Birthday Hooky

Today is my beloved Primero’s 17^th birthday. It is his third birthday with me and I cannot believe he is so “old” already! He has started talking about turning 18 next year and being a legal adult. I wish he would spend more time thinking about what his academic and occupational future will hold, but maybe that will come as the next year wears on. When I look back on the early pictures of Primero and I together it is easy to see how much he has grown physically and it also reminds me how much he has grown emotionally too. He is truly a gem, a wonderful young man and I am so proud of all of his progress and growth. I know he will eventually spread his wings and leave the nest but my heart constricts at the mere thought of it. I want to soak up all the time we have right now and bottle it for when he isn’t around as much, out doing his own thing. I know most parents feel this way about their child leaving home, but for me it seems especially poignant, given our short time together as a family. Cue the waterworks!

 

For his birthday I let him play hooky from school (I have never done this before, I promise) and plan on taking him to a dinner/movie place as a special treat. I took off of work to surprise him and spend some alone time with him, which we haven’t done in way too long. I also really want to plan a mother-son get away this coming summer, one last hurrah together before he’s legally all grown up. I might cry a good deal, so let me just refocus on him being 17 and enjoy this time right now. Happy birthday my sweet, precious Primero!

Not sure what #MicroblogMondays is? Read the inaugural post which explains the idea and how you can participate too.

Odds and Ends

Here are some odds and ends that have been bouncing around in my head but haven’t made it here yet:

 

Last week I had to take Primero to see a neurologist for numbness in his elbow. We were referred by his pediatrician when we reported the numbness at his annual physical in February. The process to get the referral was a mess, but we persevered and finally had the appointment. Fortunately, everything is fine and since the numbness is localized, it should resolve on its own with no further intervention other than a daily massage. The doctor seemed very thorough and he definitely took his time with us. As is customary when meeting a doctor for the first time, he asked a lot of background medical questions. He asked about Primero’s birth weight and I shrugged nonchalantly and said, “I don’t know.” I think I read in his paperwork he weighed the average 6-7 pounds, but I honestly didn’t remember. The doctor sat and stared at me. Crickets chirruped and I shifted in my seat uneasily. He said in a measured tone, “You don’t know?” as if saying, “What kind of mother doesn’t remember her baby’s birth weight.” I sighed as I realized I would have to out myself. “Oh, well he’s adopted, so I didn’t give birth to him.” The doctor’s countenance changed to a more congenial look as he asked how long I have known Primero and then moved along to other information we could answer. I felt defeated. I hadn’t wanted to bring it up and make it a thing, but there it was again, the giant scarlet letter A – ADOPTED. I promised myself to commit all the information from his paperwork to memory, so I could answer these questions without having to proclaim how we are different from traditional/biological families.

 

Chica Marie and Love Bug are going for a visit with their grandmother this weekend. She contacted me last weekend asking for a visit. When I asked her what she had in mind, she asked to have them over, to give me a break. How could I say no to that? I expressed reservations before about Chica Marie spending the night, but I’m hoping a day visit will be a positive chance to interact. Primero expressed greater anxiety for this visit than I did initially. I had asked him if it would be ok with him, since this is his birthday weekend. He worried that Grandma was having secret visits with the little one’s mother and that was why Mini Momma acted strangely at our last visit. I told him I wasn’t worried about hidden rendezvous with their mom, I was a little worried about how much supervision the kids would have, but I have to let it go. I want the visit to be positive for everyone, so I have be positive about it. If Chica Marie acts up, I hope there is someone there to get her back on track and if not, we will work on behaviors when she gets home. I worry Love Bug will be upset and nervous being left somewhere he doesn’t know, but I have to believe he will be distracted by his sisters and others playing with him and keeping him occupied. I worry too much about uninitiated people watching the kids; people who are unfamiliar with foster care and trauma issues in kids. But, the grandmother has their older sister, so I am sure she has now been initiated and she stated she was up to the challenge of taking both the little ones for an afternoon, so I will just take this chance to get some down time. I really hope it all goes well!

