Finding His Own Name
Dear You,
You left me a solo parent when our boys were 2 months old and 17 months old, respectively. Not a single parent who can rely on the other person to help with things like transportation, homework, sports participation fees and school clothes, but a solo parent who has to rely on friends, family, and most of all herself. For everything. EVERY. THING. It’s not like you dropped entirely off the face of the earth….there were the two or three months-at-a-time stints you tried to see your boys once a month or so for a couple of hours, sometimes even an overnight visit over the last 16 years. They were mainly uncomfortable for both your sons and you, but it was a small attempt. Then there was the three years you “connected” with them that ended just about a year ago, if you call connecting with them leaving them with your girlfriend’s kid to roam the streets and sit home alone unsupervised while you went out drinking. I guess they weren’t truly unsupervised, because they called me all weekend, every weekend, while you were busy. But three years of that does not make up for you making plans with them one day and them arriving at your house excited for a fun weekend with Dad, only to find an abandoned house and a new life with no Dad for the next four years, no matter how hard you try to convince yourself that it does.
For me to write about the trials the boys and I have gone through over the years due to your selfishness and absolute inability to be in any way connected with reality would take weeks. You will never know how terrifying it is to face the prospect of raising two boys all on your own. (Seems kind of silly for me to point out the obvious…of course you’ll never know it, you walked away from it). The days when they were simultaneously in diapers, sleeping in cribs, and drinking from bottles are far behind me now, but I’ll never forget them. The fears of those days were a little more basic. We’ve moved on now to more philosophical issues. Am I doing the right things to teach them how to be good husbands? Good fathers? Good citizens? How am I going to teach them how to shave and clean a fish and tie a tie? (Thank God for Youtube, we got the fish cleaning and tie tying down).
Then there is the deep stuff, that I try to keep a little close to the surface with them, but not so close as to basically ruin every fucking day for them. Things like “Don’t let his behavior define who YOU are”, and “I know it’s hard to believe, but it’s got nothing to do with you”. They listen, but it’s hard for me to tell if they believe me when I tell them that they really do deserve so much more than you’ve offered them. My biggest fear, and something I spend time every day on, is attempting to block the self-defeating behaviors that so often happen with kids who are abandoned or unloved by a parent. If they don’t deal with the issues they have with you now, the issues will kick their asses when they leave my home for the first time, or maybe when they find themselves as fathers.
I did everything I could to foster a relationship for the three of you. Remember how I used to nearly beg you to see them? I rarely said a bad word about you, though I have many. I never kept them from seeing you, though that’s what everyone now thinks because you aren’t man enough to tell the truth. I did my job and your job all these years, and have a few more to go yet. I overcompensate because I have to, so they have a chance at an emotionally normal adulthood.
Oh, I’m sorry, do I sound bitter? You bet your damn ass I’m bitter.
I don’t let it consume me, that would be giving you entirely too much power (another lesson I try to teach them). But wrestling season has started. You might remember that you were the reason they both started wrestling. Our oldest because it pleased you, and our youngest because he thought that maybe you’d come watch him like you did with his brother (which didn’t happen). I told them both that if you were the reason they were doing it, it was the wrong reason, but they didn’t listen and now it has taken on a life of its’ own in our house. I’m thankful for that, because it has opened new doors for them physically and mentally. It gives them a sense of balance that they are lacking with your repeated absences over the years. It will serve them well, if they leave you out of it. But they haven’t left you out of it, at least not yet.
Our oldest son received his copy of the team photo the other day. He looks amazing. He’s matured and he’s chiseled. He’s been working hard and is going to go very far this year. That night, he broke down sobbing because he misses you. He wants you to see him wrestle this year.
I do what I can to be supportive of their wrestling, and the minute I think I couldn’t be more excited about it for them, a new day happens and I’m more excited about it for them. But I’m a Mom. I’m not a male. I never wrestled. I never went to State. And these boys didn’t start this sport because of me. Or even because of themselves. They did it for you.
And all they have in return from you, after giving their unconditional love and desperately seeking your approval, are homemade birthday cards from jail with a few words trying to manipulate them into worrying about you or writing you back. Well guess what? They don’t know what to say to you. They are too busy trying to live their own lives and trying to make sense of this unfair bullshit to worry about you right now. They are not little anymore. They see right through you and that’s something you can’t handle. A part of me thinks they are not writing you back to spare your feelings. But don’t insult their intelligence by thinking they don’t know what you’re all about now. That must really suck.
Your son went 5-0 at Varsity at his first tournament yesterday. Your son is starting to get his name in the paper.
His name. Not yours.
matmom 
matmom said,
December 12, 2011 at 5:34 am
If anyone is reading this post, I might not leave it up. My son asked me to write to his Dad last week and this is my way of purging some darkness before actually writing to him.
w ewing said,
December 12, 2011 at 12:37 pm
~from one single mom to the next…thank you for printing what most of us feel. I am also the mother of two teenage boys that wrestle. I deal with this on a daily basis. I have found a strength from my sons that I don’t think all moms can understand. They deal with issues that I as an adult don’t always understand. I think it’s important for communities to understand the stories behind our youth. Not all stories are the same but all are affected. Thank God for the Coaches that are a constant in their lives. Hats off to these men that do what some men can not! I can never repay the coaches in my sons lives.
matmom said,
December 12, 2011 at 9:17 pm
Amen to that. My kids will never forget the coaches they’ve had over the years and the things they taught them. I hope my boys grow up to be men that are as giving and selfless as some of the coaches they’ve known.
Single Mom Confidential said,
February 4, 2013 at 4:49 pm
Sometimes a ‘father figure’ comes in such a different form than we ever expected. Ive learned this many times over the years of being a single parent and have grown to be so grateful for that. Thank you for this post… sometimes the simplicity of knowing someone else ‘has been there’ is a comfort in itself. Not that you wish it on anyone… but to know you are not alone helps you feel less ‘single parent’ like. 🙂
matmom said,
February 4, 2013 at 5:18 pm
It truly does take a village. Every positive coach, male family member and male teacher have been the amalgam (borrowed from the movie Parenthood) of who and what my boys’ father should have meant to them. It might seem like scraps some days, but other days I am more grateful for it than I can express.