This is a repost of the original post with revisions made. I cannot wait to share Part 2!

I grew up in a humble home, free to run around barefoot, with un-brushed hair and skinny legs. I am Italian, Irish, with a dash of black the blood test said…

I became aware of how different I was from my cousins, dad, and even my mom but mostly my sister. She has blonde hair and blue eyes; I have black hair with brown-hazel eyes. The man I knew as a dad, I would eventually learn was my stepdad (Mike). He treated me as his own, just like he treated my sister (his biological child); he was a car mechanic by night and an electrician by day. I remember him coming home late at night from work; he was a hard-working man most of his days. When he was home he took us for rides on his motorcycle, when he was working on the car he would allow us to crawl under the car while he was there repairing so that we could see exactly what took up most of his time when he was home. And boy could he sing and play the guitar. It was always the best when he played and we could sing along.

My Aunt (biological dads sister) and my biological dad Gator! ❤️

The memories we hold are many – as a child, we were together every holiday and birthday. My grandparents lived two houses down from my childhood home. My childhood home is a cute Florida-style house, a small, yellow two-bedroom house with one bathroom, with a large backyard off to the side of the house, and in the back of the house was a dirt alley. This was our favorite place to be as all the neighbors knew us and it was the best route to my best friend’s house, Jennifer, who lived three doors down. My biological father’s sister, my Aunt (seen here) lived next to my house in the other direction. For the most part, my childhood was normal.

Around the time I turned 12, my mom and dad (Mike) were divorced and before I knew it we were moving out of the only house I ever knew and called home.  I started middle school and other things I had no business starting. I was pregnant at 15, my freshman year in high school. I didn’t last very long in a traditional high school and eventually attended a program through the YWCA (Young Women’s Christian Association). There I would meet lifelong mentors to whom I am indebted; they would be my support system as I would make the hardest decision of my life – to place my daughter for adoption.

Family members and friends encouraged me to have an abortion. With all of their well-meaning reasons, I firmly decided on placing the baby for adoption but was certainly not going to murder a living being in my womb.

I remember being told that pregnancy would cause stretch marks and ruin my skin for the rest of my life; that I wouldn’t be able to go to college and hardest of all I was told that if I chose to keep my child that I would have to move out from my mothers home and handle my responsibilities. At the YWCA, I eventually experienced similar responses from peers about my decision to place my baby for adoption who were also pregnant and attending the YMCA Dropout Prevention program. While most of them wouldn’t tell me directly how they felt it was implied by their skillful ability masked in a comment like, “Wow, I couldn’t do that.” Only a handful truly had compassion and concern and would befriend me, after all, we were literally walking the aching road of pregnancy together.

1996 – Okinawa, Japan

In 1994, I decided to go to the United States Air Force (USAF). I will never forget the moment that would awaken the second hardest day of my life – kissing my 18-month-old goodbye as he lay in his crib. I left at 5:00 AM on March 3, 1995, for basic training in San Antonio, Texas. I had high aspirations and nothing was going to stop me, not even the emotional waves of leaving that sweet little boy peacefully sleeping.  

The gut-wrenching twist in my stomach and knot in my throat that stopped the tears wouldn’t let up; visions in my mind of leaving her sweet little face through the glass window at the hospital on February 27, 1991, overshadowed this day. A myriad of emotions overwhelmed me but I knew I had to push through, just like the day I left for the military.

Initially, I wasn’t going to see her but at the last minute I told the nurse I changed my mind and wanted to see her. There she was a head full of black hair, that same black hair that left me unsure of myself as a child. She was beautiful with fair caramel-colored skin and long legs, the same skinny legs that reminded me of myself running around barefoot with un-brushed hair. As tears ran down my face, my mother did the only thing she knew to do which was wheel me out of the nursery room enclosed by a large glass window that separated me from my newborn baby I had decided to place for adoption.

Xaviar was a handsome, wide-eyed, inquisitive little boy, full of wonder. He has a way of getting himself in trouble by unwittingly “telling” me all the happenings of his day. I will never forget the phone call from his kindergarten teacher, “Please come and get him, he has been kicked in the private part and is in a lot of pain.” Our time, stationed in Okinawa, Japan, per orders of the USAF was very difficult, though I wouldn’t trade the experience for anything; but I didn’t have family to call on for help. I rushed to his school and took him to the doctor. He always had a way of creating, let’s just say, situations like this. Today, he is taller than me, still has handsome brown eyes that draw you in, a personality that demands attention upon his presence, and a sweetness that still tells everything.

I have never regretted placing my daughter up for adoption. In fact, I can’t help but think about the letter the adoptive parents sent me a few weeks after her birth. It included a precious verse from the Bible, Ephesians 1:3-5: “All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms because we are united with Christ. Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to Himself through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure…”

I know I experienced a very small glimpse of God’s nature and love by placing her up for adoption just as God adopted me into His Kingdom.

One day, I look forward and hope for the chance to meet my daughter Mary Elizabeth, to see her beautiful long skinny legs and pure black hair. (Mary and I have reunited but am leaving this paragraph intact, maintaining its integrity) I am grateful for the adoption experience. I would eventually have stretch marks and graduate from college. My mother and I are very close now; God has restored what once was a broken and hurtful relationship to one that is open and growing in love each day. My mother is also blessed to have 7 grandchildren between my sister and me.

Eventually, I would take steps to build a relationship with my biological father despite having been adopted myself by my step-father I call “Dad”.  My father and I see each other regularly and he enjoys brief times with his energetic, loud grandchildren and has grown fond of our new relationship (to date he is no longer here on earth).

I will never forget lying under the Plymouth Valiant with my Dad, riding on the motorcycle, and best of all, his rendition of Randy Newman’s Short People while gracefully strumming his guitar. I look forward to hearing Mary’s story but until we meet again, I will share the beauty that comes from the ashes of an unplanned pregnancy!