When I met my husband, I was 15 years old and he was 19. I fell in love with him on the spot. We dated for months and I ended up pregnant at 16. I knew in the beginning that my daughter was my salvation. I needed someone to love me for who I was, totally and unconditionally and she did that. But it still didn't fill that need. Damon and I would go on to have one more daughter before we actually got married. After we were married, we would have one more daughter and a son.

During this time my husband's family tried desperately to get me to search for my biological parents and I fought them every step of the way. I had so much anger inside me for the woman who had given birth to me that I couldn't even begin to see past it. I became very close to my husband's family and over the years they became "my" family, not my "in-laws" but my family. They became my parents, my sisters and my brother. They saved me in many different ways, they brought love into my life where it had been lacking. My husbands mom and dad helped to show me that I was a lovable person where others before had failed. My husband's mom would watch those shows where adoptee's were reunited with their biological family and call me every chance she could reminding me that I things were not always what they seemed and that she firmly believed that the woman who gave birth to me had loved me but for whatever reason, she couldn't keep me. My husband's mom planted the seed that would eventually blossom into the flower of hope, only to be crushed by the reality of life.

When our third daughter was born I nearly died and I decided at that moment that I didn't want to leave this world without first knowing how I'd come into it. I decided to finally begin a search for the people who gave me life. It was a hard decision that I did not take lightly. But as I grew older and I watched my own children grow, I realized that a woman has to love her child beyond belief in order to entrust her care to another. I knew, I hoped that was how the woman who'd given birth to me felt, so we decided to search.