Hello all - 

I was on this site a long time ago, for issues with the same son who has now estranged himself from me twice. This is long...please bear with me. 

Son was born with problems that made him a difficult child to deal with. I can't say for sure what happened at birth, but I know that he didn't breathe well on his own at first, and there was one incident where he choked in the nursery and had to be suctioned out - so there's a possibility that lack of oxygen could have affected him somehow.  

I've often said (not to him) that it seems as soon as he learned to talk, he learned to lie, and as soon as he figured the lying thing out, he figured out how to cheat and steal.  From the time he was 2 years old, I knew there was something wrong with him, but couldn't get anyone to listen.  Doctors, daycare teachers, etc - all said it was "age appropriate and he'll grow out of it, he's just a little immature for his age".  Wrong.  This 2-year-old child threw temper tantrums that were so violent that I had to do a full body hug on him to prevent him injuring himself or someone else.  (In other words, I sat in a chair, stood him in front of me, facing away from me - or he'd bite me - and wrapped my legs around his legs, and my arms around his arms, pinning them down to his sides.  I learned very quickly to place my hand on his forehead and gently hold it back against my shoulder, or he'd head butt me - figured that out after a bloody nose and lip caused by him slamming his head backwards into my face.)  He would scream for about 20 seconds and then go limp and be fine, like nothing ever happened.  This was NOT a normal child.  It took him a long time to learn to talk due to chronic ear infections - we were at the doctor every 10 days, because as soon as the antibiotics given to him wore off, the ear infection would come back, and the doctor said he wasn't a candidate for tubes in his ears.  (When my 2nd son started down this same ear infection road, I changed doctors and got tubes put in, rather than believing the doctor knew best.)  

When he started school, the troubles only got worse.  It took me until 2nd grade to get his teachers to listen to me when I told them there was something wrong with him.  They finally set up an IEP meeting and had him observed in the classroom - they determined he had ADD, though I was pretty certain that was not the only issue.  This was right about the time I started noticing that he and his dad didn't get along very well.  As young as he was at this point, his dad just didn't really seem to like him much - he seemed to be harsher on him than our other children (there were 2 others, this son is the middle child).  He didn't want to accept the fact that his son had learning disabilities or problems, and I think that may have played into his treatment of him.  When his father and I divorced, my son was seeing a school counselor to deal with his anger issues, and was asked to draw how he felt about his father being gone - he drew a huge smile face and said he was happy.  That just broke my heart for him.  

He's had a deep-seated hatred for his younger brother for most of his life, as well - and his dad is blame for that, I believe.  Their father treated them far differently - older son (ES) was always treated far more harshly than the younger, and the younger was the "favored" son in their father's eyes.  Now the disparity between them is even worse - older son: drug addict, alcoholic, doesn't pay child support for the 2 kids he's fathered and abandoned & has estranged from the family... younger son: on a career course for the military, having done his basic training between his junior & senior years of high school and now has graduated high school and is in advanced training for the military.  Younger son used to just idolize ES...not so now.  

In middle school, the thefts began. He stole food from the after-school program he was in, and claimed it was "some other red-haired kid with my name". He stole smoke bombs from a neighbor and took them to school to try and sell them - that one got the police involved, because he brought fireworks into the school. Then came the pranks and impulsive, uncontrollable behavior. He stuck a dead mouse in the change return of a vending machine at school and the principal's daughter was the one that found it by sticking her hand in there. When someone bet him he couldn't kick in the fender of someone's car, and other kids egged him on - he proved that he could, causing several large dents in the fender. (Guess who had to pay for that...) - and those are only a few of the incidents that happened. Then the drug and alcohol use started, even before he got out of high school.  Once he graduated, which he only did by the skin of his teeth and because I pretty much dragged him kicking and screaming through the last year of school and MADE him complete all his credits so he could graduate, he moved out and moved in with a bunch of guys his age in a trailer park - and then the serious trouble started.  They went on a B&E spree, breaking into buildings and homes and stealing whatever they could find.  They even broke into the elementary school across the street from my house. They were all arrested and jailed - but the parents of the other kids bailed them all out.  I was the only one who refused to do that and left my son sitting in jail, as hard as that was to do.  It was 2 days before Christmas, and I was picking up some last minute things for the family Christmas party, when the parent of one of the kids came up to me in the store and said she needed to talk to me about my son.  I jokingly said, "Oh don't tell me he's in jail or something, right?"  The look on her face said it all.  That's how I found out he was in jail.  During one of our last conversations (which was actually an argument) before he moved out, I told him that living with these guys - all known troublemakers and drug addicts - was a bad idea, and not to call me if he ended up in jail.  Guess what - he didn't. 

