{Bringing Up Boogie} Angels In the Delivery Room: In Memory of My Friend, Nurse Valada

Vintage Boogie

When I was pregnant with Boogie, I had a difficult time getting used to the idea of pregnancy and negotiating the new changes I was going through. So the irony of being invited (along with Ove) to perform at the school for pregnant teens in Brooklyn was not lost on me. While waiting to present, I saw a pamphlet on the bulletin board—purple and pink, with a picture of a young, pregnant woman, gazing softly out of a window. She looked peaceful and angelic. I felt anything but. The pamphlet read, “Is this your first pregnancy?” I hurriedly popped one in my bag, and took a close look at it when I got back to my friend Lynne’s apartment. Though I’d just signed the lease on an apartment in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, I’d been sleeping on her couch for months. I was too scared, too pregnant, too lonely to spend much time at my own place. Plus, I didn’t have any furniture or money (outside of rent).

Anyway, when I finally looked at the flyer, I realized that it was just what I needed: An offer for a nurse to visit me once a week during the pregnancy and then once a month until the baby was 2 years old. The nurse would help me with some of the things that I found difficult and encourage me to take care of my health and my emotions in order to deliver a healthy baby. I hadn’t been eating well and the worry was already threatening this high-risk pregnancy. I called and spoke to a Maria. I held my breath waiting for her to tell me that there was some catch—that they really needed 15-year-olds, pregnant and alone. I was wondering if they wondered why an almost 30-year-old woman would need the same kind of help they offered those half my age in this particular situation. They assured me that it was for first time mothers-to-be, regardless of age, education, or social standing. A few days later, I got a call from a woman named Valada. She had a soft gentle voice with the hint of the south that most Chicago residents seem to own. She laughed easily as I hid my nerves through jokes and smartass replies to her questions. At the end of that first conversation, she told me that she was looking forward to meeting me the following week and working with me during the pregnancy.

When I met Valada, I was struck by how slight she was. This golden woman with a short, cropped afro, dyed to match. She sat with me and talked me through a questionnaire. I found myself tiptoeing through an honesty I found surprising. When she asked me about a history of depression, I held my breath and hesitated.

She took my hand and said, “It’s all right… I’ve been there too,” and we spent the rest of the time talking and crying about our shared history as black women who constantly have to fight a world that threatens us, with the strength we can't always summons. 

She was only supposed to spend an hour with me. She was there for four. When she left, she promised me friendship and a shoulder through the next few months and years.

During the course of the next nine months, I saw Valada nearly every week and spoke to her every other day. When I told her about how uncomfortable I was at the clinic, she made a few calls and found a private practice in Brooklyn Heights that would take me and then eventually perform my surgery after the baby was born. She came with me to that first appointment, the day after my son’s father and I had the worst (at that point) of our fights about… what, I don’t remember. I just know that I was bruised and broken and bargaining with my body to just hold on for the sake of this child—a baby I wasn’t sure I even liked at that point. Valada remembered I loved waffles, and promised me breakfast if I just took the first step out of the door.

In the doctor’s office, she asked the questions I couldn’t. Told the doctor what I forgot. And because I liked to make her laugh, she kept my spirits up by throwing softball pitches for my punchlines. That afternoon, we spent more time in a diner than I’m sure she got clocked for, navigating maple syrup and stories about the Jamaican men we regrettably loved at one time or another.

Valada was my friend. So when my son decided he needed to come early, she came to the hospital during her vacation to ask the questions I was afraid to ask. She held my hand and calmed down my mother who had taken the first hysterical thing smoking into Brooklyn to “support.”

And when E was born and she met him for the first time, she held him like the children she never had an opportunity to bear. Turned to me and said, “Look what you did. Everything was for this. Don’t you wish you could do it again?” and I said, “Yes.” And for the first time, meant it.

Valada was my friend. So when she wasn’t feeling well and took time off from work, I worried but remembered the sickness we shared. She said, “Girl, it’s just this damn depression. I can’t eat. I can’t sleep. I just don’t feel right. It’ll pass.” Months went by and we were phone buddies. I’d call her to see how she was feeling and she’d call me to say, “Girl… what did that boy do now? I swear these men…” And we would gossip and laugh. And she sounded like she was feeling better.

