Better Off Without Him

“Tell your mom to shut the fuck up.”  I glanced back at my son, who looked back at me, wide-eyed and quiet. Confused as to why his father would tell him to say a bad word to me.  “Tell her! Say, ‘Shut the fuck up, Mommie.’” 

“Tell your father goodbye,” I told my son as I reached for the phone.

“Bye,” my son mumbled, clearly saddened as he pressed the button to end the call.

“Are you okay, honey?” I asked him.

“He told me to say a bad word.”

“I know, baby. But we don’t say bad words to each other, right?”

“It’s not nice,” he said, shaking his little curly head, still confused.

After my son’s father and I had fallen out, I still felt it was important that he and my son maintain a relationship.  He, however, made it clear that he didn’t share that same sentiment.  He would call at times and never even ask to speak to my son, choosing to pick arguments about whom I was dating or how I “betrayed” him instead. 

Initially, he communicated mostly through emails. But after continued threats of how he couldn’t wait to “beat ur ass again so u remember who the fuck I am,” I blocked his emails.  He then had other men he was incarcerated with email me with the same threats - “u know he itchin to beat ur ass” - and one he sent himself from someone else’s account that ended, “Fuck you and that lil nigga.” in reference to my son and that shut the emails down altogether.

Phone calls quickly became his new avenue for harassment.  He’d call months apart in spurts that would last a few days and then stop calling again.  When he did call, he’d call back-to-back dozens of times until I’d answer, “Why the fuck you ain’t answering the phone?! You wit’ a nigga?! You got my son around anotha’ nigga, bitch?!”  “My son is in school,” I responded, completely ignoring his invitation to argue.  “You can call back around 2:30 if you’d like to speak to him.” And I hung up.  He called back several more times and would finally stop, only to call back again at 2:30PM, on the dot.  I passed the phone directly to my son to avoid the yelling and name-calling, but not even two minutes would pass and he’d be getting off the phone with my son, asking to speak to me. 

I once tried to establish some boundaries for the calls.  “You and I don’t have to speak to each other.  If I don’t answer, that means I’m not with my son.”  I explained to him my work schedule and my son’s school schedule but he still continued to call at times he knew I wasn’t with my son and I’d literally have to turn my phone off to stop him from calling a million miles an hour.

He’d comply with the calling schedule we had set after he got tired of being ignored, I guess.  But he’d still take advantage of the time he was supposed to be speaking to my son to tell me how I “went against the grain” and that he never would’ve thought I’d “betray” him by leaving him.  I owed him, he’d say.  The times he did speak to my son, he’d complain about how “lame” my son was/sounded. “I can’t wait to get my fuckin son, man.  Got him talkin like you, all proper and shit.  Lil’ nigga sound like he ain’t seen shit.  I want my kids to know the streets.  They can go to school but if they want to be dope boys then I’mma teach ‘em how to be the fuckin’ man then.” 

Eventually, I just became exhausted by the conversations.  We couldn’t even have a decent conversation, let alone come to an agreement on appropriate parenting – what was and wasn’t okay to teach/say to my child.  Tired of the reckless threats, I explained to my son’s father that if he continued to call and threaten me, his calls would be blocked, just as the emails were.  “How the fuck I’m ‘posed to talk to my son?!” he snapped at me. “You should think about that when you call,” I told him.  “We don’t have to speak to each other.  He’s old enough that you can ask him what’s going on.  This is a privilege and if you continue to abuse it, you’ll have to write him letters.  He’s learning to read, maybe that’ll be good for him.”  “I don’t have time to write no fucking letters,” he’d say. 

My son’s father felt like it was my responsibility to maintain the relationship between him and my son.  “If you need me to call my son, then write me and tell me to fuckin call.”  I have always felt and stated that my only obligation is to provide access for him to contact my son if he feels he would like to be a part of his life.  In accordance, he has an address and a phone number, the latter of which he abused.

I always think back to when I was in prison and I couldn’t wait to be able to call my sister to speak to my son.  He was just an infant but I’d still sit on the phone and just listen to him breathe and I’d cry and wonder if he still smelled the same.  I remember how painful it was being away from him. I try to be empathetic toward a lot of things but I will never understand a parent lacking the desire or willingness to know their child.