 

This past weekend Primero reported to me that his mother’s boyfriend had been killed. I found information in the newspaper from the town in the county south of us and it said he had been shot in the head and his death was considered a homicide. We had met this boyfriend over the summer. I don’t know what happened, although police reports state the shooting wasn’t random, so I guess he knew whoever shot him. It is such a tragedy, he was young (only a few years older than me) and had a lot of life left to live. Primero’s mother is not taking this very well, calling Primero crying and lamenting being so far from family. I saw him watching a Facebook live post of her sobbing and wondering what she was going to do, how she was going to heal from this. Primero tried to get his uncle to talk to his mom, but last I heard his uncle didn’t want her to bring him down out of his happy space at the moment. His mom also reported to him her identity had been stolen and she had to make a new Facebook account. Her SSI check had also been taken, which is where she is guessing the person got her personal information to steal her identity. Primero does what he can to bolster his mom’s spirits and help her find the strength to move on. Just this morning he was telling me how he talked to her again and tried to convince her she was strong enough to overcome this and prove to her haters she was the strong woman she claims to be. I’m glad Primero is such a caring young man, who truly wants to help others, but it breaks my heart to hear him talking to a grown up like he’s the adult and they are the teenager. I hope his mother is able to heed his words of wisdom and find the strength to pull herself out of this apparent nose-dive. Primero recommended professional help and I hope she is able to find a wise and caring therapist to help her through the recent trauma and her past as well.

 

My dad text me this morning asking me to call him when I had a moment. I called him right away. I suspected why he had called me and I wasn’t wrong. My grandfather, who has been in ailing health for some time now, was told by his doctor yesterday that he doesn’t need to make any more follow up appointments. My dad describes it as my grandfather is tired and has given up. He is down to 105 pounds of skin and bones and doesn’t have any fight left in him. My dad wanted me to come see him as soon as I can because it certainly seems like the end is near. In our brief conversation I could hear my dad getting emotional. He ended our call abruptly because I think he was about to cry. I have never seen my father cry and that hurt my heart almost as much as having to say good-bye to my beloved grandfather. I wrote about him a few times. My grandfather might have seemed stoic and  stern, but that’s only if you didn’t know him. He was a real prankster and joker and he loved to tease us all as children. He has always been a real hard worker, staying out in the fields until the job is done, lending a hand where he knew one was needed. My grandfather only has an 8^th grade education but he is smarter than some college educated people I know. He loved reading the farming newspaper that came weekly and while he pretended not to care, he was always the one giving extra treats to the barn cats. My grandfather has been a wonderful grandfather, simply the best. He could be counted on to help out in whatever pinch you found yourself in, maybe grumbling in protest, but always making sure you were ok. I will go to visit with him tomorrow after the children are off with their grandmother. I have to work on my poker face because I don’t want him to see my crying, it will make it harder for him. I’m so sad my own kids never knew him the way that I did because he truly was an awesome PopPop.

 

The saga of Chica Marie’s tooth extraction extravaganza continues on into week number four. The oral surgeons office began calling CHOR because they didn’t get a response from the county case worker after having faxed her the information last week. I called the office to find this out and to understand what was needed. Then I emailed the CHOR case worker and the county case worker to see what could be done to expedite the process, since Chica Marie bumped her mouth playing with Love Bug this past weekend and complained the tooth was bothering her. She also started picking at the abscess making it bleed and she has a hard time eating due to the loose front teeth. The county case worker first emailed that she submitted the paperwork for the court order last week and hasn’t heard anything back. She then emailed later stating bio mom’s lawyer refused to sign the court order since bio mom has agreed to make herself available to sign the consent. So, the county case worker called the oral surgeon’s office advising them to contact bio mom for consent. If I don’t hear anything next week I will be making more phone calls and round and round we go until a final resolution weeks after the surgery could have been done if bureaucratic red tape didn’t stand in the way. What a stinking mess!

 

Love bug spiked a fever at daycare late yesterday afternoon. I left work an hour early to pick him up and take him home. He fell asleep not long after I got home with him and Chica Marie. Because he had a fever of 102, he wasn’t allowed back at daycare today. Fortunately, Esperanza was willing to stay with him during the day so I wouldn’t have to use one of my personal days I was saving for the holidays to be home with him. He seemed to be doing much better this morning, no fever, so while I reported his sickness to his grandmother, I don’t think it will prevent him from participating in the visit tomorrow. He had no other symptoms, other than being grumpy and a little lethargic.

 

So, that’s what I’ve got for now. I could really use a nap, so maybe that is how I will spend my free time tomorrow. Most likely I end up doing laundry, ha!

