Small Miracles

 M has been seeing a girl he met online. He really likes her. Told us she is the coolest person he has ever met! His biggest worry (And ours) was what would happen when he tells her. He had thought he might wait because she is only in the area until Thanksgiving before heading home 4 states away and going back to college in another state. J suggested though that if M was going to have a long distance relationship it would be better that he told her now instead of waiting until they were too far away to talk in person. 

Smart boy that J. 

He was right of course. Thinking about it, it made sense. M really likes her and would like to continue to talk to her and potentially date. 

They spent the day together yesterday and when they came back to her car, he told her. Telling her that he would totally understand if she wanted him to leave and never see him again and offering to answer any questions she had. Surprisingly she told him she did not want him to leave and that she wanted to keep dating! 

M was terrified to tell her. This was the best possible outcome! 

He made sure he told her in a public place where she could leave if she wanted to and she decided to stay. she really is a cool girl. I look forward to meeting her! 

Friendships

 I had an interesting conversation with M last night. (He calls every couple of weeks now) We were talking about his parole hearing in October when we were interrupted by someone talking to him and him laughing and telling them he was talking to his mom, with the next comment being "You are loved here".

What an odd thing to hear about other inmates and also just to hear him laugh. He told me there is more camaraderie in prison then being in the actual military. He said "Believe it or not I have made friends here." 

The combination of him telling me I am loved by other inmates and that he has friends there is a bit sad. I think. I am really not sure how I feel about it. He obviously feels close enough to these other men to tell them of his home life and to create bonds with them. Granted these bonds are created because of close quarters and a commonality of being in prison for similar actions. 

I am grateful that he does not seem to have changed as far as him being always upbeat. He has always been the one child who never had any problem making friends. However while he was in the military he did seem to have a hard time. He had a few close friends that he made after he was under investigation but he never mentioned being close to anyone else. I am not sure why that was. I always hear of the military being a brotherhood but somehow my son who never had any problem at all making friends out of the military had a difficult time with it while in. 

Knowing how my son is such a social creature it somehow makes me wonder if that is why he looked at what he did. (I know I can make all kinds of excuses for him and there really is no excuse. But I have always been the type of person to try to figure out what makes people do what they do and why they are the way they are. ) I know that when I get bored I tend to get curious about random things. M has always been closest like me. Knowing him the way I do I has been trying to figure out why. Maybe I will never know. I honestly don't think he even knows why he did it. 

Boredom will drive us to do things and try things we would not have normally. 

Knowledge

Helps a little bit.
We have access to M's emails and accounts so that we can try to cover his bills etc. His emails have all of his correspondence with the lawyers, which he had more of then we knew. He is such a well read person!
When he was little we had him and his older brother in private Christian school. We thought we were doing the right thing. But then we found out that the teachers could not handle M. He was a social kid. He would walk into his 1st grade classroom and all the kids would yell his name, kinda like Cheers. But because he was so social he was a talker, so she put his desk in the corner and faced him to the wall. When we found out we pulled the boys from the school and put them in public school. He entered 2nd grade and did not know how to read and was pretty uncontrollable because he was used to running the classroom. His 2nd grade teacher was a saint! By the time he left 2nd grade he was reading well and was a great kid in the classroom. By the time he was in 6th grade he was reading at college grade level, as was his older brother.
His emails are well written and thought out. We found the one with his confession and initial letter to the lawyer. He had NOT gone looking for CP. He had been surfing Tumbler looking for legal porn (He was a single 22 year old man!) when he started receiving messages offering him pictures of younger girls. He ignored the messages for awhile until he became curious. Being much like his mother he is very trusting and naïve.
His trusting nature and curiosity is what got him in trouble.
Yes, he should have known better. But it helps in my heart to know that he was not searching it out.

I am NOT ok

Everyone keeps asking that. At least the very few people who know.
Nope, not even close to OK.
The hearing for our Airman son was Tuesday. The lawyers actually tried to keep us out of the courtroom. To shelter us from hearing the truth. We would not hear of it, because we were there to support him no matter what he did. And it was bad. We will never be the same. 
But we had to be in there. We had to have the truth. 
How could we not.
The prosecutor did her job and I hate her for it. 
Our well paid lawyer did ok, if I had it to do over with we would have saved our money. But then if we had not paid for the lawyer I would be blaming that. "If we had only paid that lawyer"
If he had not had a plea deal he would be serving 4 years instead of 3. 
3 years, dishonorable discharge and of course, the registry. 
How do you get through this?
How do you survive knowing your child did this?
I won't/can't stop loving him but I can't possibly think of him in the same way. I am distraught and crying constantly. 

