A Mother's Fight

I am starting this blog to just release the stress I have been going through over the last 4 almost 5 years. It has been the fight of my life.. The fight for MY boys! I don't even know where to begin and will probably skip parts and then later go back to explain things. This blog is not to entertain anyone, or offend anyone it is merely my thoughts, feelings about the events that have gone on in my fight for my children. I hope it doesn't bore you but maybe it will help someone. Anyway, here it goes. I had my first child at the age of 20. He was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. Black hair, brown eyes and the most amazing little grin.  (I'll call him J to protect his identity) I moved to Arkansas when J was about 6 months old. I hadn't been living in Arkansas long when I met who I thought I would spend the rest of my life with. We dated and married within a year of knowing each other. Keep in mind I was really young then. Plus, he was wonderful with my son. He loved him as though he was his own. It was in the year of 98 that I had our first child. ( I'll call him T) T was so beautiful.. It was love at first sight with him. He was so tiny, so sweet, so perfect! Here I had two perfect little boys. Over the next several years I thought I had the perfect life. We didn't have a lot of money but, we were happy and we worked hard to provide for our boys. 6 years later we had another addition to our family. ( I'll call him A) I'm skipping alot here to try and just give you a little history on my situation that leads up to the events that have changed my life FOREVER. A was as beautiful as his brothers. He had blonde curly hair, blue eyes and a smile that could light up a room. I thought I had it all. But, just before I found out that I was pregnant with A, I found out my husband was having an affair. But, determine to make my family work I tried to forgive my husband. During my pregnancy my husband whom was in the military (N.G.) was told he was going to have to serve in Iraq for at least over a year. The time that he was away really put a strain on our marriage. With the stress of an affair, him being away and us arguing with him thousands of miles away.. it was just to much for our marriage to take. So much so that in 2005 shortly after his return from Iraq we were divorced. I didn't have the financial ability to hire an attorney so I just signed the papers without reading them thoroughly. I didn't realize that I wasn't getting custody or even visitation of my children. I guess I just took for granted that it was a given due to the fact I was their mother. Sure my ex and I had talked about who the kids would live with and about visitaion. I was going to go back to school and being that I had no monetary way of supporting the kids at the time because I had been a stay at home mom. He would be the one to retain custody of the children and I would have standard visitation until which time I was able to take care of my boys. However, being that my oldest son wasn't his J remained with me. Anyway, I never questioned the vistitation issue in our divorce right at first because I was being allowed to see A and T every other weekend up until Easter of 06. At which time my then exhusband had met and had began dating another woman and things with my vistiation took a drastic change. He stopped my visits and it was at that time I found out that I had no legal right to see the children because it wasn't in the divorce. I was devastated.. It was as if someone had ripped out my heart and stepped on it! I wasn't allowed to have visits, call or any kind of contact with my children. But, I NEVER gave up.. I would still attempt to call on a weekly, even daily basis. I would send gifts, cards on birthdays and holidays. Sometimes I was allowed to call them only to have those taken away because I didn't meet some expectation of his. I would send emails and call him begging him to let me see my children. I would plead with him crying that I wanted to see them. He never seemed to care. I was on many occasions cursed and threatened when I did attempt to make contact with the kids but, it never stopped me. I began to keep record of everytime I would email, call, text so that I would have record that I never stopped trying to see them. Then one day his wife and I began to talk through myspace. We would talk on a daily basis and I would ask about the kids and tell her how much I missed them, loved them and longed to be part of their lives. After several months of talking she talked him into letting me talk to the kids over the phone. This was supposedly going to be the beginning of a reunion with the kids and I. I was thrilled. It started off as one phone call a week every Tuesday at 7. *Please bare in mind when reading this blog that I am having to leave out many, many details in order for this blog not to be a novel.* I would wait for that phone call and just rejoiced knowing that I was getting to talk to my babies. I loved hearing their little voices. I loved hearing them tell me about their day, what their favorite color was, what cartoons they liked to watch. Then whole time I just longed to hold them, smell them, kiss them and rock them in my arms again. ( I'm in tears as I right this blog just thinking about my lost time with my angels) It wasn't long after having my phone calls with the kids that my exhusband's wife began to mention adoption to me. They knew that I desperately wanted to see my children and would do almost anything to have a relationship with them. And "they" preyed on my weakness. They also knew that I didn't have the means to hire an attorney to fight for my rights so they came up with a plan. "They" told me if I would let my exhusbands wife adopt my children that they would have a consent order drawn up granting me visitation to the boys. I questioned doing something like that. Signing away my legal rights to the children. But, on the other hand I would be able to see them and do all the things a mother longs to do with her children.. love them. Was that a price I was willing to pay? I thought long and hard about it. What is a piece of paper I told myself? She will be their mother only on paper but, I will be their mother by blood! I didn't want to do it but, I thought it was the only way I would be able to see my children. So, I sold my soul to the devil and signed my name of both the adoption papers and the consent order.  It wasn't until after I had my first visit with my son.. yes I said son... they didn't allow my youngest son to come. I later found out that they had no intention of bringing him to see me. The visit was wonderful.. I played with T, we talked, I hugged and loved on him but, my visit was cut short (lasted only 30 minutes) because my ex and his wife wanted to go have ice cream. I never cried so hard in my life after they drove off with my baby in the car. After that visit they made it impossible to see the children after that.  It was always some excuse as to why they didn't show upor allow me to have my visits with the boys. Then the next thing I knew they had put in a motion to have my visitation taken away. I finally had enough of the games these people were playing with my life and the life of my children. I contacted a lawyer.. still not able to really afford it the lawyer I seeked took pity on me and my case and helped me take my ex and his wife to court. I took them to court the first time only to find out that the consent order was filed before the adoption and that my consent was worth less then the paper it was typed on. I had been tricked.. tricked to give these people my babies. I felt again like I had my heart ripped out. I felt hopeless and like now I will never be able to see my children again. I thought what did I do.. now I have signed my rights to my children away and I will never get to see them. They will never know how hard over the years I have fought to see them. But, with the grace of God my mother wa able to pay for me to get an attorney and fight to have the adoption set aside. We went back to court on June 30, 2010 and being that there hasn't ever been many cases like mine. But, on October 2, 2010 I recieved news that I had won, and the adoption has been set aside!!! But, I have only won the battle I haven't won the war just yet. I will still need to go back to court to see about being able to see them. I am just grateful to God, my mother and the wonderful attorney that took my case and worked so hard to help me! I will keep everyone posted on the outcome of everything. I'm sure they will try to appeal the ruling. I just hope that I will be able to see my beautiful children and that I can make up for lost time.