On the heels of a very tough couple of days recently as a mother, I've found the very first notebook I started to keep after I initially left Don. As if the uprising of concern for my daughter's safety and well-being isn't gut wrenching enough right now, to look back on all of this that started almost 12 years ago makes me physically ill. There are many things in the notebook that I remember all too well, I remember the torture I was trying to get through and I remember the endless nights curled up in a ball allowing someone to make me feel worthless. Some of the things I wrote about I had forgotten about, but show true to his character and show that even after nearly 12 years, he is the exact same person that I chose to walk away from. That alone, is a tremendously sad fact.
As my daughter grows older, she becomes wrapped into the verbal abuse by her dad that I've taken the brunt of all this time. I've been struggling with this for years that I can't protect her from his words. At first I couldn't protect her from his words he would use towards me in front of her, and now I can't protect her from his words towards both me and her. Not a single Judge will ever listen to me about him, nor make him get the proper counseling to be both a good parent and a good co-parent because everyone is stuck on "father's rights". As she's getting older, his verbal threats to physically harm her have increased both in volume and in descriptive nature. Even still, because he makes three times what I make, he's allowed to get away with it.
The notebook I started had it's first penned entry in July of 2005 and went in and out of entries up until July of 2009. Ironic it was almost to the exact date, four years apart. In those four years, it was a clear documentation of his abuse, his failure to spend time with our daughter, and the preset to what my life is today with him in it. Although I've worked tirelessly to build myself up and refuse to allow him to threaten me, abuse me, or degrade me, it's something that he still works on doing on a daily basis if he can.
As I re-read every entry, every line, and every word I could remember each of those moments and reflect on how far I've come. I remember thinking that there was no way I would survive it, that I couldn't possibly withstand under that kind of control and abuse; but here I am, here I am happier than ever and stronger than ever. My heart breaks over the relationships I've lost along the way due to his continual stress and pressure put on my life, I'm sad over the people who walked away or were ran out of my life because they knew they didn't have to stick around to deal with it, and I am forever in debt to those that have stuck around and been there for me.
There is nothing that will make him behave better as a human being or as a father, but my life and my daughter's life, are well over the hump and on our way into a controlled free future within just a few short years. If anything could have been different over the years, it would have been that someone would have made him go through a lot of counseling, both for anger and for parenting. Someone would have stood up with me and understood that not all parents should be allowed the same rights when it's harmful and detrimental to a child. Not every child is benefited from having both parents in their lives. I have never and don't ever aim to run Don completely out of her life, that's not my goal nor the proper way for me to be a mother, however I wholeheartedly believe that his parental rights should have had strong limitations until he proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that his only interest and his best interest was for our daughter and our daughter alone. With that being said, I know now this late in life that that simply will not ever happen because this my friends isn't the story of David and Goliath. I will however rest in my final days of my life knowing that all I ever did and wanted to do was put my child first. That I worked tirelessly to always do right by her even during the times I failed at it. I want her to be able to have a healthy and loving relationship with her dad and not one where she crumbles under the name calling, criticism, and threats.
Everyone's baby drama story is different, I know that, but I want others to think before they stand up on their soap boxes and scream about father's rights. I know too that the pendulum swings in the other direction as well with women being horrible mothers, but I want them to know that not all fathers work towards the best interest of their children but instead work years upon years to use them as pawns in order to wreak havoc and chaos on the lives of women whom simply have left them scorned.
For women who are in similar spots as myself know that you are not alone. You will survive and you will thrive if you just keep your heart, mind, and goals focused on raising the best human beings you can. The hardest statement to this day is still, "I don't know how you do it". I simply cringe at that statement because my life has no other option. I have a child who needs me, I chose to have her which is my commitment to always be there for her, provide for her, and raise her to be a good and decent human being. To say you don't know how I do it is foolish because I just do it.
LOVE MUST BE SINCERE.
HATE WHAT IS EVIL;
CLING TO WHAT IS GOOD.
~ Romans 12:9
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