Recovery--Take Nine: Group Therapy Day 1

I sat next to a felon, guess what: she, like myself was human too. I have already attended one of my six parenting classes and this was one of the many parenting support group meetings to come. I had an interesting experience maybe interesting is too broad. Allow me if I can to paint you a picture. The room is a small 15x20 that seats, I’d guess, could seat 8 people comfortably. Its dusk, and the leader of the group introduces me to everyone by way of reverse introduction. As we went around the room, I was apprehensive at first; maybe it was my Black Bourgeoisie snobbery coming out. How did I get here. I am in a room with one who looks like he’s going through the downside of a midlife crisis. The other seems to be a walking talking living breathing example of why you need health coverage. She was in a cast for her arm, just recovering from knee surgery. Then there was an older man who by profession was a reverend and then there was this Texan who was high spirited who was just coming off of parole, and then there I was and yes let me not forget the one who brought us together, the social worker who is the head of my parenting class. How did I ever wind up here? There were parts of me that were scared, pissed, irreverent and of course, just down right indignant. Why was I here? Could be, because I drove myself here and asked to know was there anybody else out there going through what I’m experiencing. See as an only child, you have a rather narcissistic view on life. You are the world, nothing and no one else matters. That is at least, until life pulls the rug out from under your feet leaving you flat on your ass and your world, which incidentally you though was yours, now up side down, turning you inside out.. That’s why I’m here; life is giving me (maybe a much needed) wake up call. The world doesn’t revolve around me and I am not the only one going through this cesspool I’ll call the family court system, otherwise known as the 13th hell. Like the rhyme of the ancient mariner, I again tell my story yet to another group of strangers who look at me and chime in with their own opinions. The body language says it all. There are grunts of disbelief, one shakes their head while the other says, Dr. Phil is looking for new people to go into the Dr. Phil house. Your story would be great! In essence, I am in Bob Newhart Group Therapy. Lovely, life is grand: NOT! My friend from Texas she gets straight to the point. “Your problem is,” she exclaims, “You are too nice.” Ok, maybe she is right. I am too nice. Looking at it in hindsight, when my co-parent cries broke, while I’m eating peanut butter and baloney, she’s got the nerve to ask me for money. Like a damn idiot, I give her cash and while my back is turned, I see the damn molly maid cleaning crew cleaning the residence, I used to call home. Right now I am thinking its time for a forensic financial audit. That’s right, I need to go find Quincy: F.E.: financial, examiner. Chalk one up for my friend from the red state of Texas. Strangely, I realize, I’m not on this raft ride alone. Turns out one guy’s crazy ex just blew his world all to pieces. After he got temporary custody of his children through a restraining order, she got more crafty. She took their kids to another county; had them hidden for days. When he finally did track his children down, turns out one child who wasn’t potty trained, went potty on herself when she first saw her daddy. Thinking he could take custody of his kids, turns out his name was not listed on the list of people who could have access to the children. Sound familiar? Damn. Bubububut wait it gets worse. What I was apprehensive about happening to me (sexual allegations), unfortunately became his crucible. The Wake County Child Protective Unit had him under a magnifying glass, vis-à-vis a fabricated allegation of child molestation, all compliments of a scorned ex. I thought I had it bad. Not only did he have to endure the criminal mindedness, of a criminal justice system, which by the way is more criminal than just, but he too, had to face the labyrinth known as child custody. Never mind the fact that a judge had assigned him temporary custody in his home county; that same judge revoked it, deferring the case to family court. Further down the pile he goes. With his team of lawyers and social workers, he endured the indignities of video taped child custody evaluations, which in the end, did in fact conclude that he was fit to parent. We won’t talk about the dent, hell lets call it what it was and still is, the train wreck these custody evaluations had with his wallet. We won’t talk about the inordinate amounts of dollars, he or anyone for that matter, will have to pay to a third party facility, so that he could visit his children at a rate of $30.00 per child per 30 Minute block. His story, one of I dare to say millions, represents the cacophony of chaos we call our tax dollars at work. I am reminded of a quote again from my good friend from the state of Texas when she says, what you considered private, now is public. You become a fish in the aquarium. Some days you are offered bait. If you’re not too smart, you become the fish out of water. If you are unprepared, you easily become prey, to the shark-skinned lawyers. But if you are careful, patient, you will live to fight or die another day. All for your sanity, all for your state of independence, all for your children. Returning back to the episode of my comrade in arms, after he is cleared of all child molestation issues, the case manager from Wake County returns to him basically saying , congratulations, you’ve one the first 12 rounds. We’ve decided to change the rules, welcome to “The Texas Death Match” where we don’t count rounds; the winner is decided by your mortality. Maybe that’s a bit too much, but its fitting because, the case worker said that he was now being investigated for emotional abuse. In short, after going through this tortuous task, if you haven’t decided to take out your hostilities on someone else or yourself, then you should consider yourself the heavyweight champ. See, here is the sad thing about it, if you are a man, one who is black or brown, one who is under employed or unemployed, the classically trained mis-educated negro, and we might as well add deviant to the list, if you get