#20: Before, After, & Then After

Cocoon
Cocoon
#20: Before, After, & Then After
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Natalie was 19 when she got pregnant. Plans to marry her boyfriend quickly fell through and she was left with a choice to keep the baby or place the baby in a closed adoption. With her parents’ help, she chose adoption. And then she found out it was actually twins. And that there might be complications.

Those complications were just the beginning of what, over the course of 20 years, has turned out to be a pretty complex story with some pretty complicated relationships. Especially when, 19 years after she said goodbye to her babies, they came back into her life.

Natalie has learned to navigate those relationships with love and understanding. She tries to be sensitive as she considers the needs and feelings of the two daughters she placed for adoption, and also their adoptive parents, their birth father, her husband, and her other children—all of whom have a place in this story.

And in the process—which is still ongoing—Natalie maintains that this is the best thing that has ever happened to her.