I supported and visited him throughout his jail stay (3 months). Unbeknownst to me, he was still playing the same old games.  He would tell me he needed comissary money, so I would provide it - then he would write to his dad and tell him he needed money and his dad would send it too - so he was really rolling in the comissary goods while he was there.  Our pastor visited him and tried to help him through this whole jail thing, and he played him too, telling him he wanted to turn his life around and getting the pastor to think he was geniunely trying to improve himself.  All lies.  
Once he got out of jail, he had an $8,000 fine and costs to pay, and if they weren't paid, he'd end up back in jail, because nonpayment of fines is a probation violation, and he was on probation for 2 years, and also had community service.  I paid all but the last $300 of the fines, which he paid because he finally got a job.  

Once all this was over, I actually thought he was on the right track.  He had a good job, was making decent money, paying his bills, bought a car, etc - seemed like everything was finally working out for him. Then he met a young woman and she quickly became pregnant.  About half-way through the pregnancy, they broke up and she moved out.  Son went into a tailspin and everything started all over again.  He ended up in rehab for addiction just after his son was born. I dutifully went to visit him, took him out for lunches and spent time with him, thinking MAYBE this was the final straw.  Then he tells me he's leaving rehab and going to a "sober living house", that nothing is wrong, he's just moving out.  I find out later that's not exactly what happened.  He got in trouble for breaking the rehab's rules and helping someone hook up a wifi router in their shared room so they could use the internet (not allowed), stealing other people's belongings, stealing out of the rehab's supply room and lying about all of it. The "sober living house" turned out to just basically be a flophouse, and he got kicked out of there too. He was begging me for money to pay his rent, pay for groceries, etc - saying he was broke because he had to pay child support for his son.  I told him based on past experiences that I wanted proof that he was paying it.  He put me off repeatedly until I refused to send him any money or buy him any groceries - so then he sends me a cell phone picture of 4 money order receipts with the payee name crossed out and his ex's name written in and "child support" written on the bottom. This is how extreme his deception gets.  I finally told him I was done believing his lies, and that he wasn't getting another penny from me - ever.  That if he couldn't support his son and be honest with me, then he didn't need to expect me to help him financially.  That's when he stopped talking to me, responding to calls or messages and cut me off completely.  He wasn't talking to anyone else in the family, either. A year later, I find out he's in another relationship and has had another baby - a boy. I called the hospital and talked to him, and he started crying and apologized for being a jerk, saying he wanted to make up with me.  I was wary, but hopeful. 

He brought his girlfriend and baby to visit me and I took them to see my mother at the nursing home (I had moved into her home as her caregiver a couple of years before and then had to place her in the nursing home).  It was a wonderful visit, and I had hopes that maybe, just maybe, this girlfriend and baby, plus some more maturity on his part, were the keys to him getting his life straightened out.  

Nope.  9 months after the baby was born, he and this girlfriend broke up because he kept lying to her - seeing a pattern here? - and we started down this long road again. He came to my mother's funeral last July, and that's the last time I saw him. In September of last year, he spoke to me one last time, and then disappeared again. First, I begged him to explain why he was doing this to us - no answer. When I finally got angry enough, I berated him via private message on Facebook, asking him how many times he thought he could do this to his family and have them keep accepting him back again, he deleted his Facebook account and changed all his phone numbers, leaving me without any way to contact him yet again. I haven't heard from him since.  

So here we are again - almost whole year with no contact, 2 children he's not seeing, supporting or having anything to do with - and for no good reason, and no idea where he's at or if he's even ok.  I hear through the grapevine occasionally that someone has seen him in the same area he was last located, and that he's working - but that's all I have.  

Now after all of this, I look back and realize that I probably enabled him too much, gave him too much, rescued him too often, and believed his lies far too much - but there's nothing I can do about that now.  
I feel used, ashamed of how he's turned out, and fearful that I will never see or hear from him again.  His grandparents and other important family members have all died now. The next deaths will be closer - me, his father, or his siblings or nieces/nephews.  Does he even care?  I ask myself that often. I wonder if he truly hates us and wants nothing to do with us, or if he's ashamed that he's involved with drugs/alcohol and not paying his child support or seeing his children - and he knows how I feel about that, so rather than face the music, he just keeps running - changing jobs when the child support order catches up to him, working under the table when he can, and sleeping where ever someone will let him use a couch for a few days.  

When he went to jail, I actually thought I was going to die.  I was so stressed and upset over the situation - NO ONE in my family has *ever* gone to jail - ever.  I was ashamed and devastated that it was MY CHILD that was the first - and for something like B&E and theft.  But then he estranged himself from me - and that was worse.  I keep wondering what will happen when I die.  Will he have reconciled with me by then, or will he even care? He doesn't communicate with anyone in my family, not even his sister, who was kind of his ally and confidant when he was a young adult. 

Thank you for reading...I know this was really long, sorry.  I just needed to get some of this off my chest.  I think about him every day, and wonder how he is.  I try to help the mothers of his children by supplying gifts, clothing and diapers and such when I can afford to.  It's not fair to me to have to do this, but I feel so badly that he has abandoned them like this.