It all started on a normal day in March 2021. I was a sophomore in high school at that time. I was in study hall class with my friend and suddenly, I got this Instagram dm from someone I did not know. I opened it, and it is just a bunch of screenshots. I read the screenshots and figured out a woman was convincing my brother he was the father of her two-year-old boy.
I did not believe it at first, so I read it repeatedly. It seemed to me the woman got a paternity test to see who the father was cause the baby didn’t look like her boyfriend. Instead, it was my brother’s kid. Now just imagine how that boyfriend of hers felt knowing the kid wasn’t his and he took care of it for two years…. yeah, he wasn’t too happy.
The mother of the kid forced my brother to take care of the kid since it’s his now, but he didn’t know what to do. He didn’t believe it was his kid. My brother himself was a sophomore in college and thought his whole life would be ruined. He didn’t know how to tell my parents from a foreign country who don’t necessarily know how to deal with a teen pregnancy. He didn’t want to tell my parents, but eventually the mother sent a text to my mom saying my brother has a child and he needs to step up as a father now.
The school day came to an end, so I waited in the pickup line for my mom to pick me up. When I got in the car, she just looked like a wreck. She seemed like she was bawled her eyes out.
It was a quiet car ride until she asked me if I knew what happened. I looked at her in the eyes and said, “Yes, I do mom.” She started to cry again and said she didn’t know what to do. I told her that God sends us challenges to test our strength. The rest of the car ride was silent.
Once we got home, I went straight to my room. The whole day all I heard was yelling from both my parents and my brother. My parents were ashamed of my brother.
Days go by and my brother tries ignoring the mother, but that’s just not the right thing to do. He knew it wasn’t right. He had to step up and be a father. He thought about how the child would not have a father figure in his life. A father figure is so important to a boy growing up. A father is there to set an example for how the son should grow up to be.
My brother had to drop out of college to focus more on the child. My parents absolutely hated that idea, but he needed to take responsibility. My brother didn’t know how to be a father. He had to grow a mature mind quickly. He was scared inside. He thought he wouldn’t be a good father. He wasn’t ready.
A couple months pass by and the mother wants my brother to meet his son. He is nervous that the little guy won’t like him, or he will be a bad father. But in my opinion, I think that’s a fear every father has.
A knock was heard at the door. It’s the mother and the child. My mom opened the door for her and greeted her. The kid ran inside the house like he already owns it! My brother saw his son for the first time. He saw himself in him. My brother saw a complete replica of himself in that kid. He fell in love immediately with him. His name is Sawyer. Sawyer is my first nephew.
My brother and Sawyer enjoying Easter together.
My first nephew at age 15. That means I am an aunt. It felt weird for the first couple months knowing I was an aunt and that my brother is a father. I honestly got made fun of a lot in high school for being an aunt. My brother got called multiple bad things that made me honestly sad. But I knew that he was doing the right thing for the kid. No one understood the position we were in.
Since my brother dropped out of college, he had to find a full-time job that could help benefit himself and his son. He found a really good job being an engineer fixing engines for bikes, four wheelers, side by side, anything you can think of that’s not a car.
Months go by and he makes great money. He filed for insurance for Sawyer immediately. He starts to spoil Sawyer with a bunch of toys and even a little four-wheeler he made himself from scratch!
A whole year goes by and my whole family loves Sawyer as their own child. We give him so much love and the education he needs.
Spa day with his cool aunt!
We take Sawyer back to his mom every Sunday since we only have weekends to see Sawyer and she gets weekdays to see him.
It’s been 2 years now and nothing has changed. She doesn’t seem to trust us. We only get him on weekends, and she gets him on weekdays. Why isn’t it 50/50? Didn’t she want my brother to step up and be a father? He can’t really be a great father if he only gets to see him on weekends, only if you’re feeling like giving Sawyer to us.
I don’t think it was fair to our family to not have Sawyer 50/50. It’s been years and Sawyer is 5 now. The woman takes advantage of the money my brother works hard for to take care of the child. She sees that she doesn’t have to supply money for the child as much now since my brother has better pay and a full-time job. The Mother of Sawyer had a habit of going out on weekends to bars while we took care of him. We don’t think that’s what a mother should do. She should have a full-time job to help my brother with Sawyer’s expenses. You need a job to take care of a child. You need insurance to cover the child’s medical injuries. Everything she doesn’t have but she takes it from us through the court systems.
In today’s world racism isn’t quite solved in our town. We live in an all-white town full of only conservatives. The court system loves to favor the white people over the foreign ones, but it should not be that way. She takes advantage of my brother because she knows that he will give all the money in the world to support his child.
But like I said in the beginning, God sends us challenges to see how strong we are. We don’t care that she’s taking money from us. We just want the child to be happy. That’s all that matters to us. We don’t want Sawyer to live the childhood life that my brother and I couldn’t experience as well. As an aunt I took him to every park there was in town and let him play for hours.
Sawyer having fun at the park.
Something I always wanted to do as a child, but my parents never had time. I always got him ice cream if he asked because as a child, my parents didn’t have enough spare money to just use. I felt like a mother to him. Sawyer is special to me. He shows me that there’s joy in everything around. You just got to make it joyful. It’s all about the vibes you bring out into the world that you will receive back.
My nephew enjoying a treat from our hometown ice cream shop.
Having Sawyer as my nephew made me mature very quickly and act like a mother myself. But I’m so grateful to be the aunt of this precious boy. He is a gift from God sent to our family. No matter what challenges God brings to us, we tough it out and make the best out of it. He doesn’t just send us challenges just cause, its to test our strength as a family.
Sawyer and I dressed up nicely for prom!
By: Evitt Nashed