I pray for my son’s father constantly.  Many people have told me that he changed for the better and with hopes that he had, I continued to try to work with him, answer calls and communicate with him but was unsuccessful.  I blocked the phone calls after the continued threats and disrespect.  I am a single mother, raising a young black male in America.  My son doesn’t have a large group of male role models.  I refuse to raise him with a man that finds it okay to verbally and physically abuse me.  “What’s going to happen if he listens to what you say to me and raises his hand at me?” I asked him once.  “You probably gon say some smart shit to deserve it,” he said and that reminded me of the way I had hear him speak to his own mother at times he had been angry.  No filter.  Zero respect. Like a dog in the street.

At whatever point my son’s father does have a change of heart, he has an address that he can write my son, when he feels mending that relationship is worth his time. 

“Mommie, who’s my real Daddy? Where is he?” Brian asked me the other day.  He asks questions like these ever so often and it always catches me off guard, always makes me cry.  “He’s away becoming better,” I said.  “Sometimes, people need time to themselves to be a better person.  But your father loves you, baby. I know that much. Sometimes people don’t know how to show love but maybe one day you can show him how.”

“By kissing and hugging and spending time, right?” he asked crawling under me.

“Right.”

When People Show You Who They Are The First Time, Believe Them

My son’s father was still in federal holding when our relationship began to end.  It was stressful and scary because I had already distanced myself from my own family and choosing to leave him meant also losing any kind of support or connection to his family, which was all I had at that time.   The thought of having no one was scary but I had probably already become included in those “if I don’t fuck with them, you don’t either” conversations I had overheard him having before about the other children and their mothers when they pissed him off.

Not supporting my son’s father while he was going through his indictment was a form of betrayal in his eyes and his mother quickly became hostile with me as well.  Especially when rumors that I was dating again began spreading.  Small disrespectful comments would be made during conversations and then things just turned outright ugly.  “I heard you talking to what’s-his-name.  Is he helping you pay the bills? I know you ain’t over there getting a wet ass for nothin’!”  She later accused me of allowing another man to wear her son’s clothes.  Saying she heard that I had given them away.   No man I dated would ever take another man’s belongings nor would I give them away.  His clothes were still hanging in the closet and folded away in drawers.  But she became upset anyway, yelling and cursing at me that she would be over to pick up her son’s clothes.  I advised her that she should calm down first because she wouldn’t be allowed to enter my home so upset and then offered that I bring the clothes to her house myself when I was able but she came anyway.

My son’s older sister, who had to be around 11 years old at the time, came to my door.  Her grandmother was waiting downstairs and sent the child up for her father’s clothes.  I could tell by her body language that she was uncomfortable and I apologized to her for being put in the middle of such an unfortunate situation.  I asked her to tell her grandmother that I would bring the clothes to her home myself when I had time.  Shortly after she left, my friend who lived in the building across from me called asking if I was okay.  She said she could see several of the county’s sheriff trucks in my parking lot.  I looked outside my patio door and saw the lights flashing against the trees, then heard a knock at the door.  “Ma’am, this lady is saying that you stole her son’s clothes, kicked her granddaughter in the leg and slammed the door in her face when she came to retrieve them,” the officer told me, waiting for an explanation.  I apologized to the officer for the misuse of her time and explained to her what had actually happened and that my son’s father had lived there, therefore the clothes were not stolen.  She asked to enter my apartment to see the clothes and I led her to the bedroom closet.   The officer, clearly annoyed at that point, said she would ask my son’s grandmother to leave and allow me to pack the clothes and deliver them myself. 

A few days later, I dropped the clothes off, folded neatly in large plastic bags, carrying them from the car to my son’s grandmother’s doorstep as she and her husband pulled them inside the house.  My son’s father called me afterward, cursing at me for “throwing my shit at my Mama door, you little disrespectful bitch!”  Apparently a lie his mother had told, but one of many more to come. 

She had also been calling my parole officer, leaving messages that I needed to be put back in prison for selling drugs and associating with other drug dealers. I couldn’t believe my own child’s grandmother would even think to behave in such a way, let alone present lies to have her grandchild’s only parent able to provide taken away.  “Leave those people alone, Ms. Evans.  You have so much potential,” my parole officer told me.  “This is why character is so important,” he said.  “People are gonna take advantage of your situation and create lies, tell stories to shame you, but consistence and integrity build other people’s confidence in who are you and what you stand for and they will believe in you regardless.”  My parole officer didn’t violate me or talk to me about police contact or any of the accusations my son’s grandmother and the other women left on his voicemail.  He didn’t question anything I told him. “You’re making a wise decision disassociating yourself from these people,” he said.  Realizing how hateful they had become, and so easily, made me agree with him.