The Beginning of Hell

The story has changed. Stress and worry is life now.
Our Airman has screwed up. Not just a little mess up easy to fix, but big. Something that will change his and our lives forever. Something that shows you who your real friends are.
What happened?
Last summer he messaged us on Facebook.
"I am going through something and I need you guys to pray for me."
Nothing else. No amount of prying can get it out of him. Time passes and we get a call from Air force investigators. WHAT?
Finally we get it out of him that he is under investigation.
Did you do something? "Yes"
Did you hurt someone? "No"
Are you hurt? "No"
Do you need a lawyer? "The Air Force has given me one"
That's it.
More calls from investigators. We get nervous and ask if we should talk to them. There is no answer because his given lawyer is unresponsive. So we start calling around. We find a lawyer who will call our son and talk to him before we pay him $7000.
Our son finally calls us and talks to his dad per the lawyers recommendation. He does not want us to know. He is afraid we will forever look at him differently. That we will stop loving him and never forgive him.
How can our child ever think that!? How can any child think that his parents will stop loving him?
It's bad.
It's something we never would have suspected. How could you?
That Spring, shortly after returning from deployment, he was on a chat app and started to get messages sending him links. He clicked on the links that led him to Dropbox and to images no one should ever have access to. Child Porn. He was curious and he looked at them. Then he realized what he had done and deleted Dropbox and any images that had been downloaded. All of this happened over two weeks.
Two weeks. 
Most of the time it takes longer to ruin someone's life. Not in this case. Just the mention of it makes people turn away. It is a horrible thing.
The lawyer called us back. MJ had felt so guilty that when they called him in he immediately gave them a written confession, his cell phone and all passwords plus gave them permission to search his apartment. This is the kind of Man our son is. He knows when he does wrong and accepts the punishment.
Little did we know what was in store for us.
The lawyer reassured us and gave us hope that there was a chance he could get it dismissed etc etc. He had not been charged yet so there was still a chance. All of the promises lawyers give so they can get your money. Another $7000 requested.
We decide to cancel our planned vacation and decide instead to drive 10 hours to visit our son. He tearfully reassured us that it was a mistake. He was so sorry. He was not interested in CP but had gotten curious. This would never ever happen again.
I believe him. We believe him. This boy does not and has never lied to us. He was the "good one" He wanted to be a hero from the time he was little. He believed in right or wrong. It's either black or white, there is no grey. The Eagle Scout. The son who is most like me. Sweet and emotional, always ready to give a hug, honest to a fault. This one one is the one under investigation.
We drive back home stunned but hopeful because we decide to hire the lawyer and he has given us hope.
Months pass. Our son is able to take leave and come home and visit the family. 90% of whom have no clue of our silent hell. We have determined to not tell anyone we do not have to in the hopes this will all pass.
Finally charges are filed. He is being court martialed. Our hearts are broken.
The lawyer tells us that now the real work can begin and he needs another $14,000 to fight for our son. Our son tells us his Air Force lawyers are changing so he really wants the paid lawyer. Of course we agree and put it on credit cards.
More time passes with little word from the lawyer until our son send us a plea deal he has been asked to sign. The plea deal is admitting guilt and no more than 18 months in jail. We hit panic mode and call the lawyer while I start researching possible defenses online. Our son calls us back, crying, "I did this. I am sorry. I screwed up" I send a message to the lawyer who tells us there is no hope.
Our son signs the plea.
To him it is black or white.
To us it is the nail in the coffin.
The only hope now is that the judge will take mercy and give him a short sentence.
The plea deal is denied. They want 3 years. He signs it. He is resigned to his fate.
Now we have to give the lawyers names of people who are close to us so they can ask for character witness letters and possible testimony. Names of people who do not know what he has done. Names of people who will now know what he has done.
Who will potentially judge us for what he has done. Judge us as being terrible parents, who did not teach our sons better. How could we let our son think that this was ok? Of course we have already judged ourselves and tried to figure out what we did wrong. What parent wouldn't?
The calls from the lawyer go out and the calls to us come in. "What did he do?"
We are surprised at the number of people who we thought would judge us the harshest instead tell us they will pray for us. And of course they would write letters. He is such a good person. We are dismayed to find that those who we thought we were closest to will not even call us back. The ones we vacation with, who we have known for over 15 years. Those are the ones who do not respond.
You find out who your true friends are when you go through something like this.
Now we wait.
The letters have been sent.
The hearing is in a week.
It is in the hands of the lawyer who has not proven himself to us and to a judge who does not know our son.
We wait and we pray.