When I was 4, my mom handed a social worker a trash bag with my things, no hug, no goodbye, just “Everything important is in there.” Inside were my dirty clothes and a stuffed rabbit with one eye missing.
Foster care raised me, moving me through four homes before I found a family that cared. I spent years resenting my mom, telling myself I was better off without her. At 24, I had my wedding—a small, beautiful ceremony in a barn. During the reception, an old woman in a tattered coat slipped a wooden box under my table before disappearing.
Inside the box were Savings Bonds, coins, a journal, and a photograph of me with a woman who looked just like my mother. The journal revealed my mother’s secret: she had left me to protect me from my abusive father. She knew she wouldn’t survive her illness, so she staged everything—making me seem like a burden to ensure the state took me. She had hidden her wedding ring and a pendant inside the rabbit for my future, hoping my foster parents would use it for my education.
The woman at the wedding wasn’t my mother—she was my aunt, who had tracked me down over the years to ensure I was safe. My mother had bought a piece of land for me in Maine and left it for when I was “settled.” She had sacrificed everything to ensure I’d be free from fear.
That night, I realized I hadn’t been abandoned. I had been placed, given a chance to thrive. My mother’s love was not in hugs, but in her sacrifice. I now see her courage in a way I never could before, and when I look at my children, I understand her sacrifice fully.
The trash bag wasn’t a sign of neglect, but of a mother’s bravery. I carry her legacy with me every day.