Violet Brown

I hope you don't mind if I ask you some questions about what the future might hold for my son. Here's my situation in a nutshell. I am married to a crack addict. We have a son together who is almost 2 years old. I am leaving my husband in about six weeks. Actually, my husband is right now classified as a missing person, so I guess we're already separated.

I haven't yet gotten down to the nitty-gritty of custody issues when it comes to our son. I've talked to a lawyer and of course there's no way my husband would ever get custody of our son, but he may be granted supervised visits, if not now then perhaps in the future if he ever gets clean. One of my questions is this: Is it better for me to fight against visits between my son and husband? Or should I allow supervised visits? Would it be better for my son to know his father, even if it means the inevitable disappointment when his father misses visit after visit? Or should I fight to keep his father out of his life? Is it worse to never meet your father as a child, or to meet your father and have him be a raging addict? I know these are big questions, but maybe some of you have experience or advice that could help.

I'd also like advice on what I should tell my son as he grows up. Questions like "why did daddy leave?" are inevitable. Obviously as he gets older it will be easier for him to understand, but what do you tell a two or three year old about drug addiction? Do any of you know of any books that could help me with this problem? Obviously having a daddy with a drug addiction, and having a daddy who abandoned him is going to affect my son for the rest of my life. I want him to know from the beginning that it was not his fault at all - that he's perfect and that his daddy is the one with the problem.

Thanks for reading this. Any advice is greatly appreciated.

lanie67

Hi Violet,

Wow, that sounds like a difficult situation. I can't imagine what I would do in your situation, but it sounds like the best thing to do first would be to find out the laws in your state about such things as custody and visitation, you can probably find them through google. I would have to take those decisions one step at a time and pray for my higher power to make it really clear to me what to do. A sponsor told me once I could pray for a higher power to make it very clear to me what I should do, I have to laugh because just as I am typing this I realized that hp has made it really, really clear to me what to do in another situation that I am faced with, just like I probably asked him/her to. You don't have to make all these decisions in one day. It sounds like you have quite a bit of stress on you so take it one day at a time. Only you know for sure what you should do, and if you are unsure it is still true that you have everything within you that you need to make the right decision about each one of these things. ((((((((((hugs)))))))))))

Peter

Yeah, I agree with lanie. It is a difficult situation.

I suppose his father will want to see his son and does have some rights where that is concerned and as far as "what to tell the boy?" is concerned, my first thought is to tell him the truth as soon as he is old enough to understand.

Remember that his father is an addict and that addicts recover every day and go on to live progressive lives.

carl250r

let the dad see the kid .

you do need to leave this crack head totaly and dont be ever sleaping with him no more,

but this guy will still love his kid. just couse someone smokes crack doesnt mean they cant take a boy fishing sometimes or 4 wheeling or hunting or whatever there into. there freaks when there on the rock but when there not they can be OK people,

please do not tell your kid about his dad smoking crack as soon as he can undersatnd.that is horible, i know the guy is a ba$!ard ,but dont let crack steal this kids inocence.he dont need to know about adiction and crack and all of the bad stuff that his dady did and whatever else his young mind will spin out of this lesson. just tell the kid that some people dont get allong some times and it is sad when it happens but it is a fact of life.You know like you both love the kid but you could not live together anymore,for reasons you will understant when you get older.something like that. But ...DON'T HAVE NO CRACK TALK WITH A KID!
maybe you will get a new man who the kid is cool with and it wont even be that important what happened to pops.
Kids get smart when there in there teens and can figure out all sort of stuff and honestly by the time there in there teens there just about allready grown,you cant realy hurt them anymore.or mess them up.the kid will figure out at some point that his dad is a douche bag.
But you must keep all of this poison away from him in his preteen years,let him be a kid in the world where everything is great .dont let drugs take out 2 birds with one stone. let dad blow his brains out with drugs ...but spair the boy.
A kid don't need to know every dang thing.
knowing all that is messed up and sick in this world is to much for a little dudes head.

Sunlight81

My heart goes out to you. I sponsor a guy who is in just your position. He has full custody of an 8 year old girl and has for years. Her mom is a drug addict with warrants for her arrest and no drivers license or insurance but she has a car. She has been in and out of treatment. She is supposed to have only supervised visits.

The little girl loves her mommy and prays for her everyday. She knows "She's sick." She wants to see her mommy but my friend is very careful, tries to find neutral ground, gramma's works pretty good. You need to designate who will care for the child if something happens to you, that's what lawyers are for.