And then the days I didn’t hear from her turned to weeks. Her cell phone went straight to voicemail. Her office phone was answered by someone else. Then her boss called me and told me that she had taken a sick leave. She wanted to get to the bottom of this thing that was hurting her. I sent her my best. Wondered if our friendship had ended now that her job had. But always wished her the best. Called the office to check but no one had heard from her. The months passed and the baby and I relocated to Maryland for the summer. One afternoon, Edna called to check on “Valada’s favorite patient.” And I laughed and told her I was good. Mentioned that I’d had a dream about Valada last week. I should have called her then, I said. And Edna said, “I’m so sorry, Bassey…” and her voice broke before she got to my name. And I said, “Don’t tell me. What happened?” and I was crying before I could get to the “Don’t.”

My friend, Valada Skeet, passed away from intestinal cancer. She was beautiful and compassionate. And bold and funny and generous and lovely and strong and helped so many people through some of the toughest times. I wish we could have helped her through hers. 

She was too young and too necessary for this mysterious and ugly thing that was diagnosed and killed her in the span of three weeks. I’ve cried for a number of reasons but the biggest was that she’ll never know what she did for the lives she touched. I always meant to tell her beyond her thinking I was the most polite child on the planet. I didn’t have the words to express how life -changing and -saving my meeting her at that time was.

I hope she knows now.

Valada, you are so loved. You will be missed. I’m grateful that you’ve found your peace.

Rest easy, Sis. Thank you for life.

Love,

Bassey and Boogie

How to Braid Black Girl Hair the RIGHT Way

So the state of Illinois is backtracking on a law that requires hair braiders to get a cosmetology degree and be licensed before they sit clients in their chairs, and it's got me feeling some kinda ways. Some background from THIS Associated Press story:

Illinois requires hair braiders to get a cosmetology degree — which can take 1,500 hours and cost $15,000 — and then apply for a license, just like people who give haircuts, manicures and facials. Proponents say the rules are needed to protect consumers if they develop problems such as hair loss or have service complaints.

But the law seems ridiculous to many braiders, the majority of whom are African and African-American women who learned as children and have refined their talent in kitchens and on stoops for generations.

"Hair braiding is not cosmetology," said Alie Kabba, executive director of the Chicago-based United African Organization. "You cannot ask an engineer to get a degree in history."

The story goes on to say that hair braiders are ignoring the law and either working under threat of being shut down by state regulators or taking their shops underground so they won't get caught braiding without a license. New legislation passed by the state legislator and awaiting the governor's signature would allow licenses to be given to hair braiders who can prove they've practiced their craft for at least two years and pay a fee; new braiders would get a license after undergoing 300 hours of training in hair braiding and sanitation.

Now, I get the argument the stylists are making: Hair braiding is something we African-American and African women learn from little ol'; I taught myself how to braid hair at age five, just from watching my mom, and Mari and Lila, ages 10 and 7 respectively, are learning on their American Girl dolls. Learning how to get nice with hair braiding is almost a rite of passage for black girls—and, if you have a little girl with a thick head of hair, it's a necessity, too.

But hair braiding is not innate. And I can't tell you how many times I sat in a "professional" hair braiding salon that was a little too unsanitary for my tastes, where stylists snatched my hair so tight I could barely see straight—a practice that could and, on a few occasions, did, pull my hair out—and nobody could offer up tips for how to protect my hair from damage. Understand, once someone jacked up my hair, I never went back, but each time I wanted to wear my hair in box braids or cornrows, I had to take my chances with a new braid stylist until I could find one who knew what she was doing and cared enough about her clientele and business that she bothered to sweep the floor, sanitize her combs, wash the towels she used while she did her job, and knew and cared enough about black hair care to not only create a style, but do it without damaging our hair.

Trust me when I tell you, those stylists/shops were rare.

I get that making someone get a cosmetology license, i.e. take hundreds of hours worth of classes on how to cut white folks' hair and apply relaxers—is kind of a waste. But why not create a licensing curriculum that teaches braiders how to braid hair without damaging it? Or how to tend to natural hair so that you help it, rather than harm it? Or to show stylists how to do something as simple as dip their combs into barbicide so I don't catch cooties from the last 100 women who had their hair done with the same dirty rat tooth comb?

