Eight years ago today, a woman who had four older children that were all being raised by other mothers, showed up at a hospital in Belgrade, Serbia, in labor.  I do not know her pregnancy story or her delivery story or what led to her being transferred to a psychiatric hospital for two weeks following delivery, or why she never came back to see the baby she delivered.  What I do know, is that in a nation where the abortion rate is nearly triple the birthrate, she chose life for a baby girl who would eventually find her way into my heart.  She gave my daughter life.

My own eighth birthday was one of my favorite.  My Mom bought me the 2-piece bathing suit I’d been eying at the local department store (Godchaux) and my grandmother bought me the biggest frilliest blue dress I’d ever seen and put my hair…