For the love of Christopher

Intruduction

If you are looking for a true story that is written from the heart and pulls at your heart-strings, read on.
Whilst writing this book, I have made every effort to tell my side of the story honestly. It has been very difficult for me and very emotional. I want people to understand what I went through and that fathers can bleed and feel pain like any mother can. For the parents who are going through the same pain as I did, I would like them to know there is light at the end of the tunnel. One day your child will come home.
I was born in 1958 in an old mill town called Farnworth, near Bolton in Lancashire. I was one of seven children. I made my entrance into the world in a home that only knew poverty and violence. We children had no choice, but to wear clothes from jumble sales and accept help from the odd charity donation and from family and friends. We were so poor, my dad made me go on building sites and pinch wood because we couldn't afford to buy coal for the fire.
Every Friday night though, we had a treat. My mum used to send me to the fish and chip shop with a big bowl for chips and pea juice, hoping we would get bigger helpings. I felt like Oliver Twist - Please sir, can I have some more?
My brothers and I were a joke around school. Our classmates used to call us the Beatles, because we all had the same hair styles. Looking back, we had haircuts like the old basin cuts – you know, when your mum put a pudding basin on your head and cut around the rim. I used to get into trouble almost every day, but only because I was defending my family honour. If I didn't get a black eye at school, I would get one from my dad for not fighting hard enough.
My father was very strict and a bit of bully and I suffered by his hand on many occasions. I was often sent upstairs to my room as punishment for my bad behaviour, but I used to sneak out through my box-room window to meet up with my friends.
When I was fourteen, I ran away from home and went to Paris. I'd had enough of living in fear of my father every day. I stayed there for four days, sleeping in the back of wagons and stealing bread from the local boulangerie to survive. I was eventually picked up by the French police and taken to the British Embassy in Paris. I stayed there all night as a guest. The Embassy officials telephoned my mother and spoke to her. "We have your son," they informed her.
"Why? Where is he?" my bewildered mother asked.
"He's in Paris."
There was silence before I heard my mother exclaim,
"Paris? I'll bloody kill him when he gets home!"
Looking back, it seems I was never afraid of striking out on my own to find pastures new. I certainly used that trait in my character after I met the woman of my dreams, but all
that will be revealed later.
I left home at the age of sixteen because I'd had enough of
my dad's constant bullying. We, especially my mother, had suffered from his bullying actions on many occasions. I detested him for it and felt I needed to protect my mother from him. She was always there for me, my rock and a shoulder to cry on and she proved her love for me throughout my life. Her love and devotion were crucial to my surviving what happened to me and it is all related in these pages.
I drifted through life with several failed relationships. Drastic though it may seem to the average man in the street, I joined the French Foreign Legion to get away from all my troubles. It was a case of out of the frying pan into the fire for me as I received a beating almost every day for six weeks and it was a complete nightmare. This is where I learned the truth in the saying, necessity is the mother of invention and bending the truth was sometimes the only way to keep control of your own life. I pretended that I was going to self- harm and the only way I could get out was with a dishonourable discharge. I didn't care. I had regained my dignity away from a regime that was completely alien to me.
I tried to settle down with various women, but I couldn't live with them. They all wanted different things from me, but I was just looking to be loved. When I did fall in love ...well, that is really where my story begins.
Out of the blue, I received a call from my mother to tell me my father was seriously ill in hospital. "I don't care," I told her. "He doesn't deserve any affection from me after the way he treated me." It was callous, but nonetheless meant.
"Please, Ian," my mother pleaded. "Go to see him. If not for him, do it for me. Make peace with him before he dies."
When I arrived at the hospital my mother was already there. My father was in a side ward, wired up to all kinds of monitors. I sat next to him and actually felt sorry for him for the first time in years. He held out his hand and I held it. He looked at me and he was mumbling something I couldn't understand. Now, I hope he said sorry, but I'll never know. He held my hand so tightly and then peacefully slipped away. I suddenly felt the pain I thought I would never experience. I felt a sudden sense of loss and I was really glad that I had made my peace with him before he died. I felt so much remorse and grief, I was confused. Deep down, I must have loved him. I just wish he had told me he loved me. I said my final goodbyes to him, determined I would turn my life around, turn my back on my past troubles and start a new chapter in my life. I knew that if I ever had a son, I would love him with all my heart and soul and do everything in my power to show him that love.
I decided I needed a holiday and a change of scenery and so my story begins...