More importantly, why not have hair braiders get real licenses so they can be held accountable when their styling goes wrong or they don't follow the simplest hygiene rules in their shops? I'll tell you this much: I'd be much more comfortable sitting in the chair of a trained, licensed stylist—and entrusting my daughters to said stylist—if I knew I could hold her accountable for her work and the care of her shop.

It makes me salty that Illinois and 10 other states in the union have been punked into excusing hair braiders from getting licensed under the claim that "black women learn to braid hair in the kitchens and on front stoops so they're experts" and that forcing them to be licensed is unfair at best, borderline racist at worst.

I readily raise my hand and say that though I can braid some hair and have for more than 35 years, I'm not a professional.

Know that the same thing can be said of plenty other women who hang an "open for business" sign in the window, tape on the wall a couple styles ripped from Black Beauty magazine, and charge upward of $300 per head for hairstyles that do way more to harm our hair than help.

Paying in Sweat at World Fitness Day

Um, yeah.

I never could strike that Jane Fonda leg-warmer pose. My legs are too heavy.

Seriously, I'm not going to lie: I have a love/hate relationship with exercise. Get me in the room with some African drums and my incredible dance instructor (and friend!) Sauda (as chronicled in THIS POST), and it doesn't matter that I can't dance a lick—I'm swaying and bending and leaping my way to a more fit body, and having so much fun that I'm telling everyone I know that I'm addicted to exercising. But let me walk into the great room in my basement and see the treadmill all dusty and lonely, laying up against my good walls, and I'll cuss out that big hunk of machinery like it stole money from my mama.

I guess you can say that I can't really be left to my own devices when it comes to staying fit. I do my best to eat right—not only for my sake, but for that of my family—and my girls and I are good for inspiring each other to get in a good work out at group classes, like belly and pole dancing. But outside of that, I need a bit of inspiration to get my work-out on at home.

On Saturday, May 1, I'm going to get a stadium full of inspiration to get moving, for sure, when I take part in World Fitness Day. The brainchild of actress, author, philanthropist and fitness icon Jane Fonda, World Fitness Day is an annual initiative to highlight the importance of staying active and fit. I'll be joining literally thousands of Georgians on the field of the Georgia Dome—home of the Atlanta Falcons—to participate in a one-of-a-kind group workout with celebrity fitness and health experts Richard Simmons, Billy Blanks, Denise Austin, dancer/director/choreographer Debbie Allen, and Dr. Sanjay Gupta. California Governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger also will deliver a video tribute—I swear, if he says, "I'll be back," it will make my millennium!—and The Pointer Sisters will pump up the crowd with live renditions of some of their greatest hits. Ludacris will also kick a few verses for the cause.



Tickets to participate in World Fitness Day are $75 a pop (though if you register now, you can get 50% off by CLICKING HERE); you can come alone or bring a bunch of friends and come as a team. If you want to just cheer on your peeps and get workout tips without moving, tickets are only $25. Kids ages 12 and up, accompanied by an adult, can participate, too; their tickets are $25, too. To register, form a team, or become a workout sponsor, CLICK HERE.

The event will benefit the Georgia Campaign for Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention, the nonprofit organization Fonda founded in 1995.

Not planning to be in Atlanta on May 1st? You can still participate in the workout by logging on HERE to check out a live feed of the event on UStream. Tune in and you might just see me getting my sweat on and doing my best Debbie Allen imitation:

You want fame? Well fame costs. And right here is where you start paying... in sweat.

Get it Debbie! And Jane! And Billie!

And Denene!

On Borrowed Time...

I'll never forget the day I found out that one of my best friends, my co-author Mitzi Miller, was living on borrowed time. It was right after she, I, and Angela Burt-Murray (the editor-in-chief of Essence) finished a book signing for our novel, The Vow, at Hue-Man Bookstore in Harlem; a woman working on a documentary about organ transplant recipients wanted to interview the three of us for her film, and, all out of nowhere, Mitzi looked right into the camera and told the interviewer that when she'd gotten her liver transplant, her doctors told her the organ would last for about eight years. She was on year number seven.

