When everyone else walked away from an orphaned little girl battling cancer, I chose to stay and adopt her. What I didn’t know was that love has a way of coming back around, sometimes in ways you never see coming.
For years, people asked me the same question at family gatherings, work parties, and anywhere strangers felt entitled to my life story: “Are you married? Do you have kids?”
And every single time, I had to smile through the sting and say, “No. Just me.”
What I never said was how much that answer cost me. How many nights I’d cried myself to sleep. And how many baby showers I’d attended with a smile plastered on my face while my heart cracked a little more.
“I’m 48 now, and I’ve made peace with being alone. Or at least, I’ve learned to pretend I have. But why does it still hurt so much?” I used to ask myself every single time someone asked about my life.
When I was younger, I imagined a different life. Noisy Saturday mornings with pancakes burning on the stove. Tiny socks disappearing in the laundry. Crayon drawings covering the fridge. A house full of chaos and laughter and love.
Then the doctors told me I’d never carry a child because my body simply couldn’t do it.
I tried everything. Fertility treatments that drained my savings and my hope. Medications that made me sick. Prayers whispered in cold clinic waiting rooms. But every test came back the same way, and eventually, I had to accept the truth.
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