I’m going to tell you a story about a father, or at least a guy that thinks he is a father. From what I hear, he is pretty excited about the prospect of fatherhood, and considers it an awesome responsibility. How he came to be a father is far from conventional, but that didn’t paralyze him, and he was looking forward to everything he could comprehend about how his life would change from the moment he looked into the eyes of his own son. For him it was a dream, and his dream turned into a nightmare when his son went missing before he could ever lay eyes on him.

To tell this father’s story, there is only one name he would want you to know, and that’s the name of his boy, Enzo. For over 8 months he prepared with the child’s mother, though there was no romantic relationship between them. On nearly a weekly basis during the prenatal months, the expecting parents spent hours planning how the child would be taken care of. When angered, the mother threatened to run away with the child. Sometimes she humored the idea of co-parenting, but was strongly against broken homes. Because the father refused romantic relationship with the mother, the mother often wanted to abort the child or give the child up for adoption, and favored those options above allowing the father to raise the child absent of her involvement, even when assured no child support would be requested. You see, the mother had a bad experience growing up in a broken home and wanted no such life for her unborn child. At the same time, she wrestled with the thought of abortion. She knew the father wanted Enzo, even if it meant raising him alone. The mother knew how the father was preparing for the child, but was very upset when the father was out of town on the day she went into labor. She had not forgiven her own father for not being present for her mother when she was born. She decided to give the baby up for adoption, saying “He should have been there”. The father was denied access to any information about the child due to HIPPA though some US states have laws that allow anyone to inquire about the identity of a parent leaving an infant child at the hospital, emergency medical services station, or fire station. This situation would have to go to court, and that’s when things really take a turn for the worse.

The effect of COVID 19 caused delays in securing a court date. When a court date was finally set, Enzo would have been 5 months old. The first day in court, the mother’s lawyer submitted a motion to dismiss the case, stating that the child was left at the hospital, so the father should be required to gather any information from the hospital directly, as the mother’s parental rights had been forfeited. The judge denied this motion and ordered the parents to sort out their grievances in mediation. When the mediation date arrived, the mother was uncooperative, exercising her right to remain silent. When Enzo would have been about 6 months old the parents met in court again, and the judge thought it was reasonable to require the mother to disclose the hospital of which she gave birth. The mother gave this information begrudgingly. The father and his lawyer, spent the next few weeks contacting the hospital and worked their way up the chain of command until they got someone to acknowledge and obey the court order over HIPPA and disclose data they had in their system regarding mothers who left their infant at any of the hospital’s locations. There was no match on the mother’s name or child’s name at the hospital that was given in court, for all the reported hospital’s locations in the tri-county area. By the next time, the parents would appear in court, Enzo would have been just about 8 months old, and the father would have to begin apologizing to friends who gifted clothing for the baby’s first few months of life at the intimate baby shower he organized for Enzo weeks before birth. When the inconclusive report from the hospital record search was given to the judge, the mother would be sworn under oath for the first time, and asked to provide sworn testimony under penalties of perjury regarding where she gave birth. The mother, representing herself, stated under oath, that she did not know where she gave birth, and after 8 months, had forgotten. The judge then gave the father and his legal team the ability to search the mother’s phone because the mother reported to be in possession of a photograph of baby Enzo at the hospital, on the day the child was born, which could have been used for geolocation purposes. A private investigator and the father’s lawyer examined the mother’s phone and photo files of the child to no avail. The mother appeared in court with new representation 2 months later, and under oath stated she was never pregnant and the whole thing was made up. The father contests this, but his legal team has lost interest in his case, as it has taken longer than expected and has yielded little money for them. With proper, diligent representation, the father could get the information he needs to find if the baby was adopted, or if something more sinister has taken place of which the mother is trying to cover up. He maintains that he was in the presence of the mother the entire duration of her pregnancy, and even helped her to make a “paper mache” mold of her stomach at 7 months. He has several ultrasounds the mother gave him during the prenatal months that he is forced to cross-reference with local hospitals and clinics, when he gets off from work, due to stagnating support from his legal team.

Men like Enzo’s father, are in need of reform in the area of father’s rights, as well as financial assistance while awaiting on the law to mature around the issues of father’s rights. As Florida Governor DeSantis approves millions towards Father’s rights, there are fathers in desperate need of competent legal assistance. Not only should more Governors initiate similar initiatives in their states, but providing grants to help fathers secure better legal assistance would help since so few laws give the father any inherent rights to a child without DNA testing. When a father has been proven to have done due diligence with respect to establishing paternity, such a grant would allow swift legal paternity actions to be filed to overturn unjust adoptions, and also provide justice in cases when the mother may have acted criminally against her unborn child. Florida happens to be a state that has such laws that allow fathers to inquire about the identity of a parent leaving a child at a hospital, however no hospital would place this state law above HIPPA, even when pressured by a lawyer. The legal teams of hospitals have to be involved which wastes more precious time as the trail for children like Enzo grows colder by the day.