Cortez Charles

Could you please share when you first learned that you were expecting a child? Where were you and where did you find out this news? Who did you tell?

Well, you know, this one's my first born son, 16 years ago. Prior to us having him, you know, we were expecting a child, wasn't taking it seriously at all, and didn't take it seriously until she miscarried. And the impact on that led us both to just saying we wanted to actually now bring a baby into the world because I wasn't taking it seriously at all. And then when we found out she was pregnant with my oldest son, it was excitement and it was nervousness. It was like a lot of family celebrated it. We were preparing for for my son, and it was it was an exciting time.

What are some family traditions around welcoming a baby into the world?

Some family traditions for mothers is to prepare the mothers to be mom. They have a baby shower, they prepare, have certain conversations, support along the way. For fathers, it's really a hard time. There was no tradition. The tradition for us, what I found was consistently being loaded and getting drunk high. I don't know what we were running away from it that morning, but we would call that celebrating, preparing for the bags, you know what I'm saying, getting together. When all of my kids was born, I was always either at a bar or with my brothers, the baby's underwriting, celebrating in that way, which, when I look back now, wasn't the most conducive thing and the best space to be in as a baby is coming, but them. But that's the truth. That's my truth.

What kind of support did you receive or did not receive from your family community, different health care providers or other resources?

The number one support that I received from my family was the communication and the encouragement and inspiration of not to ever give up. I ended up being a single dad early on in my journey of fatherhood. And so I'm talking early, like kids were months old. And so it was really tough for me being a young father and not having the mother to be there. But it had to be done. I had to step up and I had to step in and be the father to my kid because that's my responsibility, that's my role. And everywhere I looked around, man, family was always just trying to encourage me, inspire me to be better. There was a program called the Dad's Program that helped me to get custody of my son, showed me what paperwork to file and when I needed to file the same paperwork for my daughter a couple of years later, I already knew what I needed to do. And so community has supported in that way. Family has always been encouraging, never looked down upon me or never talked down upon me. They always were impressed with my consistency to be a present father. And no matter what it looked like, no matter what the circumstances, was so I had support from community, I had support from family in that way.

Did your partner breastfeed?

The really thing that stood out about this storytelling to me, when I start talking about this, the one common denominator that both of my kids mothers, my oldest son and my daughter, both of their moms did not breastfeed what I learned is along my journey, because I will reflect on this way back then. And what I learned is that bond, that moment that they get to have with the baby is like, unbreakable. That's a time in that baby's life and that's a time in that mother's life that they get and only they get that, right. The dad would never be able to have that moment. Right. And I don't want it either. But, ah, the point, the point is like, you know, that's where you, that's where you that's that's where that bond is created. And so my babies, all they had was dad holding that bottle, holding that baby close to it, close to my heart, right? And and that's what they see. You looking, I'm looking you in the eye, you know what I'm saying? And that's why it's super important, right? And I fast forward to my wife now, been married going on seven years, and she did breastfeed for a little bit with my son.

The bond that my son, my youngest son and his mom has is like extremely unbreakable. They're connected. And it's really interesting that you guys are having this question right here, and it's really apparent, right, like, how important it is to have those moments with your child to be connected the way that they're connected. It's extremely powerful.

From your experience, why is breastfeeding important in the black community?

Yeah, again, that connection is key. It's huge. It separates you what makes you any different? What makes you any different from a dad that hasn't been there or you know what I'm saying? Now I get it, right? Because my wife, she didn't breastfeed long, but she did, you know, I'm saying? She did. So it was something that has her and my son connected in a way that nobody else in this world will ever be connected to. It shows like and there's also other incentives from being breastfed, all of the health incentives, getting all of those nutrients that you're getting from moms and things of that nature. I think it's extremely important to try and even when if it hurts, keep on trying a little bit more because you push the baby out, you know what I'm saying? You could do this.

What wishes or intentions do you have for your child that you'd like to share?

I just wish for my children to go after all of their dreams, their goals and their aspirations in life and live a life of character, live a life of good health and in peace always to communicate. No matter how ugly or how hard things may be, my intentions is to just be consistent and be better than what I was yesterday. I ain't perfect, you know what I'm saying? I've had a rough upbringing. My intention is never to try to parent my parent me out of my child but have grace with my child or my children when I see a little bit of me in them.

Do you have any advice for other families who are raising kids?

Absolutely. So the Fatherhood Accountability Movement is an organization that is all about healing and restoring the family dynamic. We have the matriarch accountability movement as well that is serving the mothers and the matriarchs of that family, of that tree and the fathers individually and then collectively really using a holistic approach. We normalize and being intentional to be that village that everybody speaks of. Right? And one component of what we do is we do fatherhood showers. So we want to normalize celebrating fathers and not tolerating fathers. Not just when a mother has a baby. They get an elegant baby shower, they get their feet rubbed. We do everything that we're supposed to do. Got to run to the stove at twelve in the morning. You got to get whatever she's craving doing what we're supposed to do. Right? But we also have to understand that when a father finds out that he has a baby on the way, that's usually met with a little bit of stress off the top. That's met with a little bit of anxiety off the top. And instead of that father just being a tag a long for nine months, we need to celebrate that father when he's entering in his journey of fatherhood and encourage him with inspiration, encourage him with love and shower him with all of the things that he needs to be showered with as he gets to get ready to go on his journey and make sure that the babies get some gifts as well. So you have a baby shower and you have a fatherhood shower and if you need any of that now, reach out to us at thefatherhoodaccountabilitymovement.org. We will gladly put that fatherhood shower up for you and your family. And our last thing I will leave is to all of our black families out there we have to normalize having family meetings and check ins. We cannot continue to move on and not talk about what's going on in our kids lives and in our family's lives. So just checking in on a weekly basis, you know what I'm saying? Because I know everybody ain't sitting at the dinner table eating together and if that is the case, you know, put them phones up, you know what I'm saying? And let's check in. Let's talk about how your day went. Let's talk about what's going on in your life. There's some real things going on with our kids and our families that we are not privy to because we're not intentional on just asking, "how are you doing?"