My Life as a Rom-Com

My dating life, or lack-thereof, is reminiscent of a standard girlie rom-com, only sans rom. I have flirted with online dating for many moons since the demise of my marriage. I even dated someone briefly and just found out he got married in June. I’ve tried match.com but found it to be pointless to use as a non-paying member. I tried to register on eHarmony, but they wouldn’t have me because, at the time, I was separated but not divorced and I foolishly answered that question honestly. Lately, I’ve used OkCupid because a friend hyped it up after finding her husband from this particular app. I find it is the best to use without having to pay, since most features are available and you can communicate for free. Still, I haven’t found Mr. Right-for-me after wading through plenty of duds. Some memorable interactions include a young man who pretended to be someone else, fake pictures and all, because he wanted to lose his virginity to an older woman. One man I saw a few times gave me a humidifier for my little ones for Christmas. He demanded I return it to him when I broke it off a few months later. He would text me nearly obsessively, at first demanding I return the humidifier and then trying to reconcile. He recently found me on the site again and I’ve blocked him. I’ve had dates where the expectation for intimacy was palatable and where I chattered on and on while trying to get the guy to open up and say a few words. I had one guy secretly follow me home and leave me flowers on my porch and show up uninvited. Three guys have gotten mean and nasty, calling me names. One got mad because I asked him to stop calling me ‘babe’ and because I wasn’t interested in playing along with his scheme to financially dominate him while he pretty much dictated everything else I did. Another called me a dike because I cut my hair and told him I wouldn’t grow it out for him. I by-passed the foot fetish guy who wanted me to send him pictures of my feet constantly. I dodged the needy guys who simply could not survive going one minute without a text from me. One guy I was into and we set up a time to meet then he ghosted me for no reason. There are the hanger-oners, the guys who send me the same text day in and day out and we never really get anywhere because I don’t know them enough to even want to meet them. And, the most insidious of all, I avoided the men who thought they could get me pregnant by their sheer manliness, never mind my diagnosis or past treatments. So while the guys I’ve talked to have run the gamut from total needy train wrecks to narcissistic jerk wads, the guy for me has just never shown up.

 

In the rom-com movie I see in my mind’s eye, I have a quirky and kindhearted best friend who sits me down and tells me about myself. She tells me I’m too hung up on finding someone I deem the best fit for me that I am not giving anyone a chance to get to know me. Over cheap wine and popcorn at a girls night in at her place she admonishes me while I page through my potential matches and nix each one for various minor issues. “This one called me ‘hun’ the first day we “met” so he’s out.” “Oh, it says here he drinks often and I don’t, so we wouldn’t match.” “This guy’s profile says he doesn’t know if he wants kids or not, so we would never work out.” My bff would grab my phone and hook me up with a guy, telling me I had to follow through or else. Slowly, after a few more dates with guys way hotter than I’d see in real life, I would have an epiphany and realize what I was doing wrong. There would be a montage of me alone looking wistfully out a window or walking slowly in the rain and then wham-o! I would find Mr. Right-for-me and the movie would end with us being deliriously happy together. Cue the credits.    

 

Sadly, my life is not this rom-com movie. I don’t have a pithy friend shoving me out of my comfort zone and other than knowing I’m being picky, I have no real idea why I can’t seem to find someone to date. I know I think too much about it. I know I try too hard to make the unknown future make sense to me because I don’t want to be hurt again as massively as I was when my ex left. I know I use the kids as my shield, my get out of jail free card. And I find the effort to arrange my schedule and child care daunting and often times not worth the effort.  I give up too easily, not taking up offers on second or third dates because the first one just didn’t live up to my impossible standards. Most days it all feels so impossible. I want to believe in romantic love again, but I feel I’ll just be that lonely old lady with a ton of cats at the rate I’m going now. At least I’ll eventually have grandchildren, right?

This is Halloween

I’m sitting here just grimacing in pain. My back cramps have migrated front to abdominal cramps. Fun. I know no one likes getting their period, but I hate mine to the point of sheer loathing. It’s bad enough my uterus and ovaries couldn’t get their act together to produce a child, now they need to torment me with heavy periods and painful cramps. Gee, thanks. Hmm…. I might also be PMS-ing, but who’s to say?