Through all of the disrespect I received from my son’s grandmother (being called a bitch, her trying to get me sent back to prison and threatening to have people hurt me), I never, not once disrespected that woman.  My mother taught me better than that…

The Beginning of the End

“Babe! You hear this shit?!!” My son’s father’s voice was shaking over the phone and I could hear a Drug Enforcement Agent talking to him.  “We’ve got you selling to an agent and people in your circle are making statements against you.   I’d advise you to leave town now or we’ll be to pick you up in two weeks with an indictment.”  As much fear as that put into my son’s father at that moment, he didn’t leave, even despite me trying to convince him he should.  And sure enough, two weeks later, they came and got him.

He had left home to go to the store and get something to drink for dinner.  While he was gone my best friend called.  “Someone just told me that your son’s father was arrested at Harding’s.”  “What?” I said in disbelief.  “Who told you that?”  She said that a friend of hers had seen my son’s father get arrested in the checkout lane.  I grabbed my son and raced to the grocery store.  When I got there, I didn’t see anyone.  I was running around in a panic.  “Did someone just get arrested here?”  I asked the cashier, out of breath.  He told me two men dressed in plain clothes had arrested a black male a few minutes prior.  I knew it had to have been federal agents.   I went back home to meet several more agents at my door.  “We’ll need to search your apartment,” one said.  I asked for a search warrant, which they didn’t have.  “It’ll take a couple hours, but we can get one and in that case, we’ll kick the door the down.  So you can let us in now, or get your door kicked in.”  I refused to let them in.  I knew no drugs were in my apartment but I refused to go through that again.  “We know about you, but we’re not here for you,” they tried to assure me.  I still asked them to present the warrant before I let them enter and while we waited, I was told I couldn’t enter my apartment either.  I left to drop my son off and when I returned, they had already kicked my door in.  

My apartment was ransacked.  They had flipped over my sofas, dumped clothes all over the floor from the closet and the drawers only to leave with one thing; a letter an old friend of my son’s father had written to him from prison.

At the time my son’s father was indicted, I was working in a hotel as a housekeeper.  That was the only job I could get with my felony.  Burger King wouldn’t even hire me.  My paychecks averaged $110 a week.  I couldn’t afford to pay rent, let alone feed my child.  I thought my son’s father had been paying the rent, only to receive an eviction notice from my landlord stating that the rent hadn’t been paid in three months.  I could barely afford a $10 pack of diapers. I had no idea how I was going to find the money to pay back rent.  And to this day, I can’t tell you how I made it through that time. I found a job doing home care two months later that paid under the table and made an arrangement with my landlord for the owed rent. God’s grace is amazing, that’s all I can say.  

My son’s father was being held in a prison a few hours north and I would visit him every weekend.  Our relationship got rocky quickly as I began to discover a new freedom of having and managing my own money and what it was like to live without the stress or drama of other women harassing me or him abusing me.  A part of me felt guilty that I was so peaceful at home without him and a greater part of me just felt free.  I felt obligated to be there for him, again, and I tried, but as the pressure of being inside and going through his case began to break him down, I couldn't stomach who he was becoming... or rather, finally realizing who he always was.

I won’t go into any further detail as to why my son’s father and I fell out.  What I will say is, despite my involvement with him, I was never from the streets.  I didn’t know anything about selling drugs, street violence, etc., until I had met him.  I couldn’t have cared less about whether a person chose to testify against another person in the streets or not.  It wouldn’t have affected me in any way.  However, I CANNOT respect a man that will allow a woman to sacrifice her life to spare him from his own consequences, but when he finally has to face the consequences himself would choose to break the very “code” he praised her for keeping to save his own ass. 

Prisoner 673628

It sounds cliche' when people tell you they've found God in prison, but you have to in order to survive that hell.  I saw so much evil in there, so many demons... literally.  The COs (correctional officers) tell you upon entering not to tell anyone what you're in for or how much time you have.  "Keep your mouth closed and don't make any friends." 

