How Do You Co-Parent Alone? | Co-Parenting Unlocked: Ep 8 | KARAMO

How about this? It's time to clean up what you messed up. And that means to put the time—

period. All right, everyone. Welcome back to another episode of Co-Parenting Unlocked with my son's mother, Stephanie Brooks. Hi, love. Hello. You look beautiful, by the way.

Thank you. Same to you, gorgeous.

So today we're going to be talking about abandonment, an issue that we know a lot—

Real.

Yeah.

A lot about.

Too well. Yeah.

Too well. Too much.

For real.

Right?

Way too much.

There's actually a clip between a mother and daughter that I want to take a look at that deals with abandonment.

Oh, gosh. Let's see.

You don't know how to take accountability for your actions. She wants to say I sit up here and didn't want to fight for her. Her daddy, after he kidnapped her, he gave me an ultimatum.

It's not kidnapped.

Either sleep with him— It's called being responsible for your child. You see what I'm saying? By the way, her dad was on drugs, too. Either sleep with him or see my daughter. But see, you want to talk about everybody else, but yourself. He would beat me up every time I went to go see Diamond. So my fight was not longer in me. I love my daughter with every being inside of me. Then why you wasn't around, Mama? I don't jump in front of a truck. Then why you wasn't there? Because, Diamond, I was already going through things about me. You still not there. Because, Diamond, first of all, I got 4 kids. If you don't develop a bond with your child, tell me how this works. How is it that there's communication between she and I?

What's the question?

Can she name any one of my children? I got 4 kids. Can you name any one of them? You never let me see them. Can you name any one of my children? I don't care to see them.

Oh, wow. You don't care to see them? Wow.

You don't care, period. You don't care about yourself. I know I'm such a psychopath. You don't care to care about none of my kids or none of my grandchildren? Why would I wanna be around my grandchildren? Exactly, because you wasn't a mother. Why would I wanna be around my kids? And my grandkids, you see what I'm saying? If I know I'm psychologically messed up. But you chose to have kids knowing that you were incapable to—

uncapable.

Listen, darling. That doesn't even make it excuse you got 2 as a kid. People make mistakes every time.

That's deep. Wow.

Very deep.

Wow.

Wow. 2 beautiful women hurting at different levels. I feel for both of them, to be honest with you. I can understand where the daughter is coming from and how she is asking her mom to be accountable for her actions or her inaction when she was younger. But I also hear the mother saying that she was not in a mental space, did not have the capacity to be there, and showing up was, you know, something that she wasn't able to do. Navigating through mental health and a drug problem on top of that.

Ouch.

Ouch.

Ouch. I mean—

Because once she chose the drugs, she already abandoned her child. And then also with the mental health issue, without getting support, your child's always going to feel abandoned because you're in your head. And so it's a difficult situation, like you said, for both of them because the mother was young and probably had no understanding of how to do it. And so one of the things about my show is that I always see both sides, similar to what you just said, because I'm like, I can see this woman at, you know, 22.

Yeah.

And talking about, I'm on drugs and now my mind is messed up. I don't know what to do. No. And then she just becomes into a pattern of these things. Yeah. And not knowing how to get out of that pattern. But at the same right, the child's like, but you chose for me to be here.

You chose for me to come here.

Right. So if you didn't want me here, And you didn't know how to handle this, then you should have made a different choice.

Yeah.

Sometimes I wish that parents could just hear that when it comes to abandonment. If you could just realize that your child is just saying, you made the choice. I know you had your own things, but you made the choice. We didn't make the choice to be here. None of us as human beings made the choice to be here. Somebody else made that choice. And so once you made that choice, you now have to acknowledge that you didn't do right by that source. And that's just the end of it. Point blank, period. All right, so we have actually a fan question. We've been asking y'all to hit us up. And Christina from New York says, "Hi Karamo, hi Stephanie. My daughter is 18 and a freshman in college and now has an interest in connecting with her father who left us when she was still an infant. My ex and I were together for a bit, but my pregnancy was a surprise. I decided to keep my baby and he left me, but we reunited after I gave birth to my baby. Soon again, He left and never looked back. I didn't want to bring him to court for child support because I didn't want to leave my newborn with him or his family. But now, 18 years later, my daughter is curious about this man, and because he is Black and I am Filipina, she's interested in knowing him as she embraces her Black identity more and more. She looks Black, by the way. I want to support this decision, but I am terrified she will just be rejected by him again. What should I do? Ooh, girl, that was a lot there.

