…?
I’ve had a very few people say that perhaps we aren’t being fair to Dave, or that he doesn’t deserve they way we’re treating him. As people say, there are always 2 sides to the story.
I am not sure how what any of us have done is not fair to Dave. So far, Alison has asked him to come home, to see his boys, and to tell her what she did that was so horrible that he can’t live with her or talk to his boys with her around.
Anthony’s website has been from the perspective that as a Christian Dave once felt that what he is doing right now is very wrong. Dave has stated many times through his life that he would never divorce and that his greatest fear was his family breaking up like his did as a child. If we feel that he is doing something that he will someday regret, and if he can’t explain to us why this makes sense, we just don’t want to have him ask us why we didn’t even try to stop him. If what we say shames or embarrasses him, then I guess that shows he does still understand at some level that it is wrong to just walk out of a marriage and stop all communication with family. If he truly doesn’t care, and if the people he does business with don’t think his personal life should interfere with his business life, then he shouldn’t be affected by any of what we are doing. We aren’t trying to just shame him, we want him to rethink and see the results of what he is doing.
My blog entries are more sharing what I’m thinking and feeling and what Alison is thinking and feeling, but I think all of them have shown that we just want to know why he is doing this and that it hurts. I don’t actually expect them to affect Dave, but I do hope maybe someone else reading them will realize that this is a very painful thing to do to someone.
As for there being another side to the story, we aren’t hearing it. He won’t talk to his family (remember, he’s threatened by Anthony), or old friends, or his former pastor. I assume he’s talking to his business associates, but that won’t help us since none of them are likely to call up and help explain it to us.
He’s stopped posting on his blog and made a comment to his lawyer that his business is being affected. I had to laugh at that. Anthony’s website has had a total of 241 visitors in the past 3 weeks. I suspect many of those are people who follow Anthony on Facebook or Twitter, so people who have never worked with or known Dave. Family are seeing it, but those lines were drawn years ago I think. My posts have actually had an average of 20 visits, which I admit is quite a few more than I thought. Either way, compared to the 7,871 Twitter followers and blog followers that Dave has, we aren’t even a drop in the bucket. Searching for Dave Navarro (and skipping all those about the rocker), Rock Your Day or Launch Coach all bring up his sites, but the first 4o or 5 pages of results at least don’t bring up Anthony’s website. And I’m just not convinced that the people who do business with or follow Dave care about what he’s done.
So, let’s review what we’ve done – we’ve played with his sons, comforted his wife (and took her to the hospital when she was dehydrated), helped get her van fixed, run kids to a few events when she had to be in a different direction, and sat with Alison while she cries. Anthony and I and the oldest son tried to talk to Dave one night, and Anthony made a number of phone calls one night while driving to Raleigh for another visit. (David didn’t answer.) And Anthony has put up a website that has been fruitless as far as we can see.
I guess we should have left Alison crying, called up Dave to congratulate him on such a stellar move, and gone about our lives.
This weekend at our house, I kept looking at the photos of my sister’s children. I never really understood why she walked out, or why she left her children behind when she did it. But we also jumped in to help that time. I helped take care of the boys, reminded Duncan (he was 1 year old the day after she left) that I was not Mommy, tried to coordinate visits and phone calls when she wasn’t nearby to visit. Again, I know there were two sides to that story, but I never really understood her side. I don’t know if she couldn’t express it in a way for me to understand or if I just haven’t experienced a relationship so stifling that leaving everything behind is the only way to get out, without turning to family for support. I loved her and still love her, but she seemed to be taking care of herself so I tried to take care of her boys. Partly because someone needed to do it, and partly because it seemed to be all that I could do for her at the time.
In an older time, when family wasn’t scattered all over the state or the country, sisters and parents and cousins would have done the same thing, it just wouldn’t get much remark. Family steps in to take care of family. The one who walks away and won’t talk is harder to take care of, sometimes all we can do is try to protect and love the ones they left behind.
