Trying to Connect

When Justin’s father was released from prison for the first time, after serving two years, Justin said he wasn’t excited but he was happy for his father. Shortly after, his father committed a parole violation and landed back in prison. When it happened again, Justin began to detach.

“It got to the point, well, he’s just going to go to jail anyway, so why should I care?” he said. “I didn’t really know because you never know what my dad’s going to do next.”

In the past year and a half, Justin’s dad has managed to stay out of prison. He takes time to see Justin, but the visits haven’t done much to improve their relationship.While Justin remembers missing having a father growing up, he doesn’t really want one now. He said he doesn’t get along with male authority figures.

His dad is willing to offer him guidance, but Justin doesn’t want to hear it. “It’s frustrating to me just to watch them interact,” Kissy said, noting that conversations often end up in yelling and cussing.

Justin said he is not sure if he wants a relationship with his father anymore. “I think I’m done with him,” he said. “We’ve tried and tried and tried, and it just doesn’t seem to work out. I can’t trust people like that.”

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Desirae Menden, age 16

In the back of her head, the “why” questions always nag Desirae Menden. Why would her father use drugs and commit a crime? Why would he do that with a daughter at home?

Desirae was 3 years old when her father, who had a problem with drug abuse, went to jail for robbery. Desirae and her parents were living in California at the time, and her mother, Bridget, moved to Minnesota to be closer to family shortly after Desirae’s father’s arrest. Despite the distance, Bridget made the decision to be open with her daughter and to let Desirae foster a relationship with her father.

“It doesn’t make him no longer a parent [sic],” Bridget said. “We kept things very open.”

Desirae, who is now 16, visited her father in prison once when she was 12, and otherwise kept up a relationship with him through letters. He writes her regularly. She tries to write back, but sometimes struggles finding words to write about her life to a man she hardly knows.

Aftermath of Arrest

Questions about her father’s decisions lingered as Desirae navigated her childhood without a dad. The questions are bubbling to the surface more often, now that her father’s release from prison is imminent. He told Desirae and Bridget that he wants to move closer to build a relationship with Desirae. His goal is to see her graduate from high school.

“It’s coming to an end soon,” Bridget said. “There’s a lot of mixed feelings about it in this house.”

Desirae said she doesn’t know how to feel. She traveled to California to see her father about 4 years ago, and she remembers the visit as a surreal experience. She had seen enough pictures to know what he looked like, but the feeling wasn’t mutual. “He really didn’t recognize me,” she said. “He doesn’t even know me.”

The two had a stilted conversation about school, Desirae’s mom, and “basic stuff,” Desirae said. But it didn’t help her feel closer to her father.

While Bridget always encouraged Desirae to write her father and supported Desirae in having a relationship with him, she never pushed Desirae to do anything she didn’t want to do. She understands when Desirae doesn’t return every one of her father’s letters. “I can’t blame her,” Bridget said. “How do you talk to someone you don’t even know?”

Desirae missed having a father, especially as a child. She loved visiting her friends’ houses—it seemed they all had “accomplished” dads. They were dads who took their children places and told funny stories and displayed trophies. She hated fielding questions from other children: “Why don’t you have a dad? Where’s your dad?” It’s a lot easier to explain where her dad is now, she said, yet it still can be difficult. “Some people end up judging you for it,” she said.

Amon Hodges, age 3

 

The Stillwater correctional facility’s visiting room was hot and uncomfortable. Amon Hodges arrived there from church and was still wearing his good suit. He had a choice of three places to sit: his mom’s lap, his dad’s lap or the chair next to his mom.

In a corner of the room, there were a few beat-up books that didn’t interest him. No toys were allowed. Amon’s mother, Laura, helped him remove his stuffy jacket, but a guard quickly approached and told them he needed to wear it. Taking it off was against the rules. Amon put his jacket back on and did his best to be good.

As a safety measure, even bathroom visits aren’t permitted during visitations. After Amon graduated from diapers, Laura still brought a spare because he couldn’t always “hold it” for the entire hour. She would walk him to a changing table and help him relieve himself in a diaper. “He did not like that,” she said.

Such is the life of crime, punishment and prison security, which some parents pass along to their children. Every rule is in place for a reason, although not every reason is understandable to 3 year-olds.

By now, they all know the drill.Amon has visited his incarcerated father regularly since he was born.

Aftermath of Arrest

Amon’s parents had been married less than a year when Amon’s father was arrested for criminal sexual conduct. Laura was three months pregnant. She remembers the early days of her pregnancy—after her husband’s arrest—as a lonely time. Her friends and family weren’t speaking to her, and she couldn’t imagine becoming a mother again. (Laura also has an 18 year-old daughter.)

It wasn’t until she sought counseling for adoption that she really had a chance to talk about being pregnant. “All I needed was somebody to talk to me, and then I knew I wanted my son,” she said. “None of that other stuff mattered. It just mattered that I was pregnant, and I was going to have a healthy pregnancy.”

