(Edited and expanded May 17, 2023)

I have often wished for a family history that would have delved into details of my mom and dad; in other words, what was the background of the life they both lived? What kind of home environment were they brought up in? What were their interests, hobbies, and goals for their lives? Beliefs on religion, philosophy, politics, world events, family, business, etc.? Hopes and aspirations? Disappointments and regrets? Favorite books to read?

Not only would this have been helpful for my understanding of why I am the way I am today, but it would have also been helpful if my mom and dad had kept their own personal diaries of their lives while growing up, and also while they were raising their children: my brothers, sisters and myself.

All those memories and factual events are, for the most part lost, along with all the threads of understanding that no doubt would have helped to piece together many of the mysteries and tragedies of the Spears’ clan.

My memory is poor and has been this way since I can remember. I can’t remember hardly any details of my childhood. This, of course, is due no doubt to the fact my childhood was horrific, filled with abuse at the hands of both my mom, dad, and stepdad. I suffered abuse even at the hands of my older brothers.

Childhood traumas have been proven to create PTSD in adults; one of the signs is poor memory. For the life of me, I cannot remember much of my childhood. No doubt this is due to the trauma I routinely suffered at the hands of pathologically disturbed parents and an equally pathologically disturbed and brutal step-father.

For my own children who have suffered a different kind of abuse, called “Parental Alienation (PA)” and “Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS),” having my memories of some of the crucial events in their own childhood will undoubtably help them in dealing with their own lifelong traumas.

Looking back, there is one memory I wish to recount because it has significant importance. This occurred when my ex-wife divorced me for the first time, around the year 1988-1989, when our daughter Angie (not her real name) was around two years old.

I dearly loved Angie and delighted in her. As my firstborn, she held a special significance and importance to me, a preciousness that continues even to this day, though I have not seen or spoken with her in many years.

My ex-wife felt the same; both of us excitedly anticipated and welcomed Angie into our newly formed family. And I will confess: I believe my ex-wife was an excellent mother to our firstborn daughter and, looking back on those early days, cannot find a single fault with the way in which she loved and cared for Angie during that first year or so.

But something happened when my ex divorced me early into our first marriage together (she divorced me twice and I remarried her twice). Looking back, well over thirty years later (today is March 23, 2023), as I have often thought prior, this was a turning point in my ex’s behavior that would prove to be a continuing pattern throughout the remainder of her life, a damaging pattern that continues to this day.

My ex kept Angie from me when she separated from me; I mean this literally: she refused to allow Angie and I to spend time together. If memory serves me correctly, when Angie turned two, I missed her birthday only because my ex-wife refused to allow Angie and I to spend time together on that special day.

In fact, I had to hire an attorney in order to force my ex-wife to allow me to see my own daughter. There was approximately a six-week stretch of time where I did not see Angie. Six weeks. It is still hard to believe, even now, 30 + years later.

And I remember the moment when I finally saw Angie after all that time of being separated from her. This reunion with my daughter, remember, was accomplished only because I had a court order that forced my ex to release custody of Angie to me.

We were living apart by then, my ex-wife (officially we may have still been married but were going through the divorce process) living in her own apartment or with her parents or friends, with Angie.

We agreed to meet in a public place, at an Eegee’s located then at Oracle and Roger Road. Incredibly, as of today’s date, this same Eegee’s is still there.

My ex was to bring Angie to the Eegee’s and I would pick her up there. Angie was in her stroller, pushed by my ex. And I remember that moment when Angie and I first saw each other after six weeks: she started thumping her little chubby legs up and down in excitement while sucking her thumb, a look of wonder and surprise at seeing her dad for the first time in such a long time.

I wept. Overcome by emotion, I simply could not control myself. Even now, that memory, burned into my subconscious, still brings tears to my eyes. The joy at that reunion with the daughter I cherished and loved beyond words is a moment I simply will never forget.

I took Angie home and rejoiced at our reunion. It was heavenly! She had grown so much in six weeks that it was hard to comprehend how she could change so much in that space of time.

Though I did not know it at the time, this was the first concrete sign there was something seriously wrong with my ex-wife. What kind of person, especially a mother, would keep their daughter from the father? Certainly if there was any kind of abuse I was guilty of, such a separation might be deemed understandable. But no such abuse existed. Something in the mind of my ex caused her to take such a horrifically damaging course of action which resulted in a father and daughter being separated for approximately six weeks when such a long separation was neither justified or warranted.

For my part, I would never have considered such a thing, knowing our daughter needed both parents in her life to grow up as healthy and well-adjusted as possible. I knew Angie needed both of us in her life, that she loved both of us, and never, of course, wanted her mother and father to split apart.

And this is the main reason I knew divorce was the worst possible event that could come into the home of a family: it would wreck havoc in the heart and mind of our daughter as divorce wrecked havoc in the heart and mind of myself. I knew the terrible power of the “divorce bomb” that blew up families and wished more than anything else in the world not to put Angie through something so terrible as I knew this would prove to be.

Without diving any more deeply into this particular story, my main point is this: my ex wife has proven that her modus operandi is one of separating myself and my children from each another. Tragically, decades later, she is still following and instigating the very same plan and methods to keep us apart as she did with Angie 35 years ago.