Today, devoted dad Richard Friday makes breakfast and bathes and dresses his two little sons as he usually does. Later on, he will take Kaylon, two and a half years, and Elijah, one and a half years, to the home of friends for a World Cup football lime in his Gibson Trace, Laventille, neighbourhood. It is a typical Father’s Day morning for Friday, 33, but one tinged with heartbreaking sadness on the otherwise happy occasion because Mummy won’t be there with them.
Friday’s wife, Kaveta Singh, 32, died hours after giving birth to Elijah in an emergency C-section at the Maternity Hospital at the Eric Williams Medical Sciences Complex, Mount Hope, on January 2, 2013. Since the tragic incident, Friday has been both father and mother to his sons.
He said his whole world came crashing down when his wife died. He developed migraines, couldn’t sleep, didn’t eat properly for three months and lost 35 lbs. Friday, a construction worker, said he had an understanding boss who told him to take time off if he needed it. Friday said, “I used to sit at home and cry and break down because I didn’t give myself time to heal—one week after the funeral I went back to work.
“Kaveta was much more than the love of my life, she was my dream girl, she was more than a wife, she meant everything to me. “We had our ups and downs but she was very supportive. When a four-inch nail went in my eye, she was there at the hospital. I never had that kind of support before, it was a nice feeling being with her. She encouraged me to accomplish my goals and was my inspiration.”
He said the community was very supportive of their relationship, Kaveta was very friendly and she always had something nice to say to people, so that her death affected not only him but the community. Friday said he tried to cope with the inner pain by using alcohol to numb it, but that didn’t work. He got sick and stopped drinking. Friday said he picked himself up with memories of the kind of person Kaveta was, what her standards were and that he had to do what was best for their children.
He said there were many sleepless nights trying to learn how to be a single father, teaching himself by trial and error how to feed and change his infant son’s diapers. Friday reminisced how he would wake up at 2 am to give Elijah his bottle, and Elijah would wake up at 4 am crying, then he would put Elijah to sleep and go to work for 7 am. He said for the first five months of Elijah’s life, a friend helped take care of his son much better than he could because of her maternal instincts.
Friday said Elijah needed a mother figure at that time and she treated his newborn son like her own. He saw the love and genuine care she had for Elijah and eventually she became his girlfriend. He said when the daycare centre closed down in Laventille earlier this year, his children were cared for by their grandmother, Kaveta’s mother, in Curepe, while he was at work.
He said he provided financial support for his sons and made sure they had everything, and on week-ends when he was not working he spent time bonding with them. Friday said he enjoyed being a single father, and there was nothing better than being a parent. He said if he had one message for fathers, it was that they should not ever turn their backs on their children. That way they would know the joys of seeing their infants get up on their feet and smile, have their first teeth, and grow.
Friday said his one greatest desire for his sons was that they could grow up in a comfortable home, since neither his house nor their grandmother’s house was 100 per cent comfortable, and their grandmother’s house was old. Further, his house was in Laventille, and though Laventille was a nice place it was unpredictable. He said he applied to the Land for the Landless programme but was told there were no allocations; the Government’s social services have not contacted him.
Friday said it would make the perfect Father’s Day gift if the Government could fast-track his application or bless him with a little home to create the right environment for his children. He also wanted to have a mother figure in their lives as they needed that balance.