So I've been debating posting here for a while now but I had a huge breakthrough yesterday and figured now would be the time to post.

I'll apologize for the wall of text now, just incase it gets to that way. Anyway, backstory! I'm 24 years old, living in good ol' sunny England, I became a father in early October last year and I've been fighting for my son ever since.

I met the mother one uneventful night at the local pub, as all good stories start. We hit it off and met up a few times after, we engaged in sex quite a few times too, she had told me that she was on contraception so I thought nothing more of it, though I used protection whenever it was close by, that's mistake number one. After sleeping with her she admitted that she had been a drug user for many years previously, by drug user we're talking class A's here, Heroin, Crack, and pretty much anything else she could get her hands on. At that point I left her, not wanting anything to do with that sort of person.

Flash forwards a few months after our last encounter and I get a message from her, no text, just a picture of a positive pregnancy test. At this point a panicked and advised her to get an abortion, I damn right insisted on it, as far as I was concerned this woman was not going to be the mother of my child, that and she had been using drugs, there was no way that would be good for the child.

Mistake number two was hiding away, I pretended that nothing was going on, that no one would find out and that she would take the hint, she didn't. I keep getting messages from her asking to talk about this, there was no talking about it, she wouldn't listen to me, and I wouldn't listen to her.

I didn't hear anything from her for a good few months, until one day in october. I was sitting in a meeting at work being told that the company would no longer require my services (Working as a contractor they could do that apparently), I left that office feeling very down, only to get a text from her telling me to call her. It turned out that she had given birth the exact moment I was in that meeting. I later found out why I had not been invited to the birth.

I went to the hospital that evening and held my son for the first time, everything changed, how could I not care for this child, he was a part of me. The mother was sitting on the bed in a very bad way, she was sick, shaking, and next to unresponsive, I thought nothing about it, I assumed that the birth had just taken it out of her. Her mother was there too, she'd been there for the birth and as such was down as the official birthing partner, meaning I was only allowed to see my son for a few hours a day until he was discharged.

Four days passed and they still hadn't been discharged, people kept checking on my son but no one told me why, until the social worker came to see me. My son's mother had been using Heroin throughout the pregnancy, her last fix had been only a few hours or so before giving birth, my son was withdrawing from the drug.

I fought continuously that day for my son to come under my care, however because the mother had mentioned that I could possibly not be the father they were not allowed to release him to me, instead he was taken home by his maternal grandmother, a woman whom I had only met once at this point, and I was left with an uphill struggle on my hands.

My third mistake, I moved in with her, my son's mother, in the hope that I could keep her off of drugs, seeing as I had a clean background and experience of dealing with people with lower drug dependencies I figured I could help, I could not of been any further from right. She lied, cheated, stole, and manipulated me to get her fixes, the woman left me with nothing other than the clothes on my back and my car.

The court case started sometime between me moving out of hers and the begining of the year, so around 7 months now, I've had DNA tests, observations of how I act with my son, drugs tests, I've had my name dragged through the dirt by both my sons mother and her mother, saying that I'm abusive, quick to temper, a drug addict myself, and that I had raped her, all of which I've managed to disprove through one mean or another.

As I say, 7 months down the line, I'll bring you straight to the court case yesterday. After reading through all the evidence the judge, a woman nonetheless, ruled in favour of me having a residency order for my son. The room fell silent, the grandmother cried, the mother had already left the room.

My case is a very strange one apparently, according to my solicitor the chances of me coming out on top of this all with my son at the begining were slim to none, but I'd proved myself throughout and managed to gain a rapport with nearly everyone involved in the case which had helped no end.

So, as of Monday I am a full time single father, and my advice to everyone here that is going through something similar, don't give up! No matter what happens or what is said don't give up, you are far better than them.

Tl;Dr I became a full time single father yesterday.