i think my sons father is molesting him, how can i catch him?

when my son was 4 months old, i left his father. he abused me physically, emotionally and mentally. he also has a drug addiction. i know that when he was younger he was sexually molested and that he has NEVER talked to anyone about it. the only reason that he told me (briefly via email) is because i caught him talking on a male sex line. i know he has wierd sexually tendencies, such as talking on these sex lines, calling "special" massage therapist- both male and female. my son is now almost 14 months old. he stays with his father one night a week and every other weekend. i am scared that his father molests him. i do not have any proof. i have a very very strong gut feeling. i have had some signs that have lead me to believe this as well. such as there have been 2 incidents where i have found, as what seems to look like, pubic hairs on my sons butt. (i saved both them). my son always comes home with a diaper rash. sometimes it seems as if the sides of his diapers are stretched out, like taken off and put back on. i know this is not unusual, but sometimes my son flips out when i change him.   there have been times when he has slept to 930 in the morning when over his dads, he is always up at 730, is this because he wakes him up in the middle of the night? he crys at naptime when over his dads. i never have that problem with him. when time when i was at his fathers and i changed his diaper, it seemed as if the box for the wipes had vaseline on it? we do not use vaseline on him. i did once confront him and he told me that i was crazy and that he loves his son. but of course, what else would he say? yes i did it?
    There are time when i think i am crazy for thinking this. but there are time when i am sure iam right.i dont know what to do. i talked to my doctor. she said to look for bruising and taring. i havent seen any so far. i am so confused. i am so scared. what if im wrong and i am just driving myself crazy? what if i am right and i cant find any proof? how could i let my son go over there having these suspicious?
    please help me get to the bottom of this. any information will help. thank you in advance.

[jo929]

You first need to take your son to the DR to see if he has been abused, alos if he has this kind of lifestyle do not let the child stay with his father  luck  jo

[margypops]

Firstly I would like to say that you are a good and caring Mom to realise that you have to go with a Moms gut feeling, as jo says in the above post take you boy as soon as you can, to a Doctor for an examination, it doesnt matter if you are wrong, finding out is imperative,tell him the physical facts, and whilst you are trying to sort this out can you cut back on the visits ,I think all Dads have rights to see their children but in this intance till you know he is at risk each time to more of it.You are not crazy , best to risk being anyway than to let your boy face this and be traumatised all his life.Has his Dad got a new partner ? who else is around when your son goes to visit?

[margypops]

PS  If he is a Drug Addict you could check out if you have to send him alone maybe there is an arrangement of visitation when you are presant, Protect your Boy.

[momagain59]

Is there any way that you would allow him to watch your son at your house? Surely, you could come up with an excuse as to why it would be easier or better if he could just watch him there. Maybe, plant a nanny-cam so you could observe him. I would place the camera in an area where he would probaly be changing his diaper.  

[Michele, Katy, TX]

Please, please, please find out if your gut is right!  I beg you.  If you think there is any possibility that he could be being abused by ANYONE (don't care who it is), do everything you possibly can to find out.  The only time I have ever had problems in life is when I didn't listen to my gut.  God gave us instincts for a reason and probably the biggest reason is to protect our children.  And at 14 months old, your son has no voice.  You are his voice.  I just can't stress this enough.  I had a situation in my own family so I can tell you from experience that I would go against ANYONE to protect my children.  They are my everything.

[keep_smiling]

I studied Social Studies last year and worked with a child therapist for a number of weeks who gave me great information on how to look out for signs to see if your child is being molested. in my opinion you have more than enough proof to be worried. is there any way you could get the pubic hairs tested? that would be more than enough evidence to catch him out. anyway in the first place i cant see why you dont use his drug addiction as an excuse to keep your child away from this man.
trust your gut instinct-mothers always know best.

[mango167]

Oh my goodness.. I am so happy to see this post!!  
I am currently dealing with a crisis closely related to this!  
My son is 23 months old and I left his father about 9 months ago because for the third time in two years, I found that he was consistently calling transsexual/violent dominatrix phone lines and our computer was littered with this type of pornography.  I left for my son and there were several violent incidents before I filed for custody in July.  
Now we have no physical temporary order yet but I have allowed my son to see him every other weekend since November.  (Before that he ignored me for three months so he could say I was keeping my son from him)  
This past weekend, when my son came home at 6, I took him to dinner and then when I tried to change his diaper, he totally freaked out!
He ran away, screamed in a blood curdling growling way for 10 minutes, and wouldn't come near me unless I took his clothes off.. I held him naked for 5 minutes while he cried before I could re-diaper and dress him.  A similar situation happened again last night.  There was a period of time when his father was only visiting him at the daycare and they told me not too long ago that he used to close the door of the bathroom while changing his diaper.  He admitted to taking pictures of my son's diaper rash, trying to prove me negligent in court but now I don't know if thats all that was happening.

I called his doctor and am waiting for hear back from them but I think it might be too late this time.
I wish I had called sooner or taken him to the ER but I didn't know what to do and hoped he would just be ok.