Meet Lori

The year was 1987 and I was a senior in high school in Prince Albert Saskatchewan. I was the youngest child with three older siblings already away from home. My father said to me one day don’t disappoint me and come home pregnant. I already was and in that moment made the decision that I could not keep the baby. I lived in denial for a few more months and then at the end of the school year I moved to Regina, told my parents I had a job and lived with my boyfriend and his room mate. I started university in September, had the baby in October and using the department of social services arranged for a private sealed adoption. I got to choose the family without knowing anything that would reveal who they were. No names or city in which they resided. I picked the family that I did based on two main features...the fact that she would have an older brother and they were practising Catholics. There was the possibility that she would have other siblings as there was no medical reason they had only one child. My life went on and I had another child a few years later. I raised him mostly as a single parent with amazing support from my family.

Fast forward many years to October 2013. As her birthday was approaching I decided to ask the world wide web how to find a child I had given up for adoption many years before. The first site that I found informed me that my child was also looking for me. I now had a name...I used the Facebook platform to look her up and creep her profile and that of her family. She was very much loved and now had a child of her own. I didn’t know how to insert myself into her life so I sent her a private message and then waited a few days for her to respond. She and I chatted back and forth for quite some time before I was ready to reveal to my family and the world that I had a baby, gave her up for adoption and now wanted her to be a part of my life and my family. Dad had passed away the year before and had he still been alive I don’t think I would have welcomed her with open arms. Mom was shocked to say the least but that soon wore off as she had another grand daughter and a great grand son to welcome into the family. Today she is more of a friend than a daughter as she has loving parents who adore her. For this I am forever thankful.