What happened to Roy?

Having used drugs from his teenage years, Roy has been incarcerated 6 times since 1975. While he has been drug-free since 2004, Roy’s biggest turning point was when his daughter was born in 2010. Having started his family much later in life,  66-year-old Roy devotes all his resources and time to taking care of his family. Living at the point of frugality, he worked tirelessly towards his goal of bringing his Central Javanese wife and daughter to Singapore for many years.  However, his efforts were met with multiple obstacles, and having exhausted all means, his last resort was to relocate them to Batam, a location easily accessed by ferry and with a lower cost of living. He visits them every weekend, rain or shine. Post-COVID inflation has left him struggling to keep up with the weekly ferry expenses.

How can you help?

Your support of $350 a month will enable Roy to continue visiting his family at Batam weekly for the next year. He started family late in life and he knows time is running out for him. He hopes to spend as much time with his family, especially with his teenage daughter. 

Find out more about Roy:

Roy had a rough start in life. His biological mother left when he was just a baby, and Roy was brought up by his father’s first wife, who treated him as her own. His stepmother, step-brother and 2 step-sisters would love him unconditionally all through life; but that was not enough to keep him from mixing with the wrong company after his father left for good when Roy was just 9 years old. Having gone through many years of addiction and incarceration, Roy shares that not being there for his stepmother and brother when they passed away remains his deepest regret in life. 

The year 1985 marks one of the darkest times in his life: He was struggling with addiction and living in a crisis shelter when he met with an accident. His last memory of the incident was being pushed down a flight of stairs when he was inebriated. Roy required surgery to remove blood clots in his brain from the accident, and when he awoke after a 10-day coma, he found out that some of his motor neurons were damaged. To this day, his motor functions remain affected. He is unable to run and walks with a limp. With his balance and gait compromised, he also falls easily. 

He shares that while he wanted to change, it was truly a struggle. Sinking into depression, he almost gave up many times. For him, it was a miracle when he met his wife and saw a glimmer of hope for a family of his own – a new beginning. He determined never to let his loved ones down again and strived each day to be the best husband and father to his family.

Since 2010, Roy made many unsuccessful attempts to apply PR/citizenship for his Indonesian wife and daughter. Due to his past incarcerations and physical limitations, Roy’s employment options are limited, and his salary in the early years was insufficient for him to provide food and shelter for his family in Singapore.

Despite the circumstances, he continued to persevere and sought help from a Family Service Centre to reunite with his family. With their support, a Foundation granted him monthly support for the past 12 years,  enabling him to visit his family weekly. This arrangement came to an end as Roy accepted the improbability of relocating his family to Singapore.

Roy is currently working in a charity organization that helps ex-offenders. His organization provides food and accommodation for him, which greatly reduces his expenses. This allows him to channel almost all his salary as a logistics executive to his wife, mainly for the living expenses and his daughter’s school fees in Batam.

Since our first Campaign, Roy has tried to further tighten his belt to be financially independent and to manage his transport fees on his own. However, these plans fell through when his wife was diagnosed with Glaucoma, and his daughter developed a hormonal disorder resulting in severe hair loss. These conditions require ongoing treatment and have been a significant financial burden for the already strapped family.

Despite his frugality, he has been unable to keep up with the increased cost of the ferry trips to Batam which has doubled since 2020. Support Roy in his endeavors to be a loving husband and father, one who can be reliably present for his family.