Young Prince -- The Long Version

I met my wife in an AOL chatroom, during the summer of 2001, several months after a very nasty breakup with my son, Austin's, mother, Danielle, after a year and a half of taking care her and her son, Patrick, who I was raising like my own son, since his father was a worthless asshole. We tried to work everything out, but there was no way that it was ever going to work out, considering I walked in on her and my best friend right after we broke up. She decided she wanted to move three hours away to be closer to her parents, but honestly, I think she was trying to take my son away from me. I helped her pack the U-Haul, but I was not financially able at the time to be able to relocate. So I stayed here, trying to save money to be able to get my car fixed to be able to visit him.

Then, the most amazing thing happened. I met the most amazing woman ever, Jenny, and her two daughters, Keana, and Cassie. She also had a son, Brenden, but unfortunately, I was never able to meet him. He died when he was three months old. I don't know how she did it, but she held it together pretty good, I think. I mean, she was a lot stronger than I could have been if I had lost my son.

Jenny agreed to drive me up to see him when I got my paycheck, so I made arrangements to see him for a couple of hours. Three hours up, three hours back, just to be able to spend an hour with my son. It was well worth it, I missed him very much, since I had not seen him in a whole month, since she had moved up there. I would have loved to stay longer, but Danielle would try to start an argument with me, saying that I should leave Jenny at home, which wasn't happening, since we had just met, or I should drop her off in the nearest town while I visit Austin, which I wasn't going to do for basically the same reason as the other, plus I wasn't going to leave her someplace she didn't know her way around. That would not be cool. That and she would drive into my head how Austin needs a full-time father, and not just someone who drops in every other week. I told her that I was his full-time father and nothing was ever going to change that. I also told her that if she ever tried to take him away, she would definately regret it.

So, every other week, I would put aside enough gas money to drive up there and see him. Man, how I wished I could see him more often, without all the bullshit. But if that is what it took to see him, I would do it happily. This went on until September, when she actually began to let me start taking him and Patrick back home with me for two weeks at a time. I was so happy, now I could spend as much time with him as we both needed. All went well for the next few months, I took him trick or treating for the first time. We dressed him up like a jack o lantern, but I painted his face up like the crow, in black and orange, it was pretty wicked. We were also able to throw him his first birthday party, but, that was the last time I would be able to see him again until February.

Chicken Pox? How the fuck could he have chicken pox? But the doctor said not to bring him in, so we better listen to the doctor. Or so we thought. We called to ask Danielle knew where he could have caught it, but she got mad and insisted that we take him into the doctor anyways. She told me that I was a worthless father because I didn't take him in. So finally, after arguing over the phone and instant message, I finally decided to take him in and prove her stupid, but the anger had already infected me and Jenny both. We pulled up at a red light, but since we were so stressed from dealing with Danielle, that when I told her "Go ahead and turn right," she thought I said, "Go, it's a green light," so she did, driving straight into the path of a Chevy Suburban. All I remember is seeing the front of the SUV before it slammed into my door, the next thing I know, I am out of my seatbelt and in the backseat, checking Austin to make sure he was all right. He was a little shaken up, but pretty good for the most part, he just kept staring at me, so I made a face at him, and he started laughing, so I knew he was fine. We never made it to the doctor that night, we just drove home and went to bed.

As soon as I told her what had happened, she told me the one thing I told her I had better never hear, " You will never see him again." That was enough. I didn't need to hear anymore, she refused to work with me for Christmas or anything. The next day, I went to the courthouse and filed for joint custody. That's right, joint custody, because I wasn't going to take him from her, I just wanted my time with him. They set us up for a court date in the middle of February, so I was happy to be getting an early birthday present.

Along comes the beginning of February, and I have two weeks before I get to see my son, my everything. I had made arrangements to buy my boss's truck, and was getting ready to get off work and talk to him about it, when I received a phone call from Jenny saying that Danielle had dumped both of the boys off on her parents with no clothes or jackets, just their sleepers. She was mad because her parents wouldn't babysit for her, so she could go out and party. Partying was always something she loved to do.

When we met, I was selling everything from weed to crank, and even some acid on occasion, but I was doing more than I was selling. I went from 225 lbs, down to 179 lbs, in only two weeks. My waistline wasn't the only thing shriveling to nothing, so was my bank account. I was writing bad checks to get money so I could buy more. I ended up going into debt of about $600 and I couldn't care less. When my sister died of cancer in January of 2000, six months shy of her 21st birthday, I had been up for five days already, so of course I had to get more. I was an emotional mess. I had to be carried out of the funeral home because every time I looked at the casket, I would almost collapse from grief. Anyone who knows me, knows that is not me. I am the one that stays strong for everyone else, because I can deal with it. All my life I have been dealing with bullshit, so why can't I deal with this. As soon as I left the funeral home, I went to my friends house, not for support, but to buy more dope. All my family wanted and needed me at the house, but I needed my medicine if I was going to be able to deal with these people. After about an hour, I felt like I was gonna explode on someone if I didn't leave. I have no idea where the rage came from, but it scared me, just not enough to make me wanna quit. Not until March 14, 2000. That is the day I found out that Danielle was pregnant with my son. From that moment on, I decided that the only way to make sure that she didn't do any dope, is to make sure the temptation wasn't there, so I completely quit. With the exception of weed, I quit everything I had ever loved before. Just like that I was able to give it up, and I have not been tempted to return in the least.