Of course, I'd known that my friend had had a transplant; when the three of us worked as editors at Honey, Angela and I lorded over Mitzi like she was our child and we her protective mothers—forbidding her to partake in risky assignments for her column, imploring her to get the proper rest and nutrition she needed to be well. But I didn't know her liver had an expiration date—that there was a chance I would lose my friend. And so when the documentarian asked me how I felt about Mitzi's struggle to keep her transplanted liver healthy, I cried. Like, sloppy, ugly cried. No person, let alone my dear friend, should be forced to wonder day in and day out when a part of her body would, quite literally, cease to function—when she'd have to go on a mad search for another liver or face an unspeakable illness that could forever change, even end, her life.

This weighs on my mind every time Mitzi tells me she's not feeling well, for sure. And it's weighing on my mind this week after Mitzi wrote on her blog, Mitzi Moments, a passionate post about needed changes in the way organs are harvested and shared between regions—regulations that lead all-too-many potential recipients endangered. She graciously agreed to let me repost it here on MyBrownBaby. I ask you to read it and, in my friend's honor, take a moment to advocate on behalf of her and the many sick Americans who are wasting away while they wait for life-saving transplants.



By MITZI MILLER

Thirteen years ago I was diagnosed with auto-immune hepatitis. As a result, my liver had completely stopped functioning. Basically, I was told that I needed a liver transplant IMMEDIATELY or I was going to die.

Clearly, I received the transplant.

But those eighteen months I spent waiting for an organ to become available were the hardest minutes, hours, days, and months of my life. And not just because I was unspeakably ill but also because while waiting, I watched fellow patients who had been waiting along with me, die. Yeah, I can't explain what that does for the moral... Not.

But the thing is, once I received the organ I was so busy living and catching up on the years I spent dealing with the liver that I started to forget the scariest details of the ordeal. Like damn near everything. To this day, it takes my mom, medical charts and closest friends to help me remember half the craziness that happened... The human mind is so amazing.

All that to say, when I saw the commercial for the premiere of the new season of MTV doc series True Life, True Life: I Need A Transplant, I totally flashed back. And trust, it was not fun. Then, to make matters worse, while doing my monthly blood tests at the hospital last week, my coordinator informed me that things have gotten even worse for liver patients in New York State.

Apparently, nowadays New York State patients experience some of the longest wait times for a liver in the country- 26.9 months. That's more than TWICE the national wait time. Honestly, I just don't know if I would be alive if I would've had to wait almost two and a half YEARS for my transplant. Unfortunately, this increased wait is happening because 1) there are not enough organ donors and 2) organs aren't shared nationally, only regionally. Which means that if an organ becomes available in say California, a patient in New York will never have access.... even if no one is California needs it or is a match.

So you're clear: Over 160 New Yorkers died on the waiting list this past year. Mind you, because of the existing regional system, nearly 1000 viable donor livers are discarded each year at centers with small waiting lists while patients in other regions remain on long wait lists and basically die.

SILENCE

While I'm happy to report that they've recently started lobbying for policy change (there's an important meeting in Atlanta on April 12th that I may attend); we all know how slow that road can be if the regular folks don't get involved. *serious side-eye*

So I'm asking everyone to take a minute out of their day, and contact their representative HERE

Since there's no form letter or petition, I wrote a little something for you to cut and paste:

I know someone who was able to receive the liver transplant necessary to save her life. Unfortunately, because of the existing regional access system and new language in recent guidelines from the government in the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2010, many others will not be as lucky.

As a voting constituent, I'm asking for you to help fight for changes to the system to include broader sharing.

Sincerely,

I promise, this will take 30 seconds and very likely save a life. So go on and be my hero today.

Babies and Bubbles: Natural Ways To Care For Your Child's Delicate Skin

By KAREN PETERS

When my first son was born, I didn’t think twice about running out and purchasing the usual fare: petroleum jelly, baby oil, and the moisturizer that we all associate with that magical "baby smell.” I had about seven or eight baby bags already packed with all these products—everything I thought I needed to take care of my baby. For sure, I believed that the products everyone else was using would be best for my new baby.

