Custody Battle over Ryan

I get really annoyed with the way most of our family treats Ryan. He was only 3 years old when he came into our lives, and yes he was a shy timid child, who didn't warm up to many people because so many people had came in & out of his life.

Think about it, he lived with his mom & sister and then suddenly he had a whole new mom, a dad & no siblings anymore, how would you feel?

So my parents lived just down the block from us, and my husband & I are the ones who got them the duplex they lived in!

So for the whole first couple of weeks they were all about my son & his sister, who still lived with us then, (although they paid more attention to his sister who we did NOT adopt)

So then my brother Robert & his 16 year old girlfriend moved in with her newborn baby & all the sudden it was like "Ryan who?"

They started ignoring him & only came to my house to take showers! (Their hot water heater went out), seriously they started basically treating him like he was invisible, unless they wanted something. Then Robert & Amber & the baby moved to Texas and they paid Ryan more attention.

Then Ryan's birth mom moved out and took her daughter so Ryan was all alone. And then things happened and we didn't talk 2 her for 1 & 1/2 years, then we moved to Texas & Robert & his family moved in with us & to Ryan it was like getting a sister again.

He loved Tasheena his "Baby" as he called her & in his eyes she took the spot of his missing sister, then they moved to Arkansas again, soon my husband got transferred back to Arkansas (He worked for J.B. Hunt) and we moved to a tiny town called Leola, and Billy's cousins paid alot of attention 2 Ryan & he called them aunt & Uncle,

Finally we found a better house in Sheridan & moved in literally next door to Billy's sister Tina & her then husband John, who they both adored Ryan! (And still do) And to make things better it was a 5 trailer trailer park and we were trailer #4, Tina was #5, Billy's cousin Jason was #1, and him & his girlfriend Amber had 2 kids, Adam, who was 4, same age as Ryan & a 1 year old girl, Patience.

Trailer #2 was Kevin & Alyssa who we became good friends with & trailer #3 was Jason's dad & step mom who took to Ryan & he called them Grandma & Grandpa.

So we were a huge family, but it wasn't all happiness, my husbands mom would go to Tina's house & when she'd leave my son would be standing in the front yard crying & waving & screaming "Grandma stop" and she'd ignore him & drive on by.

She'd call & say "Next weekend I'll come get you & you can stay the night" But that next weekend never came along, however she did stop by almost every church service & pick up her granddaughter & take her to church but I guess because Ryan is adopted he doesn't matter or have feelings.

So then like I said Ryan came to live with us August 2005, then his birth mom last talked to him Christmas 2005, then suddenly Feb. 2007 I got the worst news of my life, it was a Friday & the mail lady pulled into the yard & honked so I went out.

There was a certified letter for Billy from a attorney, I knew what it was before I even opened it. Billy was at work, Ryan was with his Aunt Tina for the day shopping, no body was home in the trailer park except me,

I was crying before I even opened the envelope and then I saw, his birth mom was suing us for full custody of Ryan, child support from Billy & for Billy to be arrested for not giving her visits, which we were told not to give her.

I cried for 2 hours before Billy came home, and we we're flat broke, because the day before he had gotten paid and we paid our rent & bought food.

Literally we had like $20.00

So I called my sister, who sent me $100.00, and we started selling everything Billy & owned, our 4 wheeler for $100.00, a pistol for $100.00, our travel trailer we had just bought and almost had remodeled for $300.00 my brand new digital camera for $100.00 and small odd & ends & by Monday we had sold $800.00 worth of stuff to hire a lawyer.

Now he was 4, he had been potty trained for almost a year, (Billy potty trained him), he use to pee the bed alot up until Jan. 2006, then suddenly because he over heard us talking he asked if she was going 2 take him away from us & he started peeing the bed again, and he withdrew from the bright loud easy going child.

So she got visits of Ryan every other sat. from 8 am to 5 pm, and he'd be ok when he left but as soon as he got home he'd cry and withdraw more, it would take us almost the whole 2 weeks to get him back to normal then he'd go again.

Finally he started telling us that they said I wasn't his mom & they made him a bedroom over there, and he was going 2 have to live with them, and he'd never see us again, to see him crying so hard his whole body was shaking was so hard.

