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Sadly, I’ve been watching the ratchedness that is Love & Hip Hop: Atlanta and aside from the vagina-bearing fights, petty hair-pulling and “I-slept-with-yo-man” drama, I noticed a continuing theme that seems all-too common with Black women in both the reality and real worlds: keeping your child away from its daddy out of spite.
Hold up, wayaminute!
You have an active father who wants to be involved in your child’s life, but refuse to let him because you’re bitter that he pulled a fast one on your heart? For those of you who still watch this mess of a show, you know I’m talking about castmate Tiarra and her situationship with the now-incarcerated Scrapp DeLeon. For those of you who don’t (God bless you), I’m pretty sure you’ve seen this scene play out elsewhere; whether on another reality series, with a friend or relative, or your own personal experiences. (I just hope none of you reading this are the petty little broken-hearted exes that carryout such foolishness. Rolls eyes.)
Don’t get me wrong, there are valid reasons why one would and should keep their child away from his or her father; like he’s a deranged abuser, a druggie, or capable of putting your child in some sort of danger. But to withhold your baby and deny his/her father of his natural RIGHT to bond with his seed simply because you’re in your feelings? Girl, get it together!
No doubt, getting your heart broken sucks. Badly. You don’t want to see that a$$hole, you don’t want to hear from that piece of sh*t, you don’t even want to think about that nefarious, evil, wicked, sorry mothaf$!#a! (Yeah, when you’re hurt, he’s every terrible epithet, cuss word and profane name in the book). So naturally, when you birth a child that belongs to YOU, as the overly-complicated emotional being that you as a woman are, you feel like you have the right to also distance your child, that came from your body, from it’s father out of pain and spite. I get it.
But isn’t it bad enough that a large sum of our children already suffer from lack of paternal involvement? Isn’t it bad enough that our Black men are being hauled off and locked away in hell cells, missing out on the growth of their children by force? Isn’t it bad enough that our young kings are being shot down in cold blood at the hands of racist cops, or as a result of some petty street beef?
We have enough darts being thrown at the integrity of the Black-father-Black-child bond by the outside world, don’t contribute to the reservoir of artillery. Don’t perpetuate the cycle of the fatherless Black child or contribute to the Black familiy’s plight. Because when you deny your child the right to formulate or sustain a relationship with his/her daddy for something as trivial as a heartbreak, then essentially, that’s what you’re doing.
Please, don’t be that woman.
Put your personal feelings to the side and think about what’s best for your child. After all, when you’re keeping a kid away from daddy, they’re the one you’re really hurting. Rest on that.
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