It didn’t occur to me that the typical baby products would contain harsh, toxic, or carcinogenic ingredients, but I was wrong; when I finally started reading the labels, my eyes were opened to another reality entirely. It really snapped me out of my new mommy daze and made me remember that I was born knowing everything I needed to know about how to incorporate more natural products into my baby's skin care regimen. After all, the wise mothers who came before me embraced nature as they cared for their children, and an internship in the bush of Cameroon, Africa, inspired me to start mixing up natural and organic shea butters and essential oils and herbs in the lab, a.k.a. my kitchen. I've long created natural, simple, freshly made, healthy products for grownups who shunned ingredients that were deemed toxic, irritating, or cancer-causing (and believe me, there were thousands of them).

Right then and there, I got “the wake up call” and started fashioning some of my grownup products for my baby's delicate skin. Everything I blended for him was natural and had no more than four or five ingredients. When it was bath or bedtime, he would coo and ooh about our annointing rituals using the wonderful, safe products that I made especially for him—one of the best, most powerfully nurturing gifts that I could offer him. I could rest easy knowing that I was massaging his skin with healthy, nourishing baobab fruit seed oil instead of coating it with a by product of gasoline and kerosene (mineral oil, also known as baby oil). It did me and my baby good to soothe his mild eczema with shea butter and lavender instead of flammable, chemically-treated hydrocarbons (petroleum jelly). He and I were happier cleansing his tender little arms and legs with a wash made from olive and coconut oil instead of antifreeze and solvent ( 1, 4 dioxane is found in more than half of the baby washes on the market and is an ingredient used to make coolant and bubbles).

Now that all of my boys are past the baby stage—my youngest is 3, yeah!—and I no longer blend baby care products in my kitchen, I literally make it my business to share what I know with other mothers and encourage the blending of something sweet and beautiful for babies. Now I host Honey B.U.N.S. (Babies Use No Synthetics) gatherings where a bunch of us mothers get together around our sacred blending pots and add a lot of love, blessings, and super simple ingredients to create some of the most incredibly nurturing baby washes, oils, and lotions for special, spiritual and most perfect beings—our babies!

Here, a simple but special recipe you can make all on your own—safe for you and your babies. It's simply delicious. Enjoy!

Basic Recipe for Gentle Massage Oil

What you'll need:
16 oz. jojoba oil (this oil is most similar to the components in human sebum, our inherent moisturizer.)
16 oz. sweet almond oil (moisturizing and gentle; easily absorbed)
16 drops of lavender essential oil (this is not fragrance, but a pure essential oil for soothing any skin ailment)*
8 drops of Roman chamomile (this is not a fragrance, but a pure essential oil for calming)*
4 4-ounce bottles
1 32-ounce jar

The mix:
Pour all ingredients into the 32 ounce bottle or jar; shake well and pour evenly into the four, 4-ounce bottles. Enjoy massaging your baby with this special, delicious elixir.

Note: Natural does not always mean best for your baby. There are some babies who are sensitive to many things, including ingredients that come from the Earth, such as essential oils. If your baby is prone to allergic reactions or has sensitive skin, simply use jojoba oil without essential oils. Also, please note that all ingredients with the exception of the jars can be purchased at Whole Foods or your local health food store.

About our MyBrownBaby contributor
Karen Peters is founder of The Peace & Beauty Project, a nonprofit organization that encourages girls to honor natural beauty while making health conscious decisions. On Wednesday, November 11 at 5 p.m., she will host a "Babies & Bubbles Baby Care Workshop" to help moms learn about the ingredients that are safe for babies' skin. To learn more about Karen's organization and her workshop, click HERE or call 407.339.7529.

Green Poop, Motrin, and Healthcare Reform: Do the Right Thing, Already

The girl had a stomachache and was vomiting and for some reason, her poop was neon green, and so it only made sense to take her to the doctor, right? And so we get there and the doctor gives us the worse case scenario (appendicitis) and the most likely (stomach virus), and tells us to run with the most likely, and so we do. Prescription in hand, my baby and I make a detour to the bathroom, where she lets out two more loads—one from each end, both green—before we head out the doctor's office and back to the house. Girlfriend gets a fever. The doctor told us to expect this. But I forgot to ask if I could give her fever-lowering Motrin with the anti-vomiting prescription. And this is where it got dicey.

And super expensive.

I dial up the on-call nurse, and make the mistake of mentioning the two green loads Lila left back at the doctor's office, and by the time we finish up our conversation, the nurse is insisting that I take my baby to the emergency room because the "most likely" my doctor diagnosed earlier in the day really could be "the worst case scenario" and she's not going to tell me whether the Motrin can be used with the prescription because she doesn't want to chance it and "you shouldn't either," she says.