 

Despite my vicious back cramps, we went trick-or-treating last night. I had planned for us to have spaghetti with sausage. I didn’t cook the sausage the night before, but since I couldn’t sleep anyway due to a cat biting my nose, a dog whimpering to go outside, a hand that had fallen asleep and my own internal workings that simply won’t let me rest, I cooked the sausage yesterday morning. I was in a foul mood all weekend and the same cankerous spirit persisted through Monday morning as well. I should really talk to my doctor about getting a handle on my PMS. But, that was no help for my period, so why should I expect anything different for my hormones? Anyway, after a ghastly morning of rushing around and running late, I managed to make it through the busy day at work and come home to cook pasta and eat dinner. Primero was preoccupied on putting the final touches on his Greek god costume, applying the gold tattoos I found on clearance at the dollar store. Chica Marie was chomping at the bit to get her costume on and Love Bug was grumpy. We rushed through dinner and I hurriedly got the children ready. Chica Marie was a witch, so I painted her face green and added some other witch-y touches like purple eyeliner, black eyebrows and of course the obligatory black nose wart. Primero busied himself spray-painting a pair of my socks gold, since it was chilly and he only had flimsy gold sandals to wear. Love Bug didn’t eat much dinner and refused to put on his FBI vest, tie and ear piece. Primero convinced him to wear it as I threw on yoga pants, a white tank top and fleece jacket for my soccer mom outfit. We headed off to the neighborhood where we usually go trick-or-treating. We stopped at my friend’s house and then set off. Love Bug was happy to eat a lollipop and Chica Marie was set on collecting candy. Primero kept stopping to retie his lace-up sandals and my back cramps became more and more unbearable as we marched around the area for nearly an hour. Primero convinced me to stop over at his uncles house on the way home, but his uncle didn’t answer the door because he thought we were trick-or-treaters. I was glad to be back home but I had to get Chica Marie’s face cleaned off so she could get ready for bed. And I had the dinner dishes to wash. Primero sequestered himself in his room taking pictures of himself in his costume and Love Bug begged for more candy while watching TV. Fortunately, I had done dishes that morning so there weren’t as many to wash. Primero finally came back upstairs when I was done and trying to cajole Love Bug into his pajamas. I put Love Bug to bed and took a shower before sitting down to watch Dancing with the Stars (we taped it).

 

This past weekend I was a total shithead mother. I was pissy and miserable and it just wasn’t one of my finest moments. Esperanza spent the night on Friday and we rented the new Ghostbusters movie, which I really liked, but it meant staying up to late to watch it. So, there was strike one not in my favor. Love Bug cannot sleep past 7:30, so he woke me up too early Saturday morning. I dozed for another 30 minutes after Love Bug got up and when I found him in the living room, he had made a massive mess and got into some of Primero’s things. Strike two. Before I could make the kids breakfast, I had to wash the two sinks full of dishes. Strike 2 1/5. I made breakfast and started cleaning, which almost always makes me grumpy. Then I found cat pee in Chica Marie’s bedroom and that was it, I was a miserable mess, griping at having to clean and then re-clean because as we all know, cleaning with kids is like trying to brush your teeth while eating an Oreo. Primero and Esperanza finally drug themselves out of bed around 12:30, after I put the kids down for their nap. I had to get ready to take Chica Marie to karate and I was short with her, rushing her to get into her new uniform, getting angry when I realized we forgot her nun chucks, only to get there and find out the class had been cancelled. Sunday I did a little better, but I was still immensely crabby and short with the kids.

 

Of course, when I act stupid like this, I get down on myself. My negative inner voice does not help the situation, telling myself I’m an awful mother and how could I get angry with these precious children when they are what I wanted for so long. I need to work on taming my inner beast better, swallowing more of my angry words and trying to be nicer to myself when things aren’t perfect. Easier said than done, but something I need to keep striving towards.

Facebook Stalking

A few weeks ago I had written about discovering old messages on Facebook messenger. See here. Stupidly, I decided to Facebook stalk my ex to see how things were going with him and his new "wife" (I'm not sure if they actually got married or if they just call one another husband and wife - it's common to do that in Nicaragua. They even have a word meaning more than boyfriend but not really husband). I knew I wouldn't find anything I would really like to see. My past searches revealed their relationship, their trips to Nicaragua, the cars they've bought and various other odds and ends they made public on Facebook. What I saw certainly caused me pause. From a post on August 13th, my ex posted, "Bendicciones de Dios porque ya viene junior en camino" - "Blessings from God because junior is on the way." October 16th was their baby shower for their impending son. Too late, I clicked off his page and tried to distract myself with something else. My heart was pounding and my stomach felt queasy. I'm a fool for letting my morbid curiosity take ahold of me, for snooping into something I really didn't even want to know. Eight years after we began trying to start a family, he is going to be a father.

