Today is Friday, July 22nd, 2005; Karen's Korner #595

This is a "Chicken Soup for the Soul" which I enjoyed and hope that you do to. It is a snapshot of what 'love' sometimes looks like:
 
My Toughest Decision
By Kristina Dulcey

     Mistakes, mistakes, mistakes.  Everyone makes them.  No one saw mine coming.
     Overall, I was a really good kid.  At fifteen, I was a sophomore at a Catholic high school and a member of the National Honor Society.  I played softball and ran cross- country.  I had, and still have, aspirations of becoming a doctor.  If someone would have told me that at the age of fifteen I would become pregnant, I would have said they were crazy.  Why would anyone do something so foolish?  It's still hard for me to believe, but it happened.
     October 11, 1997, was the day my daughter was born.  I took one look at her, and it was love at first sight.  It was so overwhelming - a flood of emotions that I have never experienced.  I loved her in a way that could only be described as unconditional.  I looked at her, and in my heart I knew that I could not give her all the things that she needed and deserved to have, no matter how badly I wanted to.  Physically, emotionally and in every other way, I was not capable of being a mother.  I knew what had to be done.  Putting all my emotions aside and doing what I felt was best for my daughter, I decided to give her up for adoption.
     Placing my baby in the arms of her mother was the hardest thing I've ever had to do.  My very soul ached.  Even though I still get to see my daughter because I am blessed with having an open adoption, the pain is still there.  I can feel it burning inside me every day, when I think about Katelyn.  I only hope that when she gets older, she realizes how much I love her.  I love her more than anything in the world.
     Today is my daughter's first Christmas.  I won't be there to share with her the joy of this season, or to play Santa and open her presents for her (she's only two months old).  In fact, I won't be there to see her first step, or hear her first word.  I won't be there to take pictures on her first day of kindergarten.  When she cries for her mommy, it won't be me that she wants.      I know in my heart that I made the right choice.  I just wish with all my heart that it was a choice I never had to make.


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