He'd hold on to us & beg us not to make him live with them, he loved us, he told me he knew she had him but I was his mommy & I was the one he loved & he didn't want to go away from me.

Due to the court costs we we're rapidly going broke, we lied on our myspace pages & told everyone that my sister was fronting us all this money, but it wasn't true, she didn't have much, but she offered us mental support and gave us $200.oo total towards the court costs. (which we're more than Thankful for)

So we had already cut back on alot of stuff, and Billy & I did without so much to pay to keep our son. Soon we couldn't pay rent & we moved in with my parents, who had a huge house but was full with both my parents, both my brothers, 1 of their wives & Tasheena, Amber's daughter.

Ryan got his own room, so did Billy & I had our room, like everyone else, the house was big with 6 bedrooms, but still they offered no help, they never once went with us to any court date, Amber did once, she was there for alot of it making me laugh by things she said (You have 2 know Amber)

Then me & my parents had it our because of the difference they we're treating my son & Tasheena so Billy & I talked to the landlord where we lived when Ryan first came into our lives & we rented one of the duplex's again.

This happened at his 5th birthday party, we were still deep into the custody battle. So for Ryan's birthday no one could get along so we had 2 parties, one for his birth family & one for our family because they refused to be around his birth mom, but he wanted his little sister & new little brother there.

School started & Ryan was a little more happy with the visits, but he still had accidents every now & then & he'd wake up screaming that she was kidnapping him.

We also found out that Ryan had Osteochondritis Dissecans in both knee caps, & we had 2 take him to Shriner's every few months, which was like 8 hours away.

Then Ryan came home & told us something that he said that happened during a visit so we told our lawyer who made us go to the prosecuting attorney who stopped visits for 30 days, then we got more papers saying they wanted my husband to go 2 jail again, even though it was court ordered for no visits,

but low & behold our lawyer gave them visits back, (I have no clue why we were paying him)

so then they never showed up for the next visit & my husband was waiting with a police officer the whole time, so we had proof he waited, then more court papers, and still no help from my parents.

Finally his birth mom called me & we talked & we agreed to do the adoption on my part so she signed papers in Oct. 2007 & her rights were terminated by Nov. 2007 & the adoption was finalized Jan. 22nd 2008.

During the court battle my parents did nothing except buy the 4 wheeler from us & resell within a few months for way more money, which pissed me off because we were trying 2 keep our son, not make them money, of course they didn't offer us any of the money.

Billy's mom said & I quote "Why don't you just give him back, it would make things easier on everyone?"

Why don't I give him back? Because he is my son, and had been for almost 2 years, thats why, why don't you not be a hypocrite, you go to church & act like a Christian but did your butt help us during any of the court stuff? NO!

Did you ever show him any affection? NO!

The only people who helped us is, my sister Brandy & her husband Steve, my sister in law Amber, Billy's sister Tina & her husband John, who had good humor (LOL) during the court issues.

And a guy we just meet during the beginning of it who was friends of his birth mom's husband and gave us alot of our info.

Now things are somewhat better, we get along, but I feel sad because of everything that happened and everything that Ryan went through.

He was the innocent one who went through so much and now he has some mental issues he's dealing with & he still asks me from time to time if I'm going to get rid of him, and he still worries that she will try to take him back.

And the sad thing is this:

Nobody except Billy & my sister Brandy knows how close I came to ending the court case, I would cry when Ryan cried and he was hurting being torn between everyone, I felt lie crap & knew part of it was my fault, and I almost told the lawyer to give her custody of Ryan & my husband signing over his rights to keep from paying child support.

I came close so many times, it would have killed me to have done it, but I would rather me have hurt then to see him hurting, to stop him being tossed from house to house, mom to mom, family to family, hearing the people from their house saying things about us, and filling his head with things, then coming & hearing people around us & our house telling him thins & him overhearing things.

I'm glad it never happened, I don't know what I would do without my son, so I'm happy she let me adopt him like was promised when he fist came to us, but she came so close to winning everything that mattered.

I will tell Ryan this when he's older, & I hope he doesn't hate me for it, I hope he understands that if I had done it that I would have done it because I loved him so much that I was going to do what I thought was best, which was to stop him from being torn, not because of any other reason!