Girl, that is a lot. I would say this. You already gave him 2 turns to hurt you and your baby. Don't give him a third. In my opinion, his decision was made. And let him rock with that. He want to be over there, let him be over there. You be fully present. About your daughter learning her Blackness, that is not an issue. It's never going to be an issue unless you guys make it one. If she have other relatives that are present, if they represent his side of the family, OK, great. I would be all for setting that up. But as far as him, I would not encourage that.

I mean, he did it twice. So this is the funny thing. I agree with you to some piece. So like the part you said about the relative, I agree with the relative being involved. But I also do believe that she as a daughter does need her opportunity to see if this man is going to show up. Because most of the decisions were made— I think about our situation. Jason could definitely feel like I abandoned him. How?

No, how?

Because I wasn't there. It doesn't matter what our situation was. As a child, all he knows is my dad wasn't there. And so when I came back in his life, the opportunity was given to me to show up for him. Now, I could have did the exact opposite. I could have been like, dude, I'm gone. I'm out of here. You know what I mean? But the opportunity was given for me to build a relationship. Now, what I do believe you said that I agree with as well is bringing in a relative. Who then maybe might be able to say, just in case this person—

Right.

You know, that person— I almost said son. Yeah, OK. Doesn't do what he needs to do, I want you to know that we're not rejecting you.

Right.

We're here for you, yeah.

And that will allow her to both feel like a connection, but also to learn about that Black identity. And I think for you, mom, I think this is an opportunity for you to understand that you're going to have to show her and tell her and explain to her that there are individuals in your life that are not going to always show up.

Oh, yeah.

And that this is the point where you is going to have to help her to grieve that relationship. But I understand your point of view. You like, don't give that shit another chance. I get it.

I mean, I would tread lightly for sure.

Yeah, you got to tread lightly.

Give him a little grace, but I watch his ass. I wouldn't give him too much.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But I think she deserves it. Deserves a chance. Good question. All right, so there's a lot more on our show of abandonment. We got a lot of that, OK? Yeah. It's deep over here. We get deep over here on the Karamo Show. So I have another clip that I want you to check out.

All right.

You told your son that we just heard on that tape that you said you wish he was never born.

I don't mean that I wish he was never born, but when we going through something and he calling me bitches and hoes and stuff like that, that's when I say stuff like that. And he don't get when he say stuff to me, it hurts me and I just retaliate and say stuff back.

So why do you say hurtful things to your children?

I don't mean to say hurtful things to my children, but I've been through a lot and they just like sometimes don't give me a chance. And especially Kenneth, he don't give me a chance. He just all the time try to scream at me or tell me I'm doing it wrong and never give me a chance to be a mother.

So why is he still in foster care then? Especially when you have the other 4 kids?

Well, when he first came home, he would start trying to break up my things, cursing me out. And it was like being an ongoing situation. So it was like, okay, you cannot stay in here with me because we not getting along. I don't want you to hurt me and I didn't wanna hurt him.

Kenny, what was going on there? Why were you in that space where you felt like you had to break stuff?

Because I felt like, you know, I'm the child, you're my mother. You should at least take the time out to hear me with my traumas, what I went through. Like, you know, I love my mom, but I'm your child.

So because she didn't feel like she heard you, to get her attention, you started breaking things?

Yes, 'cause that's what got her attention. But it been plenty of times you went on trips without me, without me even knowing. I call you, you already there.

And the reason why is that because no matter, like I said, he don't never, nothing enough for him. I could take him on a trip and he would spoil a trip for everybody because something didn't go his way. Is like, oh, I'm gonna mess everybody up. And that's not right to do. So sometimes I had to leave him home.

Yeah. Well, you didn't have to.

In order to have—

Well, hold on, I gotta tell you this. You didn't have to. You made a choice to. Okay, there goes that word choice. I didn't know what the clip was gonna say.

Right. That was a choice.

It's a choice. It's always a choice of parents to— It's always a choice of the parent. And this is the thing they realize. It's always a choice of what are you gonna do? And you have to realize that children are hurt by those choices. 15, 12, 18. And children don't know how to manage their emotions, especially if they had a parent that abandoned them. And in this case, over and over again.

