Trying To Get His Stuff

Yesterday, my wife and our 16-year-old went over to his father’s house to get some of his belongings. When our 16-year-old knocked on the front door, his father answered and yanked him inside the house and shut the front door. He began yelling at the boy, my wife described it as “screaming”, so that it could be heard through the door. When she approached the door, the father locked the front door. The screaming continued to be heard through the front door, but my wife couldn’t see anything. She rang the bell. Waited a minute (she timed it). Rang again. Waited a minute. Knocked on the door. Waited a minute. Knocked again. The door was thrown open by the father, yelling at my wife, telling her that he couldn’t believe she would come over without calling or texting first. Our 16-year-old came out with 3 of his shirts and one of his posters. The father then screamed that my wife had ruined our 16-year-old’s driver’s education experience. My wife said nothing. Our 16-year-old said that they had been trying to talk with him for 7 months. He responded with, “No you haven’t! Prove it!” He then screamed that this wasn’t the 16-year-old’s home and he couldn’t just come over here whenever he wanted and this wasn’t the way this should be happening. My wife said, calmly, that he had been trying to get his stuff from 7 weeks, and he had tried every other way. The father then screamed that was a lie, and that my wife had been filling our 16-year-old’s therapist with lies. The father then screamed that it was the 16-year-old’s fault that the most recent meeting with the therapist, father, and 16-year-old wasn’t productive because he walked out of the meeting and that’s why it wasn’t resolved. 16-year-old moved his body like he was going to respond, but my wife urged him to get in the car, at which point the father screamed that she needed to get off his property and that he was going to call the cops.

When my family returned home, my wife was breathing heavily, was incredibly emotional, and coming down from an entirely terrifying experience. And while our 16-year-old was upset, he was not close to being as upset as my wife. He said that he had been grabbed and pushed by his father, but he hadn’t been hit, and he didn’t think he needed medical attention.

Later in the evening, my wife told me something I thought was rather shocking and revealing. Our 16-year-old wasn’t scared. He was upset, but he wasn’t surprised by the reaction of his clearly insane father. My wife reiterated that when she came away from the experience, she had to breathe deeply and repeatedly before she was able to regain control of her emotional state. She had gone through trauma. And while our 16-year-old had gone through the same trauma, he was acting like this was to be expected. “He’s been through this before,” she said to me. And it settled on me that this level of insanity was something that both the boys deal with on a far-too-regular basis.

And, legally, we can’t do anything to keep our children safe. The only legal action we might have is after their father has physically hurt them or killed them. Emotional abuse means nothing. Even physical abuse means nothing if it can’t be seen by others, like being pushed and grabbed.

Why have we created a system where we cannot protect our children? Why haven’t we done something about it? Why are we not changing that right now?