trapped in the web of the DV and, or the family court system, you are presumed guilty until proven innocent. Innocence costs. Right here, the wallet is where you start paying. If you have money, the better chance you have for a good defense. Even if truth is on your side, which it was in my case, lawyers easily can play the game of Chess with your life. A competent lawyer vs. and incompetent lawyer easily dictates if you will or will not see your children. Will bogus allegations be the scarlet letter on your record for life or just a zit you will have to explain at a job interview. A competent lawyer vs. a hack could mean the difference between you having a criminal record because you unknowingly violated a restraining order vs. you having the opportunity to explain to your child who incidentally asks, Daddy, are you ever going to leave me again? You, will, fight back the tears—and if you’re lucky, you’ll have no other choice but to face the road and not your child. Fighting back the tears, it is mandatory you say this! “I never left you. I will never leave you. And even in this complicated thing called death which you are too young and innocent to comprehend right now; know even then, if the word death and my name are mentioned in the same sentence, know this even, on, that, day, I will never leave you.” Granted it may sound dramatic, may even be the lines uttered in some academy award winning motion picture, but its real. I said it. I’ve had to say it on more than one occasion. I’ve had to say it when I went to go walk our dog in the dark of a December night. Red Chief was crying in the arms of his grandfather, scared shitless not knowing if Daddy was coming back. In the eyes of Red Chief you see, his dad, mysteriously vanished. The explanation given to him was this, daddy was sick. Daddy loves you but he can’t take care of himself so he had to leave. Hellish mind games to play with a child. Extending, divorce and separation can be a hellish fireball to ride. On this journey through divorce and separation, you may think some ungodly things of your former spouse and their family. This cancer, like any cancer in the body, if not abated, let alone monitored, it will spread, in this case to your children. If that happens, tell him what he’s won Johnny! Ok, Bob (as in Barker) you could win an all expenses paid trip to Hellacious Acres! You and your guest take off to Hellacious Acres compliments of Hell in a Hand basket Airlines. You will enjoy a life long stay in the pit of white lava, where you will burn for life! Now certainly I realize I’ve taken it a wee bit over the top. However, to put your child in the middle of a grown up dispute, because you and your ex spouse act like adolescents in side of grown peoples bodies, doesn’t demonstrate maturity but the exact opposite, and seriously you need, a beat down, maybe a few of them. This probably why I am going through my shit right now. We both are catching it but won’t admit it. Denial is a wonderful drug. We didn’t act like adults about it. To anyone thinking about separation or divorce, there is a right way and wrong way to do things. Weaponizing your children, against your spouse, that’s simply evil. Allowing your lawyer to use your children against your spouse, that’s evil, to the second power. Even in the gangsters rule book, children are off limits. So back to what I was saying, as a parent if you ever have to counter parental alienation, from their side or even in your own, you commit that speech to memory. Put in brail, know how to sign it, shit put it in any foreign language your child may one day learn. It sounds deep. It sounds profound. It is the truth and must become, as it has for me, a way of breathing. Within the course of our meeting I have to say, my story represented the anomaly. I was able to successfully secure joint physical and legal custody of our son, despite the many attempts to do otherwise by my co-parent. As I went deeper into my back-story, my suspicions of bipolar disorder rose to the surface. As I do here, I qualified my suspicions by saying that I am not a doctor and no there has been no firm diagnosis. But as I replayed the various episodes, the numerous plates, cups, and flatware in our bedroom that would sometimes be there on weeks, the apple cores which started to grow fungi, the soiled sanitary napkins that would overflow out of our bedroom waste basket, I began to wonder about the wedding vows I took; wasn’t I supposed to be there through sickness and health. Its then when the one in the cast said to me, she knows about manic depression from first hand experience.. My ex boyfriend had it and died from it. She elaborated about how he would go through moments of bliss and then erupt into three-week splurges looking for drugs. And as she spun her story, my head went down on the table like a cowering dog. You did yourself a favor and saved your son by leaving. Unfortunately, only those who have experienced the signs of what you have said, and I too am not a doctor, I just happened to love someone who didn’t love themselves, before it gets better for them, it only gets worse. By this time, the dog came up. They began asking, she didn’t put the dog down did she? No, but she took him to the vet with no intentions of getting him back, which in turn could have resulted in him being put to sleep. It was then the room got quiet, dead silence. The felon who I sat beside, told me point blank, you will have bad days, you will have good days. You will have bad days again. You will be to the point of wondering if all of what you are going through and yet to go through is worth it. There will even come a time when you will just want to walk away from everything because it seems on the surface, it will be the easiest thing to do. You will go through more money than you thought you ever had , and guess what, you will find more money. My legal fees are in excess of $30,000.00 That’s just for the custody battle. We’ll not talk about the criminal legal fees but lets just say, you don’t ever want to do business with bail bondsmen. Do not cut anyone out of your life who is family or friend. What you are going through and will continue to go through is a typical day in the park. One morning you’ll wake up accepting what has happened to you and then incidentally you will say oh yes, divorce, does suck.