There was no real explanation.
Even worse, there was nothing about his ten children.
My family immediately told me to walk away. They insisted the children needed to enter foster care and that I couldn’t sacrifice my entire life for a man who had abandoned me.
For a moment, I tried to listen.
Then I looked at those children.
I couldn’t do it.
I went to the county office and applied for emergency guardianship, beginning a long legal process that eventually made all ten children officially mine.
Those first years were brutal.
I worked long shifts at a fabric warehouse and spent evenings sewing school uniforms for extra money. The older children helped with cooking, cleaning, and looking after the younger ones.
There were nights when exhaustion brought me to tears.
But I never regretted keeping them together.
A few men entered my life over the years. Most disappeared when they discovered I was raising ten children.
