The Day I Found My Son With Down Syndrome's Biological Mother

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She was a person I thought about for years, and yet I had never seen her face. I knew her name only because of a single, unredacted document in a sea of papers I received when I adopted my son 15 years ago when he was less than a month old.

She had given birth to him, and she had left him. Drowning in a sea of overwhelming surprises after the premature birth of her first child, this woman had become so frightened at the prospect of raising a child with Down syndrome that she and the baby’s father made the choice to go home childless and to leave the baby in the care of the doctors and nurses in a Miami hospital. A few weeks later that baby boy would find himself in my arms, and then in my heart.

It was supposed to be a closed adoption; neither of us would ever learn of the other. We would never meet; never interfere with each other’s lives. And yet, I found myself thinking of her. The day that we had brought home our new baby from the adoption agency, they had offered an open adoption plan to us. It wasn’t what we had agreed to in the beginning of the process, but I promised to at least consider sending pictures once in a while so long as the biological parents never knew our names.

But I never sent the pictures. I would get as far as putting them in an envelope with a letter explaining all of my son’s accomplishments and how his smile could light up a room in an instant. That he was accomplishing milestones at a rate that surprised everyone, and that he had every chance at an independent life one day. I would walk that letter to the mailbox and then I would freeze. This was my baby, and now I was trying to share him with the person who abandoned him. Could I do that to him? No. I would return envelope in hand and say to myself, “maybe tomorrow.”

Still, try as I might, I couldn’t hate the woman. I had been there. At the age of 18 I had given birth to a baby boy whom I never suspected had Down syndrome. We had bloodwork that should have shown us he was at risk, right? Wasn’t that the purpose of the triple screen? My sweet baby had slipped through the screenings undetected, just like her baby. The only difference was the outcome. Perhaps I had a stronger support system, maybe my faith was stronger… whatever the reason, we had each made a different decision on that day, but as hard as I tried I couldn’t be angry at the woman. It was a terrifying moment to have the pediatrician tell me that every little thing I found cute and endearing about my son, his almond eyes, his short stubby fingers, even the single crease across the middle of his palm, were all signs there was something “wrong.”

I came from a large family, a family rooted in our Christian beliefs and that helped immensely. If I had not had that, who knows what I would have done with such news. But I do know that as I looked at my newborn baby there was also nothing more beautiful to me in the world. He and his brother developed a bond almost like twins. They had their own language they used between each other, and no one has ever guessed they were not related by blood.

As each year passed, I found myself reliving that moment when my son was born and my thoughts would drift to her. What if she had known before he was born? What would she have done? The question terrified me.

My adopted son has been a ray of sunshine in my life. Now a teen, he loves electronics and playing video games, but more than that, he loves to help. I never have to ask for help cleaning; if I pick up a broom, he will grab the dustpan. If I am vacuuming, he moves things out of my way without me asking even once. He loves reading, and he loves to make others smile. I couldn’t imagine life without him. And that thought continued to creep in my mind more and more as I thought about the decision his birth mother made that day.

After 10 years, I called the adoption agency.

I learned that the mother had called every year to ask if any pictures had been sent in of the baby she gave up. If there had been a letter to update her on how he had been doing. Of course there hadn’t, and I hated myself for the pain I had caused her.

So, I did what every rational human being does when they need to find someone — I turned to social media. I searched the parents’ names and was met with so many options that it seemed impossible to find the right ones. I gave up, thinking to myself this was an impossible mission. But I never forgot about her.

Finally, another five years later, I sat down and searched for her. More determined, I weeded through the options with the limited information I had on her. At last, I had two choices. I said a prayer and selected the one that seemed most likely to be her… and then I opened Messenger.

After awkwardly starting off with a vague introduction, I asked the woman if she had given up a baby for adoption who was born with Down syndrome. Cryptic enough? You’d swear I wasn’t even trying to avoid sounding like a creeper.
I hit send, and regret filled my soul. What had I just done? What if this woman was actually horrible? What if she wanted my son back in her life? What if she would in turn hunt us down and invade our lives that were existing in happy anonymity at that point. I called my husband.

“Can you take it back? Can you retract a message?” He asked immediately. I searched for a way and found none.

“No. Maybe she’ll never see it?” I offered. We both knew it was 50/50. The message would most likely be sent to a social media junk folder and lay in wait to see if she ever checked that inbox. Maybe she never would.

When I messaged my best friend, she offered a question I didn’t really have an answer for. “Why did you do it?”
I sat there and stared at the question. Why had I done this? What did I expect would happen… what did I even want to happen? I wasn’t trying to reunite them, if anything I was more certain than ever not to shake up my son’s life with this revelation. As a family with our other children, we all agreed to protect him from this secret. No child should ever have a reason to look at their own family and wonder if they really belonged or not.

But now what? What had I done?

At last, I realized it was because I wanted her to know that if she had to do it all over again, she had done the right thing. I wanted her to know that if she ever met someone else facing such a hard decision, to encourage them to choose life. Because his was a life worth living, and he deserved every minute of it.

It was a couple of weeks later when my messenger notification went off. It was her. She responded with details of my son’s birth that only his mother would know or I would know from the hospital records I was given. There was no doubt, it was her.

What followed was a conversation of two souls who loved the same human being. Not a love interest, but a deeper love. A love of wanting the best for someone that didn’t serve ourselves in the slightest bit. I learned that she never forgot or stopped loving that baby she had left in the hospital that day. She thought of him often, and to my aching relief, she was grateful I had finally found her. Yay, I wasn’t going to social media jail today, folks!

I sent her images of my son and she gave me a brief insight into what that decision had done to her over all these years. The heartache of never knowing if that baby had a happy home. If he was thriving. If he was healthy.

I filled her in on it all, and we gushed over him in mutual adoration. She eased my fears by saying she would not try to interfere in our lives, she didn’t want that for him either, but asked politely if I would continue annually sending pictures. Of course, I agreed, and I have.

I suspect one day I’ll transition to videos. I suspect one day she might be a face in a crowd as he walks across a stage to accept a diploma that he has every right to obtain and celebrate. Maybe she’ll even be a face he doesn’t recognize that gives him a congratulatory hug.

I’d allow that, but more than that, she deserves that. It’s because of her that I have this amazing boy in my life that I would never have known had she not made the most wrenching decision of her own.