I watched a young woman get her face cut open with a pencil for breaking up with her girlfriend.  She was in so much shock she just kept walking, blood dripping from her face into the white snow.  They sat her in a chair and she was unresponsive, staring into space, shivering.  She returned with her face stitched together from her ear to her lip a few days later, her girlfriend unremorseful, emotionless.  Several other girls would begin to have hallucinations and delusions. One attempted to commit suicide by stabbing herself with a pen, another shaved her hair off and attempted to rape her cellmate and another woke screaming and shouting hysterically at 3 am that some spirit or demon had taken over her body.  They were all detained and taken into isolation.  All of these women came into prison seemingly "normal".  No mental diagnoses, usually non violent offenses like larceny or embezzlement.  The women who had been there longer would bet on who'd "make it" or not and they were usually right.  It would always be the girls who tried to "fit in," searching for attention or friendship.

Being in prison was exhausting and depressing.  It was by the grace of God that I survived it myself because internally, I was exhausted and broken.  I didn't want to move or talk.  Everyday was a struggle to just live, breath, walk, talk and pretend like I was "okay."  I was depressed, but I didn't want to turn out like those other girls so I'd kiss my baby's picture and pull myself up from that bunk everyday.

My son's father had just gotten out of jail when I went to prison.  He wrote me a couple times and sent me a few dollars here and there.  He'd say, "You don't need no money like that, you good, you'll be going to boot camp soon."  So I'd use the money he sent me to buy cigarettes and trade them for things I needed but didn't have enough money for, like soap, deodorant, paper, and envelopes to write home.  And if I made good, I could order a few snacks.  But soon after I was there, smoking became banned in the prisons. Since I didn't smoke myself, I still had cigarettes I saved to sell when I needed more personal items.  But I started hearing that some of the other women knew I had them and were plotting against me so I gave them away to protect myself. 

I signed up for boot camp and in February of 2009, I was picked up from the prison and transported to the camp.  Upon the 90 day completion, I'd be going home.  My father wrote me every week I was there.  No one was there for me more than he was and I know I broke his heart when I went back to my son's father. 

I came home on parole and house arrest that May.  I was paroled to my mother's house but my son's father convinced me to come back to him.  I got all my papers transferred and less than a week before I was to move back with him, my ex-coworker was calling my phone again at the apartment that he supposedly got for me with a second girl inside.  My best friend went and saw both women there. The mother of his child before mine would call my parole officer constantly, so much that he told me he had to unplug his office phone, trying to get him to violate me and send me back to prison. And she'd be outside keying his car and putting sugar in the tank, her and maybe one of the others. I couldn't believe I had come back to him for the same bullshit. And then to have my son there too, I at least expected a little more discretion and respect on the home front, AT LEAST... but I was only fooling myself.

The beating continued not long after because I'd tell him I wasn't going to put up with his shit anymore.  That as soon as I got off house arrest, I was out of there.  He became way more careless with the beatings though, dragging me down flights of stairs in front of our neighbors. He even beat me while they were trying to pull him off of me.  Thankfully, he never hit me in front of my baby, but once, when he tried to hug me, my son began to cry and pushed his father away from me.  After that,  he sat me down and begged me not to leave.  He told me he needed me and that he knew his "time was running short." He had had a few run ins with federal agents and he knew they were building a case on him and were preparing an indictment.  He said he could feel it... I could too.

 

Untitled

I had my son the day before my 20th birthday on October 14, 2008.  That moment was so surreal for me.  My baby was so beautiful and he was so peaceful (as long as no one bothered him lol).  He was my glimpse of sunshine peeking through the clouds of a deadly storm.  I had three weeks with him before my sentencing.  I wanted to embrace those moments of joy so badly, I didn't sleep for three days.  I'd stay awake and just stare at him sleeping.  God... I didn't want to let him go.

When my son's father cheated, it wasn't with just one other girl. It was always two, three or maybe even more at a time.  So before my baby was even a day old, one of the other kid's mother's and my former co worker had written under his picture on the hospital website that he was ugly and that he couldn't be his father's child.  Another of his kid's mom kept calling and texting me, harassing, per usual.  My situation in itself was so miserable only a jealous hate and evil could delight in that.  Forget that my son's father shamed me endlessly.  Forget that I was incarcerated my entire pregnancy and now about to leave my newborn baby for prison.  These women hated me and harassed me to no end all because they wanted a man they saw as "mine" regardless of how horribly he treated me. It had taken me until that day to realize that the girls calling and harassing would never end.  In misery there are no boundaries, which is why I offered none of them the attention they were seeking.  They were the very last of my concerns.  None of them, not my son's father... no body mattered to me anymore.  The only feeling I allowed myself was to fall in love with my son and absorb every minute I could with him.