Now you have to understand that it's 10 p.m. on a school night and Lila just wants to sleep and I'm not really feeling the ER thing, but this nurse has me feeling some kinda ways so I wrap my baby up and pile her in the car and drive across town and sit in that stupid ER room for an hour—Lila sweaty and sleepy and curled up on my lap—waiting to hear the ER doctor tell me my kid's got "worst case scenario." When the ER doctor finally gets around to Lila, she listens to me describe baby girl's symptoms, what my doctor said about them earlier, and doc's course of treatment, and then the ER lady laughs—literally laughs!—at the nurse's insistence that I bring Lila to the ER.

"It's not the worst case scenario," she says, rolling her eyes. "Give her some Motrin for the fever. She's fine."

The bill for that ER visit, kids? More than $300.

My insurance, which cost double that each month, covered a small fraction of the cost—roughly the equivalent of the discount you get in the grocery story with a coupon from the Sunday paper. Despite all the claims of the vaunted "competition" in the marketplace, when we tried to switch to another company that was offering a cheaper alternative, Nick was denied because of his "pre-existing condition"—high blood pressure (this for a guy who works out almost seven days a week, takes medication to control his condition, and hasn't been seriously sick a day in his life).

And don't get me started on how many thousands we ended up paying—and still owe!—in hospital/x-ray/rehab fees for a couple of football injuries Mazi suffered earlier this year.

Yeah.

Um, I don't know about you and yours up in your house, but 'round my way, all up in my house? The health care system is B.R.O.K.E.N. You can't tell me that paying over $300 to find out if I can mix Motrin with an anti-vomiting pill is okay. Or that paying almost $700 a month for health insurance and STILL being bombarded with health care charges and fees when we actually USE the services of a doctor is okay. Or that a family that works just as hard—if not harder—than Nick and I do but can't afford ANY insurance should be forced to sit and watch and worry while their child passes green vomit and poop—or worse—with no viable way to get help for their baby. Don't get me wrong: The Millner/Chiles household is blessed to have enough cash on hand for some kind of insurance, but we are compassionate people in the unique position of being able to see up close the many holes and flaws in the system.

I say all of this to make the point that the ongoing debate surrounding healthcare reform shouldn't be about death panels or raucous town hall meetings or coverage for illegal immigrants or abortion or government intervention or Sarah Palin or
dumb ass Glenn Beck or Republicans or Democrats or Socialism or Hitler or President Obama's standings in the latest polls. Making changes to our broke down healthcare system is about mothers and fathers and babies and hardworking families and compassion and being fair. It's about doing what's right by Americans, and demanding that these fat cat insurance companies stop running game on us. It's about holding our elected representatives accountable, so that they'll stop caving into a sorry few, and recognize that the masses aren't as dumb as cable news will have us believe.

It's about doing something because what we have right now is just dead wrong.

I mean, I'm just sayin'.


If you have questions about healthcare reform, or want to know more about what's in the plan, rather than who got shouted down at the latest town hall meeting, MomsRising.org has you covered. The advocacy group for moms and children put together a resource page for its Healthcare Truth Squad, and is sending moms to town hall meetings across the country—in red capes!—to educate rather than agitate Americans looking for honest dialogue and true reform. Check out their in-depth myth-busting resource page HERE.

Editor's Note: I respect that not everyone agrees with my stance on this—it's your right, and you are welcome to post your opinions in the comment section. I only ask that you A) be respectful, and B) know what you're talking about and be ready to disagree without being disagreeable. I don't suffer fools easily, and I'm NOT one of those ninnies who allow people to shout and yell and act the fool all up in her space. Post away, but be clear: Say something foul/stupid/off-topic, and your comment will be erased.

African American Babies Need Moms Who Know Their History

By DENENE MILLNER

I found the papers when I was 12—in a metal box tucked under my parents’ bed. I wasn’t supposed to be snooping all through their personal belongings; my mother had put a lock on her door, presumably to keep my brother and I from dipping into her stash of moon pies and using her pricy, smelly lotions, and discovering her and my dad’s copy of “The Joy of Sex.” But kids are experts at getting into stuff and finding the hidden, and that little flimsy lock was no match for the wits of a curious preteen and her big brother. If we wanted to see it, it was going to get seen.

