I read this email, sent to Men’s Rights Agency just this week 16/6/12, and I want to share it with you as it expresses so well the devastation many fathers feel when their children are removed from their lives, for no good reason.

I have the writer’s permission to publish his email. MRA Editor

Hello,

I have dealt with this alone as most men do but i am at the point where i have had enough and need to vent. I am mentally drained and emotionally dehydrated.

I had two children with a woman many years ago. One born in 1998 and one in 2001. Two sons, a man’s pride, glory and representation of who he is, what he is.

The relationship broke down for many reasons and she moved me out in 2003 after she got an insurance payout.

Since then i haven’t seen nor heard from her or the kids. They have basically fallen from the face of the earth. I have no photos of them, no news, no knowledge of achievements or any contact what so ever. I don’t even know where they are.

Every year I buy birthday presents then give them away to needy kids. Every year I buy Christmas presents, sit them under the tree, then come New Year give them away to needy kids.

Through the erosion of time I don’t remember what they look like but as hard as I try I can’t forget them.

I still pay my child support and have asked many times for CSA to assist me, but the sterile replies of cold accountancy linguists only add to a weight that is indescribable.

I brush it off as a man does and steel my mind for another year of dreaming, wondering and coping with my own fantasied versions of what they look like, how they sound, how quickly they run, how well they do at school, all the things that many take for granted.

As a man, I try to brush it off with comments of “what can I do” and “one day they will find me.”  This how ever is a front. I am not made of stone and although this experience has hardened me to the core I find it harder and harder to compress the feelings of loss and sadness that try to erupt from my damaged soul.

I am not asking for help, nor do I want it. My way of coping is to continually punish myself. I now expect hardship, I expect disappointment, i expect quiet sorrow.

I only wrote this to vent. To vent [about] 9 of the hardest years of my life.

Not to vent to someone who would judge, pat me on the back and look awkwardly away, but to a stranger who would read, understand and take something away from this.

Time now to get up and get on with it.

Thank you for listening.

The sun comes up tomorrow but my heart remains set.

regards

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