I won't say the way my son's father treated me didn't hurt me.  It did.  Crushed my heart.  But I HAD to go numb or I wouldn't have made it through my pregnancy.  It stung, I cried but I had to find solace somewhere for the sake of my sanity and my son.  I didn't expect him to act differently or be a better man. But I DID expect some type of respect.  Besides the fact that he had MY car, I shouldn't have had to walk anywhere, shouldn't have had to ASK for money or rides and I shouldn't have had to deal with other women harassing me the entire time.

I didn't take the case because I thought it was going to change anything between him and me.  I didn't take it because I loved him or to prove anything either.  They had offered me the opportunity to make statements against other people too in return for a deal but I couldn't do it.  I had taken the case because I thought that that was what I was supposed to do.  I saw it as more of an obligation than a favor.  I was disgusted by his complete disregard for me and I was hurt, yes.  But turning my son's father in, or anyone else for that matter, had never, not once even crossed my mind.  I never thought about it, not even once.  And to this day, I don't know why.

I granted power of attorney over my son to my sister.  My son's father was pissed I didn't leave my son with his mother (until he was released from jail for a probation violation) but he was too irresponsible, too selfish and too desperate for a dollar.  He'd drop his kids off to any and everybody so he could run the streets. I at least wanted the peace of mind that my baby would be safe while I was away.

The first Tuesday that November, I was sentenced to two years in prison.  My baby was three weeks old.  I'll never forget trying to hug him and say goodbye handcuffed in that courtroom.  Seeing his face gave me this overwhelming sense of peace but crushed my heart at the same time.  That tore me apart.  To this day, I've never felt a greater pain than I did the nights I cried for my baby... never.  I cried for him every single night... every one.  My sister would send me pictures of his chubby little face that I'd stare at endlessly and I'd call home just to listen to him breath, cry, whatever, it didn't matter I just wanted to hear him; to know he was there. My dreams of him were so real, I'd swear I could smell his hair.  I hated being awake.   I wanted to hold him so bad. 

A couple of weeks after being in prison, I went to shower and realized the milk from my breasts had dried out.  I cried silently in the shower but inside I was screaming, yelling, losing more of myself.  The smell of my milk reminded me of my baby. In a way, it still made me feel close to him.  That was all I had.  I felt so empty and hurt.  Physically, it pained me to be awake but I'd still pretend I was okay.  My soul was broken and empty.  I had to find God.

Pregnant & On the Way To Prison

In February of 2008, I was feeling ill and went to the emergency room.  They performed an ultra sound and there it was; a little baby the size of a jelly bean.  Mixed emotions began to overwhelm me, excited about the life growing inside me but disappointed in myself for not being more responsible.  My baby's father was in jail (yet again) and I was on my way there. 

I called my sister.  She and I didn't speak much but before all the mess, she had been my best friend.  I cried and cried to her.  "I don't want to have his baby," I told her.  He was abusive, in and out of jail and had six other children that I knew of.  He'd have his preferences of which kids he'd deal with based on his relationships with their mothers.  I heard him tell his mom once, "I told ya'll if I don't fuck with them, you don't either!"  Then it'd just be birthday and holiday appearances for them if he didn't.  I felt SO bad for those babies and here I was bringing another one into the same situation and I myself was facing prison time.

I went to trial in April charged with Delivery and Manufacturing of a Controlled Substance but I wasn't a drug dealer and I knew it was clear the drugs weren't mine so I figured a jury would have no reason to convict me.  

My lawyer was horrible.  After jury selection and during breaks,  he would talk to the prosecutor about their colleagues and what they planned to have for lunch that day, right in the courtroom, right in front of me.  I felt so alone in that court room... defenseless.

In the middle of the trial, the prosecuting attorney moved to add the lesser charge of possession, which the judge allowed.  I was oblivious to the fact that she could even do such a thing and knew right then that I would be going to prison.  I was so pissed at my lawyer and felt so helpless.  Sure enough, I was found guilty by jury of Possession of a Controlled Substance.  The judge postponed my sentencing because of my pregnancy.  I was to turn myself in the next day, remain in jail for the majority of my pregnancy, be released in October for the entire month to be able to deliver my child and then return to court in November for sentencing.

I broke down in the court house.  They had to ask my son's father to take me outside because I was weeping so loudly it was disturbing the other courts.  I cried to my son's father, wanting for him to go inside and say, "They were my drugs, take me" but instead he was just quiet.  He dropped me off at home and left. I'm not sure where he went.  I was so numb that day, I'm not even sure if I really cared.

