the last time i seen my husband he was in a police car on his way to do a year volation...A YEAR..our daughter was 6 mon. old and he was 19 years old..a few months later a friend said he was in a murder trail that he killed a man in chino next...hes doing life without and in the shu at pelican bey..now our daughter is 13 and is wanting and asking about her dad...what do i do ...i love him still today as i did then but i have her to protect...we write but i have never asked him about it or anything not something you can tell in a letter...we write about my life i guesss HELP

I am so sorry to hear these thing I know it has caused you great pain and heartache. My son has a son and he did not see him from the time he was 8 until he was 17 and that is not a good thing. I didn't want to push him into visiting if he didn't want to but one day he just said he wanted to go. He is going with me again this year in July. Children need to know their father no matter who they are or where they are. Love Barbara

I believe very strongly that fathers who are in prison have a right to see their kids, but I don't believe that when that father is in prison for a crime of rape/child molestation or domestic violence/murder of a spouse that visiting is appropriate, at all!

Now I may get flack from that statment but I feel very strongly about that.

I have been on the outside, raising a child who has a father on the inside & when it comes down to it kids need both parents, but there has to be a line drawn, if the child is under age 16 the mother or a relative should make arrangments for the child to see her dad on fathers day & any others that you choose, after the age of 16 then depending on the state where he is, then a notarized visiting form allowing her to visit without a adult can be given, thereby taking you out of the picture & allowing the child to grow independant of your relationship with his/her father.

I do believe that if the visists are negative & not nuturing the growth of the relationship it needs to be stopped. So many times a bitter wife/girlfriend will stop the visitations all together & I don't agree with that.
In the case here, the 13 yr old girl should see her father, in prison he committed murder, his reasoning does matter, but not to her.
What does matter is that the mother needs to see him to reconcile her feelings & to see where he is at emotionally, in preparing him for a visit from his past, his child.
I say.. see him, lay your heart out there & get things out in the open, relieve yourself of the questions, then allow your daughter to experience what some may never...the love of a father!

Yes I agree with the above. Has your Daughter ever wrote to her Dad? I may start there. And let the Dad know that his Daughter does want to know him. By writing letters it may be easier for when the visit comes.
Just a suggestion.
My son was 7 when he started asking about Daddy. Hes not in for the same reasons as your daughters but still the same, I mentioned to his Dad to see if he wanted our son to see him in there. We left that up to our son and I did perpare him but it was also my first time seeing Dad in prison also. We had lived in different states. The visit turned out all real good, I think my son was just wondering about his "Daddy".

Whichru,

I am terribly sorry about your husband and the situation he got himself into as well as what you have been through because of his actions. I agree, that if your daughter is asking about her dad, I would be honest with her and tell her about her dad. She is old enough to understand and I can fully understand wanting to look out for her best interest, but she has a dad and she has the right to have a relationship with him.. I would write your husband and you both can discuss the best way to approach your daughter. Maybe him writing a letter to her personally letting her know why he's not been around all these years and when the letter comes, I would be there with her so that you can explains things and maybe answer any questions she might have..

I wish you all the best of luck and will put all of you in my thoughts and prayers. Let us know how it all turns out.

my daughter is 6 now, her father was sentenced for rape 2 days after I found out I was pregnant and she hasn't seen him since she was about a year old - but that was partly his choice as he choses to pretend she doesn't exist.

She too has reached the stage where she's asking. she wants a daddy in her life and it is so hard to explain to her where it all went wrong and still let her know, her daddy and i both wanted her very much.


Best wishes to you hun

I can't imagine how hard that is. I would take her to see her dad. Does the dad want to see her? That might help her a little, knowing her dad, and where he is. She has a right to know, since that is her dad. I would talk to her father and see what he thinks about it. It is hard when a little girl wants to know who, where, what, why and when. Trying to come up with all those answers, and making them the right answers is hard. Good Luck.

Considering I am a child of a man who is in prison for murder, I have a few things to say. I never got to meet my father. I may never since he is doing life in WV and I am in CA. He didn't want to play house with my mother- he wanted to party instead. I always new my father was not around. I have never layed eyes upon him. I do not even have a picture of him. All I had was a birthdate and a name. Unfortunatley, his absence has impacted me in numerous ways. I never knew where my dad was or what he was doing. My mom never gave me any information because she either didn't have any or was trying tp "protect" me. All she ever told me was that he was no good and I was better off without him and I should be thankful for what I do have in my life. I could never accept that. How can you be thankful that you don't know your dad or anything about him and he is a hushed hushed conversation. I needed to know him so I could make my own judgement. Half of me was missing and it hurt me every single day. There has not been a day I haven't wondered. Well, I located him last week. I am 26 years old now. I had all sorts of ideas of who he could be or what he could be. None of them prepared me for what I learned. I expected that maybe he would be in prison for drugs or something else... My dad is in prison because he brutally beat a 63 year old woman to death and robbed her and then proceeded to beat her 89 year old mother almost to death. I was by no means prepared for that. I never imagined..... I am shocked. I have all these feelings right now. I am angry, hurt, sad, upset, and most of all my heart is absolutely broken. No matter what- he is still my father and for some reason I have a lot of love for him even in light of his absence and what he did to those women. I feel like my mother lied to me to protect me. I can understand her side of it beings I am also a mother, however I wish I could have known all this before I started looking for him. Now I am confused and agry with her. I want to know him because bottom line- HE is my father and to me nobody else can fill that void. Its not like a person in prison can kill their child through a glass window and who is to say he would even want to. I don't know the situation he was in when this happened and plain and simple people are human and humans make mistakes. In my opinion you should let her know. Its very possible she might not even want a relationship with him-but its also just as possible that she might. I personally don't have a relationship with him- I am waiting for him to respond to the letter I wrote him. I feel like I deserve an explanation. I am unsure of if I even want to have a relationship with him at this time- but I do feel like my mom should have given me the chance to decide for myslef. My mother thinks she was protecting me from him but all she was protecting me from was the truth. Don't parents teach us that honesty is the best policy? I hope I have not offended you as I am only speaking from what I know now. I'm just giving it to you from a daughters prespective. Good luck to both of you. I hope for the best.