But this? This I wasn’t ready for.

BABY GIRL...
DENENE MILLNER…
HEREYBY FORMALLY ADOPTED ON THIS DAY…

My fingers trembled as I brought the paper closer to my face—as if the words would magically morph into something wholly different if I just stared at them a little harder, a little longer, a little bit more closely to my 20/20s. But the words just… wouldn’t… change.

And then, suddenly, it felt like someone had fired buckshot into my chest. The shock was almost unbearable: My mom and dad weren’t my mom and dad. My brother? Not my brother, either. None of them by blood, anyway.

To this day, I can’t tell you how I got those papers back into the metal box, how I pushed that metal back under their bed, how I convinced my legs to carry me out of their room and shut the door and lock it back and act like I’d never seen those papers.

How I managed to keep their secret—my secret—for all those years.

For years—more than 20 years—I refused to acknowledge my adoption or tell my parents I knew they’d adopted me. At first it was because I was scared they’d be mad at me for snooping, but as I grew older, that morphed into my need to protect their privacy. Maybe they didn’t want to explain to everyone coming and going why they didn’t have biological babies together, or where they found me, or why my birth parents gave me up. Maybe, I reasoned, my mom and dad feared I would search for the people who abandoned me on the stoop of that New York City orphanage—that I would find them and, in turn, reject the two people who didn’t give me blood, but who truly gave me life.

I couldn’t do that to them. To me. To us. Though my birth parents deserve praise for birthing me and having the courage to love me enough to give me away, my parents get the glory for raising me, educating me, supporting me, disciplining me, and loving me beyond measure—and doing it with an enormous amount of grace and wisdom. Despite the odds. With little money. And no help. Just them.

And love.

No, there was no need to find the birth parents—it didn’t even occur to me to do so. Not until, that is, I became pregnant with my first baby.

Not knowing, you see, wreaked havoc on my health history, which, because I don’t know who my birth parents are, is basically non-existent. From the time I’ve been old enough to go to the doctor on my own, I’ve been forced to leave the “family history” part of the stacks of first-visit papers blank, which always leads to a really awkward opening conversation with my doctors, who realize pretty early on that they’ll have to treat whatever is ailing me without the extremely valuable “family health history” tools they need to figure out what might be causing my health problems. I haven’t a clue if cancer runs in my family, or diabetes, or weight problems—hypertension, stroke, gout. You name it, it could be lurking, waiting to claim me, and I will have no clue until it taps me on the shoulder and goes to work on my system.

This was most glaring while I was pregnant; neither of my ob-gyns had the valuable information they needed to help me figure out health risks for my pregnancy and, more important, my children. They knew Nick’s family’s health and were able to keep an eye out for specific Chiles family issues. But my side of it was the big unknown—you might as well have crossed an “X” across my paperwork.

And this disturbed me greatly.

I couldn’t change this in time enough for my pregnancies, and while I still have no interest in finding out who my birth parents are (wouldn’t be able to anyway, seeing as she/he/they left me on a stoop in the middle of Manhattan) I do wish that the government would change laws to at least allow adopted kids access to their health history, even if their adoption records are sealed tighter than Ft. Knox.

This doesn’t—and shouldn’t—be your story if you know who your birth parents are you’re looking to get pregnant or are pregnant. For sure, all you have to do to gather up your family health history is to start asking questions. Ask your mother and father who has/had what in their family; hit up your aunties and uncles at the next family reunion; quiz your cousins at the next barbeque. Your play aunties might even have some info—might know what your granddaddy’s brother might have had when he passed on.

Then take that information and write it down. The March of Dimes is a fantastic resource for info on the importance of family history, and has on its website a downloadable family health questionnaire to help walk you through the information you should be gathering. Take a look at what the March of Dimes has to say about the importance of genetic testing, too, to help you see into your baby’s health future.

I didn’t have this option.

You do.

Please, don’t take it for granted.

For more information on family history, genetic testing, and pre-pregnancy, pregnancy, and newborn care, please check out the March of Dimes website. This blog post was donated by MyBrownBaby to the March of Dimes as part of its March of Dimes Moms initiative.