Right.

You took in the other kids, but you said, I don't want you, Steve.

Right. Because he was difficult. See, that's the thing. You don't get to choose the reaction, the response, and the pain, the level of pain.

You better preach!

What?

You don't get to choose. You don't get to choose. So because you can't choose the reaction of your child, you choose to do other things that will make them feel abandoned.

And that's making it work. How about this? It's time to clean up what you messed up. And that means to put the time—

I'm sorry.

Period.

Do what?

Keep going. Keep going, girl.

That means to put the time, the effort, and no matter how long it takes, you don't get to decide that he should be OK because everybody else was OK. Period. That's not it. Yeah. No.

No wonder why she my baby mama. Period.

It's so true.

Yeah. Listen, abandonment can be healed, but it starts with the parent deciding that they are going to acknowledge their choices.

That's right.

And your children have the right to be angry. They do. One of the things that, you know, like, this is a different situation, but our child recently acted a fool and was angry. And my response to him was not to match his anger. I listened to him.

Yeah, you did.

I said, I'm sorry you felt that way.

Yep, acknowledged it.

I acknowledged it, and I said, now we will change courses.

Yep, that's it. Yeah, that's what you do.

It shifts a little bit. You don't start matching energy. You don't start saying, I'm going to do this and make another choice to make them feel bad.

That's right. Because all you're doing then is putting nails in coffin, just sealing the deal.

Sealing the deal.

We need to always remember this too. These children are going to be adults, and you are going to want your adult— it is a joy of a parent to have an adult child who is actively just as much in your life involved as you are in theirs.

Yep, it is.

And so, you know, these decisions that you make, and like, you have to literally show them, I'm here to nurture you through the hurt that I caused.

That I caused.

I'm willing to put in the work because I am invested in you. I love you. I want your future to be our future.

We were 15-year-olds at one time.

Yes, we were. A long time ago.

OK, a long time ago. And during that time, I would say that I felt completely abandoned when we were 15. I can speak for you and say you probably felt abandoned.

Yeah, most definitely I did. I felt abandoned then, Karamo. If I can even flash forward a little bit, I feel abandoned today, if that makes sense.

Yes.

I mean, like, really for real, just being transparent about it all, with my good grown 44-year-old self, there are times when I very much feel that the love of my parents or like the attention from them would make me whole in some ways. So yeah, even at this age, I can say I can relate to that.

No, see, this is one of the things you— what you've done is you've just so clearly articulated what happens when a child who's never had an opportunity to deal with their abandonment issues— That's right. —and they grow with a parent who's not willing to acknowledge that they abandoned their child. That's right. Right. We still grow up, and we still feel that abandonment. We still feel that loneliness. We still feel like, why are you still not here for me? Why can't you show up for me? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I was at my mother— you know, my mother turned 70 the other day, and we had that big birthday party. Yes. Yes. And I felt very abandoned by my father growing up. Like, the minute that I told him that I was gay, it was done. Even before then, he was already checked out. Quiet as kept. That's why me and you was running the streets. Doing what we wanted to do. Because ain't nobody was around, you know what I mean? Wasn't nobody around. We was just running the streets, you know what I mean? When he was around during the party, I was like, there's still no connection here. And you're telling me that everything is OK. Everything is fine. We're good. I should forgive you. The past is the past. But the acknowledgment and the healing the healing that is needed, the conversations have not been had. And so thus, we are sitting in this circle where I still feel the same way I felt. And I don't think that parents understand that, or those who don't want to understand that, we end up still feeling this way.

Oh, yeah. The impact of that is lifelong, I believe. Like, I don't think there's a time in your life that you cannot use, benefit, or get by, if you will, from having the love of your parents. Actively involved in your life. Yeah. Like, you know, different stages and different phases that we're going to be addressing. Mm-hmm. But we need them.

Like, what? Amen. Listen, anybody, if you have issues with abandonment, we want to know how you dealt with it. We want to know how you support each other, how you talk to your friends and families. Hit us up in the comments. Yes. We read them. We want to know. We do. And thank you for watching another episode of Co-Parenting Unlocked with me and my baby mama, Stephanie. Hey.

Next time on Co-Parenting Unlocked, I was like, move. Move. Watch your feet. Move. He didn't do it. The next thing, he jumped on that hood, and I hit the gas.