Certain Internet subcultures associate the name Chad with attractiveness and virility. Naming me Chad was the first thing my parents had done for me, and possibly the best.
Quickly after my birth, they realized that meth is more fun than diapers and formula. Their downward spiral was quick. The story I was told is that my dad was shot to death in a convenience store robbery gone wrong. My mom held on a bit longer, but eventually she got caught trying to sell her own body for money, and made her way to prison, and I to the foster care system.
She met her untimely demise in prison, awaiting trial, killed by an overdose. Meanwhile, I went on to become a young troubled child, and scare away several foster families. But not John and Martha. Or at least not Martha. They took me home on my 10th birthday, gave me a cozy room to call my own, and a stable predictable routine.
It didn’t take me long to realize that there was no love in their marriage. John, my adoptive dad, had married out of a sense of duty, it was just one of the things one does, but he cared little for family life, and probably saw Martha, my adoptive mom, as little more than a roommate. He was consumed by work, his career the only thing he valued in life.