She's a bad mother. Last time I had the kids, we looked at photographs I took of them once in their halloween costumes. One of the youngest said that this year, he wants to dress up as a mother, because it's the scariest thing he could think of.
However, she is their mother. I can't take them away, however much they should be taken away. And not tomorrow, not ten, not twenty years from now am I going to villify their mother. Not even with the facts. I'm not looking to use the kids as my battle ground; they're innocents, and if they end up one day with a rosy picture of their mother, I'm not going to do anything to alter that. Why would I?
What if you were surprised with new evidence that your mother was a lying whore who used you and did all manner of things that shock the image you've held of her since child hood? For some that might lead to some serious psychological issues.
The woman is a bitch. If she were a dog, I'd have had her euthanized or shot years ago. But she isn't dog, and all I can do is take one day at a time. I don't get to see the kids unless I pay. The kids are afraid of her. They don't eat well. I buy them shoes and she throws them away, leaves them in junk that's literally falling apart. She refuses to seek medical attention for them.
A couple of years ago at a family wedding, three of them mysteriously showed up with my ex. One of the younger ones approached me while I was standing with my father and brother. Holding my leg and looking up at me he said, "Daddy, uncle chet beats me with a stick." Personally, I'd like to see "uncle chet" as the backdrop for the sillouette of a .44 front sight...along with the rest of them. I really would. But in today's society...in a land where child protective services won't lift a finger (told me straight up that without photographic evidence of head injuries or a dead body, they wouldn't even investigate)...what is one to do?
For now, I have the privilege of reminding them to listen to their mother, to encourage them to support her, to encourage them to be as good as they can be in the hopes that she won't scream at them or strike them. My own intervention will only lead to my incarceration, where I can do them no good at all. The law has no interest in the safety or welfare of the children, the judge who made these calls probably sits in expensive home when he's not ruining people's lives, completely free of any debits of conscience. A few seconds of his wasted time on the bench, and entire families will pay for decades with their lives.
They money I spend is nothing; it's inconsequential. At times it's been more than I bring in...often the total amount I've sent to here has exceeded my income, and I've hawked my few posessions. Headsets, firearms, my parachutes. Whatever I've had. The money is nothing, however. The children are everything, and short of taking the law into my own hands, completely out of my reach. I visit them, I try to give them stability and support...but a mother can do no wrong in the eyes of the court, and I am not their mother.
I can't count the number of times when the kids commented at a younger age, "Daddy, you're following satan." Who told you that, guys? Mom, of course. She villifies me when I've done nothing, fills them with all sorts of lies. It's the woman she became, not the one I married. A hurtful, hateful, evil bitch. If I tried to play that game, to use the kids against her, in any way, I would be no better. I refuse to go there.
So no, the kids will never see the legal papers, the court documents, the receipts. If they choose to hate her because of what they see with their own eyes in her house, if they make up their own mind, then they can decide for themselves...but on no account will that take place because of me.
Children are not weapons.