I should be happy for him, right? I shouldn't begrudge him the very thing I had so desired. I wish I were that gracious, but I am not. I had secretly hoped he would be as infertile as me, never being able to father a child. I felt righteous in my wish to curse him, given how awful he was to me. He had actually told me we might have stayed together if I had been able to give him a child. At the time that off-hand comment gutted me, made me loathe myself and my defective reproductive system. Now, I realize not getting pregnant with his child was probably a blessing in disguise. He might have stuck around, but I have no illusions that he would have stayed loyal. While at one time I believe he would have been a good father, I learned in the short time we parented together, he didn't see child rearing as his responsibility. Sure, he liked kids, but he shirked responsibility and felt it was a woman's duty to change diapers, feed children and keep up with household chores. I certainly won't forget the night I begged him to stay home, to not leave me alone with a young child who had been in our house a matter of days. He callously ignored my pleas and selfishly went out drinking with his friends. Maybe he had matured in the 5 years since then. Or maybe she thinks the same about the division of labor between a husband and wife. Regardless, they will soon be parents and I need to keep myself from Facebook stalking them in the future.

Not sure what #MicroblogMondays is? Read the inaugural post which explains the idea and how you can participate too

The Name Game

Despite TPR being maddeningly elusive, the imminent adoption of the little ones has been on my mind since the meeting with the school two weeks ago. The county case worker indicated no rush to address adoption with Chica Marie during that visit, even after I expressed my desire for the discussion to begin sooner rather than later. I’ve been reticent to start the discussion mostly because things always feel so nebulous to me, but also because I view this as being the case workers ball to start rolling. After all, they are the professionals who have been taught the best way to say these types of things to a child. And, if my experience with Primero counts for anything, this is how it should be done. Still, no one but me has bothered to float the idea of adoption past Chica Marie. No one has bothered to check in with her, see how she views this whole thing or try to explain how it works in child-like terms. Just me. And I have said so little to her. I guess I’ve been waiting for the “right” time and viewed TPR as that measuring stick. But, as TPR continues to change and the goal of adoption remains the same, I’ve gotten brazen and have begun talking with Chica Marie about adoption. Luckily for us, she has seen adoption through Primero so she has seen that nothing, as far as the day-to-day life stuff, changes. Still, adoption to her is not something she can understand.

 

From past experience (when we had a fateful discussion about her mommy not being her legal mommy anymore, which she took to mean dead and could not stop crying about it), I decided to talk about names, rather than adoption itself. So, I explained first how Primero changed his last names, taking his second last name from his bio mom and adding my last name. Chica Marie promptly told me she hated my last name. Undeterred, I explained how Love Bug was going to keep his first name and change his middle and last names. She got more agitated, vehemently declaring she HATED my last name. Resolute, I forged on and asked her about changing her name or keeping her name how it is now, just using my last name instead. She had a fit, screaming she hated my stupid last name and didn’t want that name. She wanted to be called by the nickname her sister gave her, Butt-butt. Er, no. That is not happening. Abandoning the last name debate, I asked her about her first name. I suggested it is hard for people to know how to pronounce her name and thought perhaps we could switch her first name and her middle name or spell her first name differently or get a whole new name altogether. She opted for a brand new name, forgetting about her anger over my last name. Nothing I suggested appealed to her and other than the offensive nickname, she had no suggestions. Our conversation came to a halt when I realized the time and instructed her to prepare for a bath. This conversation was last week and we have not yet resumed negotiations. Primero, frustrated with Chica Marie’s indecisiveness, told me to just pick a name and forget about getting her consent. I would rather it not come to that.

 

There are a lot of schools of thought when it comes to changing the name of an adopted child, just as there are a lot of considerations. I wish it were as easy as it is for people having biological children, just pick a name and go, but it’s not. I have mourned many times the loss of naming my own children. I won’t get to use the names I had so lovingly picked out when I first started this journey. If we had been able to conceive naturally, and had a girl I wanted to name her Alice Adelia after our grandmothers. A boy would have been named Emerson Antonio (the middle name Flaco’s middle name and keeping with a tradition my parents started in giving the son the same middle name of the father – Love Bug is getting my father’s middle name). I won’t have an Allura Brielle or a Branson Nathaniel. No Henry David, no Molly Marie. It makes me sad, but I’ve given up dreaming of ‘what could have been’ and force myself to stay in the ‘what is’ camp.

 

I am not a fan of Chica Marie’s name and I really have an aversion to names using apostrophes, yet if she expressed a desire to keep her name as is, I would honor that. Unfortunately, Chica Marie is hard to pin down and while she pitched a fit over losing a last name she doesn’t even know (she can spell her first name but does not know her last name), she expressed no attachment to her first or middle name. After some more consideration, I have come to the conclusion that I am going to give her three options. Option number one is to keep her first and middle name as they are and add my last name. Option two is a slight deviation from her first name, keeping the first syllable but changing the ending and keeping her current middle name. The third and final option is another deviation from her original name, keeping the first syllable but changing the last and adding a new middle name. Even though she didn’t seem concerned about it, I thought it would be best to keep her first name with the same letter so we can keep using her nickname and not have one huge change all at once.

