The mum says her son is nearly 10, but has the developmental age of a toddler.
The mum says her son is nearly 10, but has the developmental age of a toddler.
The mother of a brain-damaged boy is “disgusted” she must seek permission to change his surname from the man who inflicted his lifelong injuries.
The now-9-year-old has the mental age of a toddler, yet his abuser is allowed a say on whether the child keeps his surname.
The Tauranga mother, who cannot be named, said she was heartbroken recently to find out the boy’s father, who hasn’t seen him or asked about him for nearly a decade, must be given a chance to respond to her application to change the child’s last name.
On January 19, 2014, the woman’s newborn son woke in the night. She and her partner of 10 years had been alternating getting up to him for night wakes, and it was his turn.
The child was shaken when he was only 29 days old, causing permanent brain damage.
“I could hear him going ‘Shut the f*** up’,” she told the Herald. “I jumped out of bed and went and got the baby.”
But the woman did not know at that point that her partner had violently shaken their 29-day-old child. She only knew something was wrong the next day when the boy developed a foot twitch and became lethargic. She took him to hospital where he was placed on life support as he received treatment for brain bleeds and a traumatic brain injury.
“I remember the pediatrician coming in and saying ‘Who shook him?’ ”
Police charged the father over the injuries later that year, and he was eventually sentenced to four years in prison. Aside from supervised visits for a couple of months after the assault, the man has not seen or tried to contact his son since.
He is nearly 10 now, but his mum has been told her son is at a developmental age of about two years and six months. He still wears nappies, goes to a special school, and can’t read or write. He is essentially a “giant toddler”.
“He doesn’t even recognise his own name,” the mum said.
He also suffers from spastic cerebral palsy.
The woman has a 4-year-old son, and the pair watch Paw Patrol together, she said. She must supervise her 9-year-old carefully in case he accidentally injures her younger son in a tantrum or by playing too roughly.
The woman said she has had counselling in the past to try to deal with the pain of knowing her son will likely not develop much further than this.
“It’s like a grieving process. You grieve your living child. This isn’t the life that he should have been living.”
Recently, the mum decided to take steps to change her son’s surname, which is his father’s.
The boy cannot read or write, and has spastic cerebral palsy.
“I do wish I had done it earlier,” she said, adding her boy’s injury was becoming more “noticeable” as he got older, bringing the matter to the forefront of her mind.
Until now, she had done her best to “ignore the whole fact that that person exists”, but had been having to use a surname she “hates” when dealing with official matters for her child.
The mum engaged a lawyer to help her file a “without-notice” application to the court to have the boy’s name changed, but the court came back to her with an instruction she must serve her ex-partner and give him 28 days to respond to the application.
She had to have the man served in prison, where he is serving a sentence for stabbing someone.
The mum said it was “heartbreaking” that she had to ask for permission from “a dad that took my son’s right to a life”.
“It’s just disgusting that he would have any actual rights. I don’t understand why he doesn’t lose all his parental rights ... I think the whole process needs to change, especially for special circumstances.”
It has been 20 days so far and the father has not responded. If he does not respond within the deadline, the mum said, she would be able to change her son’s name, but she was still upset that he should have any input on the decision.
The Ministry of Justice declined to comment due to the ongoing court case.
A spokesperson for the Department of Internal Affairs said the law specified changing a child’s name required permission from all of the child’s legal guardians.
“This means that, if the father is a legal guardian of the child, his consent is needed for the name change,” they said.
“In terms of options to change the child’s name without requiring consent from the father, the mother could make an application to the Family Court to remove the father as the legal guardian of their child.
“The court will only remove a guardian if this is in the child’s best interests and supports their welfare. The guardian will also get the chance to respond to the application.
“Once the father is no longer a guardian of the child, only the mother’s consent would be required for the name change application.”
According to the Ministry of Justice website, a person can be removed as a guardian if they are “seriously unfit”, or unwilling to be a guardian. Serious unfitness includes abuse of the child and criminal convictions.
Melissa Nightingale is a Wellington-based reporter who covers crime, justice and news in the capital. She joined the Herald in 2016 and has worked as a journalist for 10 years.
