I have seen people bash deadbeat parents. I will not say what these parents do is good or bad because only they know where the shoe pinches. But to me, deadbeat parents are the funniest lot I have ever come across -- funny in an annoying way.

For deadbeats who totally keep off, maybe, just maybe it is better that way. There are deadbeat parents who hover over their children’s lives like desperate hawks eying pieces of chicken during an outdoor gathering. I am always tempted to laugh at their actions but I know my laughter will come out wicked like that of Cinderella’s step mother. So I always cover my mouth with both hands and laugh using my internal organs.

Dear parents, the moment you willingly decide to become deadbeats, just keep the farthest distance from those you are willfully hurting. There’s really no point in watching from a distance. I am addressing you who thumps your chest before your friends calling yourself a parent to a child you know nothing about and then bravely talking before other parents about parenting. There is no parenting in visiting your baby mama/daddy’s social media wall, downloading photos of the child you neglected and walking around with them, calling yourself a father. Whose father are you? Father Abraham?

I once saw a deadbeat dad comment on his daughter’s photo, posted on his baby mama’s Facebook page. “Happy second birthday my queen!” There’s nothing wrong with that statement until you read it with the baby mama’s mind. First of all, the child wasn’t turning two, she was turning four. Secondly, why was he abusing the powerful word ‘queen’? How is she your queen if you don’t even know how old she is, what she eats, how she lives and if she is comfortable? You have never even seen her in person yet you live in the same town.

Before you start ruthlessly poking my poor behind, I am talking about the deadbeat parents who willfully decide to be deadbeat. The keyword here being ‘willfully’. Not those who have been denied their children because of the negative energy shared between the parties involved. These deadbeat’s parents will never make the effort to trace their own flesh and blood as the other parent works day and night to make the world a better place for the children involved. Then later on, when things start running smoothly and the children start shining bright like diamonds, they will limp back into the lives of these children with this lame line, “I have never stopped loving you.” When the children have grown into successful adults, spewing success, they will insist on associating themselves with them and imagine that they are now ready to meet and mend the bridge that was willfully brought down. That’s when some of them will forcefully and shamelessly make their names the child’s surname.

For the deadbeat mothers, that’s the time they find right to come and throw us the sick line, “I carried her for nine months in my womb.” I ask today, before all the success came into your child’s life, did the number of months you carried her reduce to one and a half?

Then we have those children who will drag a loyal parent back into depression by agreeing to meet up with the deadbeats later in life. I don’t mean to say they shouldn’t meet. Actually, for closure, if a child wants to meet their deadbeat parent later in life, they should be allowed to do so while exercising caution.

Some deadbeats genuinely change for the better and honestly regret their past actions. Others, however, take the chance as an opportunity to show the other party that they too can be loved by the children. Such cases always end up with unnecessary heartbreaks to the children after they learn that they were only being used.

Dear children with deadbeat parents, if you would wish to meet them for closure, exercise caution. There is a reason they stayed away. To you deadbeat parents, the moment you hit the deadbeat highway, resist looking in the rear-view mirror unless you are planning to make peace with either your children, the other parent, or both.


Deadbeat Parents;Lady Speak;Spot On