictate how we were to negate any other interference by other parties or judgments that could undo our agreement to work this out together. First - I didn't want my son subjected anymore to the unsupervised menace of a man whom she had living in her house close to as long as we hadn't lived together. Second - We make an agreement that the courts were not to interfere in our lives any further, that we make an agreement to how we both participate in providing for our son's needs and not undermine our own. Third - That we nullify any other orders that were made in effort to sway the courts opinion about the other. This lasted just long enough for something to ruffle his mother's feather, and then the moorings began to crumble under the instigation of uncertainty, instead of their strengthening with perseverance. Something I have been managing to deflect all on my own, but seen everyone else laid victim by it's broad constriction of view. I actually saw my son more between December and March of this past school year, than I had in a year and half prior to leaving. Then my son's mother allowed her ex-boyfriend back into the house, and I was cut off for appearances, not because I had broken any agreement or arrangement. I have since been cut off from my child, completely but one phone call in September and two pictures since he started Kindergarten this school year. He was upset with me because I hadn't seen him in so long and that we haven't been able to talk. I know he feels overwhelmed by the circumstances that surround him and our helplessness to find anyone who we can entrust with our confidence, both individually and collectively. Mostly, I know he wishes to move on from what's been inflicted upon him and that would be completed with my being in his life again. His mother, however, has no reason to embrace any of the advantages of this. She has full custody and the right to deny my participation in our son's life for any reason. This was granted to her by the courts. If I had any request I would make, it would be to recognize the sensitive and subtle way I approach this subject. I wish to convey my intentions and positions as not to influence any of the injustice to escalate any further. I do however see my disadvantage in protecting my son from further hardship as unacceptable to endure or allow to continue without saying something first. I do not mind as a man about to be thirty to be isolated from circumstances confused by those involved. For my son to be held at bay and in harms way, I do, however, find a shortsightedness that those put into power have little advantage to overlook any further. With Thanks Giving a week away and Christmas and the New Year in the not so distant future, I am hopeful that I can influence this get better, but would also like to reach out to those families with similar experiences, so that we all don't feel so lonely and isolated anymore. Families are important because they give us opportunities to repeat mistakes we didn't learn better from and not to be isolated with just one person's influence. Most importantly with family, there's always someone close at hand that can explain the reason for things and why we all must stick together until it all works out. Otherwise, slavery, war and hunger become things we perpetuate, rather than what we've overcome. I think the things that made this country strong are available even to those who have just begun to call it home, and if anything's to be learned from those inalienable rights of each citizen being undermined for better surveillance of anyone's life. I believe it's the importance of solidifying the Bill of Rights as the foundation for what this country is made of. I want my son to have the opportunity to see that through his own eyes, not from how things used to be.