It bothers me to see so many comments that assume the dad abandoned his kid, or that Rosner was a saint for allowing that final contact, or that there was really some question about what she should have done.

#1- She claims her ex said he didn't want to be *married to her*, NOT that he didn't want to *parent their child*. Even after he decided to leave the marriage, he was involved in their son's birth and he visited him, until Rosner decided to move with the baby halfway across the country. She refers to her ex "remaining in Texas" as though it was his choice to live so far from his child, when that choice was clearly *hers*.

#2- Cross-country travel is not affordable for everyone, nor is the high cost of putting oneself up in New York. Paying child support (which the dad presumably did - the author doesn't state otherwise) can put out-of-state visits even further from reach. Rosner herself says her ex could not afford to visit (until her mother let him stay with her - accommodations which presumably would not have been offered to an EX-son-in-law, except that he was terminally ill). Rosner does not say she offered to fly her son back to Texas for visits, on her own dime. After all, the child was only an infant when she left and a toddler when the father died. Speaking of being a toddler, the dad did not exactly have the option of meaningful contact with their son via the phone, e-mail or letters.

#3- Rosner explains the benefits to *herself* of moving to NY, affording her the comforts of her childhood nest and the symbolism of leaving her painful past behind her. But she gave those gifts to herself *at the expense* of her son being able to grow up near his other parent, who - by her own account - DID visit, before she moved. The people who applaud Rosner for the morality and selflessness of finally enabling her ex to know their son do NOT seem to question the morality of her choice to move - *which made it so difficult for the dad to visit in the first place*! That astounds me. As a society, we should not be so cavalier about a mother's moral entitlement to move a child away from his father, after divorce. We don't hesitate to judge fathers who move away from their kids. Why the double-standard?

#4 - Evidently, even before his illness, the Dad had hoped to rebuild a relationship with his son when the child was older. The very self-affirming tone of Rosner's article leaves her ex sounding like an absentee parent making lame excuses. But, considering the circumstances, his hope may have been genuine and practical. In the future, he might have earned more and become able to visit NY. Had the dad lived, their son would have grown old enough for visits in TX and for supplementing visits with phone calls, e-mail and letters.

#5 - Rosner portrays her ex coming back to *her* - finally fulfilling her wish to have a "co-parent" - as an integral part of his re-entrance into *their son's* life. This also brings question marks to my mind. Sure, it's nice when a divorced couple genuinely and mutually derives a sense of commonality from parenting. But some divorced moms feel they and their children are so inexorably linked that an ex's rights, as a parent, are directly proportional to his interest in interacting with *the mom*. One sees this thinking in a mother who believes that by divorcing *her*, a man also "abandoned" their children; or a mother who feels entitled to move the kids far away: "What's good for me is good for them and if it upsets their father, then that's what he gets for not staying with me." Various things Rosner mentioned make me wonder if this was her outlook. A) She describes pitying her ex at the time of the divorce because *she* "had Judah" and *he* had nothing... but the idea that *only one* of them could have Judah is something she seems to have *created*, by moving. (Again, her ex had been involved before that.) B) She takes no ownership whatsoever of her contribution to her ex's lack of contact with their son. She moved, but she depicts his absence as entirely his own deplorable choice. C) *Her* willingness to facilitate him seeing their son was notably concurrent with *his* renewed willingness to be a partner to her (in some respect).

The gist of the story Rosner has told is: "Rotten man suddenly and inexplicably abandons wonderful wife and unborn child; valiant mom makes happy new life for herself and child, elsewhere; rotten man comes crawling back on his deathbed; saintly mom - clearly the bigger person - forgives him and makes it possible for him to redeem himself by finally visiting his child... Can *you* imagine being so selfless!?"

There's something inescapably self-gratifying about Rosner selling a story to the Times depicting herself as a hero and her ex as an undeserving bum - AFTER he has passed away and cannot speak for himself. I am left wondering, if we heard his version of the story, would it be: "Man was forced to leave marriage for reasons anyone would understand; man was heartbroken when ex-wife took their baby and moved far away during major economic recession, knowing he couldn't afford to visit; man dreamed of day he could enjoy regular contact with son; tragic medical diagnosis crushed his dreams; heroic father was willing to do ANYTHING - grovel to his ex, sleep at her mother's apartment - to gain access to his child before he died,"?

OF COURSE real life is rarely as simplistically black-and-white as EITHER story. I'm not trying to argue that Ms. Rosner consciously or maliciously misrepresented anything, only that EVERY time we hear a very polarized account of a divorce, we should remain attuned to the fact that we've only heard one side of the story. It is very easy to sympathize with a pregnant woman whose husband left her, easy to assume he had no reason and *write him off as a jerk*. It's satisfying to applaud a single mom who portrays herself as having left the shackles of a bad divorce and started a new life, just her and "her" kid. But while men are often less vocal about what they suffer in marriage, divorce and custody/visitation struggles, many of them ARE suffering...and they rarely get society's benefit of the doubt in the way that mother do.

Kudos to this woman. Her strength on behalf of her son is wonderful. May this blessing return to her ten-fold.