I was taken to jail the next morning.  I had told myself not to stress because I didn't want to hurt the baby.  But while using the bathroom one day, I saw blood in my underwear.  I asked for the nurse and was told there was nothing the nurse could do because she wasn't qualified to deal with pregnancies and that I'd have to go see my OBGYN.  They took me to my appointments in the jail jumpsuit, shackled at my wrists and ankles with two officers to escort me.  I waited in the lobby, people staring but I was so scared for my baby, I didn't care.  I ended up learning I had cists that had burst which caused the bleeding but thankfully they had resolved on their own.  My midwife explained to me that despite my situation, it was very important to try to not stress myself or the baby.  I promised her and myself that I wouldn't.

The jail became overcrowded and a month later I was sent to finish the remainder of my time in a probation facility, similar to a halfway housing center.  There, I was able to wear my own clothing and get passes to go to any appointments I had.

I would call my son's father to pick me up for my appointments and he'd tell me he couldn't and that he was busy.  That was a hot summer, lots of flooding and 95* weather.  I'd wal, big and pregnant, taking the bus to my appointments and more than once, I'd see him with another girl while the bus passed by. 

I'd call him for money for bus fare and food and most of the time, he'd tell me he didn't have it.  His friends and their girlfriends would bring it instead.  One time, when he did bring money to the facility, I remember watching him leave with another girl, my co worker that had shared the paper around my work place.  But I didn't have time to worry about him cheating or what he was doing in the streets.  I didn't have time or the emotional capacity for my feelings to be hurt or to hate him.  I was getting closer and closer to my due date and thus closer and closer to going to prison.  I had to figure out what that would mean for my son.

Shit Hit The Fan

September of 2007... shit hit the fan.

I was reading the newspaper, opened it up and saw my own face in the Kalamazoo's Most Wanted column.  My heart dropped to my stomach.  It was a Monday.  I'll never forget.  Ironically, I had just seen the detective from my case the Friday before at the courthouse and he stopped me to ask how I was doing.  He knew where I lived, he had been to my house and my job.  He could've easily picked me up if he wanted to. 

I immediately thought of my family.  What would they say?  They had no idea what was going on.  I barely spoke to them.  Feelings of shame and fear overwhelmed me.  That detective wanted me to know this wasn't a game and that they weren't playing around with me.  I got the message loud and clear.  I had an anxiety attack and broke down in my car.  I could barely catch my breath.

I turned myself in the next morning and was released on a personal recognizance bond.  I almost immediately lost my job.  I worked in healthcare as a CNA.  My son's father had been cheating with a co worker of mine and she took the paper around my work place.  For whatever reason, it humored her.  My supervisor expressed the concern that my coworkers and even family members of clients had seen the paper so they had to let me go.

I had a court appointed attorney who, of course, didn't seem very interested in my case or me.  I'd tell my son's father I needed a lawyer and he'd say, "They're just going to give you probation. This happened last time. You straight.  Look... if they try to send you to jail, I'mma step up and take it.  But you gon be good." 

"Last time" was when the girl he was with before me had taken a case for him.  She received probation on a deferment program and retained a clean record upon completion of her probation. That's what he thought was going to happen to me too. But this wasn't that. Even I could see that. I had federal agents at my doorstep, or whoever's doorstep I happened to be at when they wanted to speak to me.  They had a full investigation out on him AND every man he grew up with.  Other lawyers and officers I didn't even know would pull me aside and let me know that this was serious and I was in way over my head. That didn't seem to phase my son's father.  "Same shit" he'd say.  Yeah, alright.

The officers, lawyers and even the DEA would get so frustrated with me and they'd all say, "You think he gives a shit about you?! He's going to let you go down for him and you think he's going to be there for you?!! He's saving his own ass, you better save yours."  They all said it... but I never listened. Ironically, when I think of it now, those are the words that stand out the most.

They did offer me probation, though.  But only in return for a statement.  Though I had a state case, I still met with federal agents to discuss a "deal."  

"Make a statement against your son's father in return for deferment."  I said no...  "Well, do you know 'such and such'? Get close, wear a wire, find out some information and testify in return for deferment."  I declined again. They pulled the offer for probation deferment for non cooperation. I plead not guilty to the delivery and manufacturing charge and my case went to trial.......