 

To my surprise, when I showed Primero the choices I had made his first question was, “what does she have from her mom?” Taken aback, I said in the first option, she retains her first and middle name that her mom gave her, in the second option she keeps her first name, it is only the third option that is a total change. I asked if his suggestion was I give both the children their mother’s last name as a middle name and he said no. Our conversation ended before I could ask him if he thought the name change felt like I was trying to cut ties from her mother because that is not my intent. And, if that is how it is perceived, then I’m not changing her name, just the spelling (I just find that apostrophe insufferable!). I guess I just need to sit with this more and wait for Chica Marie to find her voice on the matter.

Seasonal Transitions

Today is the coldest day since winter ended last spring and I forgot to put on a coat. Fortunately, the children are wearing jackets and I’m dressed warmer than I was yesterday. Still, I was chilly dropping kids off and getting to work this morning. I’ll need to dig out some fall jackets and stick them by the front door so I remember to wear them. The seasonal transitions always seem to take me by surprise. I guess I’m not much of a planner. My goal this weekend is to dig out my fall/winter clothing. I changed over my shoes (I have so many that they cannot inhabit the same closet all year and so roughly half of them get tucked away each season in what I dub the bi-annual shoe migration) but I never got around to doing my clothing, mostly because the weather kept fooling me with warmer than expected days. I just bought the little ones new winter pajamas over the weekend because it was getting too chilly to wear the summer ones they had.

 

Esperanza visited last night, coming over right after Primero got out of school. She was there when I got home. Primero and I had a therapy session and I asked our usual baby-sitter (Mr J’s girlfriend) to stay with the kids. Esperanza said she would most likely leave before we got home but she ended up staying. I took her home just before going to bed last night, although she seemed reluctant to leave. I think she was having a nice time reminiscing with Primero and it felt like old times. Those types of visits are hard to quit. While she was there I pumped her for information regarding her ex-friend with the car loan. I have some data I can share with the lender and Esperanza reached out to the friends older brother in a plea for her to take are of this issue. Apparently, she is living with her boyfriend in Florida and not working. Whatever. Not my problem.

 

During the visit a discussion came up regarding Hermano’s baby. According to Esperanza, some family members question if the baby is actually Hermano’s son because he doesn’t look like him. This tiny baby, just two months old this weekend, doesn’t look like Hermano and so mustn’t be his child. Primero also told me the baby was autistic (which made me mad because no one could possibly know this about a newborn) and now that he has Down Syndrome (which is used to accuse the child of not belonging to Hermano because there are no instances of Down Syndrome in his family – the ignorance in all of these suppositions enrages me). Basically, how I see it, Hermano is done playing daddy and is now trying to disqualify himself based on undetermined paternity. The irony is that CYS and his foster parents begged him to get a paternity test before agreeing the child was his and he refused, insisting he knew the baby was his baby. Now, he has broken up with the baby’s mother (again) and questions the baby’s paternity. As I told Esperanza and Primero last night, Hermano’s name is the one on the birth certificate so he is the legal father of the baby and therefore responsible for that child. I don’t feel sorry for him and I don’t feel sorry for the girlfriend; who I feel sorry for is the innocent baby they created and brought into this mess. The cycle of broken homes has now turned into this latest generation. Where will it end?

 

This morning Primero was pumping me for information on custody disputes. He said his younger sister (not the youngest, but the one in age just after him) has been asking to move back in with her step-father (the man she thought was her father for most of her life) and younger sister but her aunt (related to the other assumed biological father) wants her to move to Florida to live with her biological father. There are questions over who has legal custody of her, since her mom removed her from her step-father’s home and placed her with her paternal aunt, but still retains custody as far as anyone knows. We talked about how long her step-father had raised her and how she felt connected to him. We also discussed how her wishes would need to be considered since she is over 12 years old. Still, I told him it would be a complex case and there were a lot of outcomes, should it be taken into a courtroom for a decision. Primero seemed very concerned about the issue, I’m sure because he worried about losing a sibling to such a faraway place. I know he and Esperanza tried contacting their mother about the whole thing, but were unable to reach her. I hope the situation resolves itself in a positive manner.