Amon’s father won’t be eligible for release until Amon is an adult. Amon’s only interactions with his father take place in a visiting room or during phone calls.

Laura is allowing Amon to reach conclusions about his father naturally, and she always answers his questions. However, she still hasn’t told him that his father’s home—the one Amon visits weekly—is actually a prison. Right now, Amon said his father lives in “the big house.”

Once, as they waited in the visiting room lobby, Amon paged through a magazine and noticed a picture of a man in a business suit and tie. “That’s a prisoner,” he said. Laura asked him if he knew any prisoners. He said no, he didn’t. Later, he wasn’t so sure.

“I feel like he knows and he tiptoes around it,” Laura said. “He’s a deep thinker, and I don’t want to push him.”

Justin Cunningham, Jr., age 12

“My dad went to prison for many different reasons,” Justin Cunningham, Jr. said. “Some of them I don’t know. Some of them I do.”

Up until 18 months ago, Justin’s father spent most of Justin’s life in prison.

Justin never saw his father get arrested, and what he knows of his father’s crime—a 2nd degree assault with a dangerous weapon—was pieced together by things his mother has told him and conversations he wasn’t supposed to hear. “I would think about, ‘Why would he have to do that?’ and all that other stuff, you know? It’s not necessary.”

As he enters his teen years, it’s clear that Justin has a lot going for him. He is poised and polite. He’s intelligent and thoughtful. He has a mother who loves him. But he’s also struggling with school and behavior issues at the same time he’s struggling to develop a relationship with his dad.

According to Justin’s mother, Kissy Mason, her incarcerated ex-husband believes that a father’s role is to be an authoritarian. He gets frustrated and pulls away when Justin doesn’t respond to his sporadic discipline and advice.

“If you have not had that relationship with your child, you can’t think you’re just going to step into that male role of directing those children,” Kissy said. “That’s not being a father.”

Aftermath of Arrest

Justin’s parents divorced in 2005—after seven years together— when his father was serving time. Justin was 4 when his father was first incarcerated. Even though they stayed in touch through letters and visits, Justin didn’t grow up feeling close to his father.

“Sometimes you need touch to have a relationship,” Justin said. “To bond, you need to do things.”

He remembers being bored during visits to prison. “We visited him kind of often,” Justin said. “I’d probably talk to him like 20 or 30 minutes and then doze off.”

Kissy tried to fill the roles of two parents. “I would go out, and I would have to do boy stuff. I would try to do the soccer thing. I did baseball, football,” Kissy said. “We went fishing together; we went camping. I would just try to do the activities that I think a man would do.

Yet, there were times when Justin wanted a real dad. “If I was playing soccer, I’d be like ‘Oh, I wish my dad was here to play soccer,’” Justin said. “If I was just doing extra activities, I would think ‘My dad should be doing this with me.’”

Kissy said she feels alone when it comes to parenting. If Justin gets sick or has a problem at school, Kissy has to take time away from work. “You have the support from the school or the social workers, but when you need to make tough decisions, it’s hard,” Kissy said.

She also said it was a struggle adjusting from two incomes to one, and even now that her ex-husband is out of prison, he struggles to find work to help support his family.

Without Dad

Laura said that one day, Amon will have to do the same soul searching she did when her husband was arrested and found guilty. Laura won’t talk about her husband’s crime with anyone. She said it’s his story to tell.

She decided that it didn’t make sense to punish him or her son by severing their relationship. However, she feels like her son is being punished for the crimes of his father.

She believes that there is an unfair assumption that just because her husband is in prison, he doesn’t want to be a father and doesn’t deserve the chance to be one. “He wants to see his son,” Laura said. “Amon was our little love child.We both love him very much.”

But she knows that Amon’s father won’t ever teach him to walk or drive a car.He will never sit with him as he does his math homework or tuck him into bed at night. They will never share a meal together or play a board game.

That’s the harshest reality.

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Building a Relationship?

Desirae said she is angry at her father for his lifelong absence. As she contemplates his return, she is trying to weigh the importance of letting someone who wasn’t—couldn’t be—there for her back in her world. “I’ve made it this far without him in my life,” she said.

Feelings of excitement, hesitation, indifference, and anger swirl through her mind. Desirae must sort through the feelings she has, separating them from the feelings she thinks she should have. Should she be feeling happy? Is it okay if she isn’t?

One thing Desirae knows for sure—she is blessed to have Bridget for a mother. She’s grateful that her mother has been so supportive. “It happened to her, too, and she’s still helping me,” Desirae said. “She’s open and she’s willing to talk about it.”

As she enters her junior year of high school, Desirae is contemplating her future plans and thinking about entering cosmetology school after high school. In addition, “I’m completely anti-drugs,” she said, adding that she plans to be drugfree forever. Even though her father hasn’t been present, knowing her father’s story has changed the way Desirae approaches her life.  IQ

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