I hurried and bought the truck, so we headed to Danielle's parents' house. Almost immediately, we started having troubles with the truck, we couldn't drive any faster than 45 mph, turning a 6 hour round trip into a 12 hour voyage. When we got to her parents' house, he was there in his sleeper, but it reeked of shit, like he had sat in it for days. Her parents said they washed it three times and it still stunk. We wrapped him in his blanket and strapped him into his carseat, then drove six hours back home, before the motor locked up as we pulled into town. Of course, we lived on the other side of town, and it was 5 in the morning, so I called my boss and made him get out and drive me home. He then offered me a Camaro that he had, for the same price as the truck. I figured this was a good deal, but of course, it wasn't.

Me and Jenny then proceeded to take donations of clothes for Austin and try and get him a decent jacket. We had no diapers, wipes, anything, and I had another week before I got paid again. The truck sucked every last dime outta me, so I was asking everyone I knew. By the time we got done there was a five foot high pile of clothes that people had donated, but we couldn't go through them fast enough.

By time the courtdate came around, I had my son and had been taking real good care of him for two weeks, but when we got into the courtroom, I just froze up. I do that sometimes when I am nervous, so the judge ordered Danielle to have custody until our next courtdate in April. If it hadn't been for my mom and Jenny, that may very well been the end right there, but they started making a commotion in the back of the room, taking everyones attention off me, so I was able to collect my thoughts and tell my story to the judge. When asked if it was true, Danielle told the judge that he was just "visiting his daddy" for the past two weeks. The judge was disgusted with her, and awarded me temporary custody until April, when we returned to court. Two days later, an investigator for Child Protection Services stopped by and told us that she had filed a report that we did drugs in front of the kids and our house was trashed. We explained the situation, and he said he had to look around because of protocol, and if the house was cleaned up in two days, he would drop the whole case. So we did and so did he.

" I know for a fact that he smokes weed everyday," she told the judge when we returned to court. I knew she was going to do that, so I was able to clean my system out before going to court, so when the judge ordered us both to take a drug test, I was ready. My mom was nervous, since she was partially aware of my past with drugs, so she asked Jenny if I was gonna pass this test. Jenny didn't know what to think. She had only known my mom a year, and never did we mention anything when my mom was around. Not because we had anything to worry about, I just didn't. Maybe it was a respect thing, but I couldn't even bring myself to smoke a cigarette in front of her, let alone a joint. She told Jenny that she knows I do it, so Jenny assured her that we quit for the last month. Even the judge, when my results came back negative, told Danielle that I haven't smoked for at least thirty days. She then started her next attack. She tried telling the judge that we were living in unfit conditions, since Jenny's ex was staying with us, since he had nowhere else to go. The judge simply told her that if I had failed the drug test, then she might listen to what she had said.

Over the next couple of months, we returned to court to determine how much child support she would be ordered to pay. Since she failed to have a job after three months, the judge ordered her to pay $30 a week. Over the next year, I didn't recieve a single check, and in April, me and Jenny were married. We then decided to file for child support enforcement. That dragged out another six months, before the judge finally charged her with contempt and ordered her in jail until she paid $200. They let her out after paying $170. We finally started recieving child support checks of $50 twice a week, then after a couple of weeks it dropped to once a week, then once a month, until she stopped paying altogether. She also didn't want to work with us on visitation. She thought she should be able to drop in whenever. It didn't matter if she came by at 9 o'clock at night, she expected us to wake him up, so she could see him. I refused and explained to her that if she wanted to visit him, then she needed to make arrangements. I let her visit him if we weren't doing anything, but with three kids, you're always doing something. She refused to work with me, so I told her that she could see him when she called to make arrangements. The last time we seen or heard from her was in December of 2003, she dropped off his birthday present. She got him a toy that was made for a six month old baby. He was three years old! She didn't know him and he didn't know her. She kept trying to pick him up, but he would cry and reach for Jenny, calling for "Momma".

Over the next two years, we were technically homeless, following a bogus eviction. For the first few weeks we stayed in hotels, but that got expensive, so we stayed with my friend. We were real good friends, but things started to fall apart between us because he still loved to party and some of his guests stole some things from me, so Jenny's ex decided to return the favor and let us stay with him, it was a place to stay, but six people in a 24x24 efficiency apartment ain't real comfortable. We had to hide from his landlord and his maintenance men. They were always trying to find a reason to evict him. For the first time in my life, I felt like a mexican. Lol, sorry, inside joke with myself. Finally, we found another house and started the adoption process. It took about six months altogether and on August 30, 2006, Jenny officially became Austin's Momma.