Teresa was nineteen when she found herself pregnant, unwed, and with a boyfriend who wasn’t planning on standing by her. Neither the pregnancy or single motherhood shocked her family. Single mothers weren’t uncommon among them and her mother had raised her and her siblings mostly on her own. It was Teresa’s decision about the pregnancy that was uncommon and actually a shock to her family. After carefully considering her options, Teresa had made the decision to release her baby for adoption.

It wasn’t easy and Teresa didn’t know where to turn to begin the process of letting her baby be adopted. A local church told her about FCA in near by Knoxville. So, against her family’s wishes and all by herself, Teresa drove from Kingsport to FCA in Knoxville and stayed for the next six months.

Her family’s’ hard stance on the adoption would be evidenced 30 years later when her son was introduced to her as "the baby she had given away." 

"I looked around me and I envisioned the life ahead for me and my baby," Teresa related on that day 35 years later when she came to visit The Florence Crittenton Agency with the son she had given away. "I wanted something different for my child. Something I knew I couldn’t give him," Teresa said. 

It was a tough choice for Teresa, but her determination never wavered. She received a great deal of support from the FCA staff. Counselor Dorothy Farnham was a name Teresa remembered from her past. Dorothy helped Teresa as she prepared to give birth and give her child to another family to raise. "Dorothy made me feel good about myself and supported my decision. It helped a lot at that time in my life," said Teresa. 

"After his birth, I couldn’t see him and so he was given to his new family," Teresa said with her tear-filled eyes focused on the conference table as she told about that day. 

Teresa met a man, married and moved out of state soon after. Her husband knew of the child. Even after they had their own children, her husband would ask if Teresa wanted to find the boy. Teresa wanted more than anything to see her son, but she wanted more not to ever disrupt the life he had now, or to cause him any pain. 

It was her son, Scott, who eventually found her. His search began when his own child became ill and the doctors needed family medical history. Scott always knew he had been adopted, but his adopted mother and father gave him love and security and he had never felt like anything other than their son. 

Now he had to find his birth mother. His search was long and exhaustive, and his son was healthy again long before it ended. What Scott found out was that he had been living within miles of his biological extended family – grandmother, aunts, uncles and cousins were acquaintances in his everyday life. They accepted him into their lives, but still Teresa didn’t know he was there. He did not contact her for the same reasons she hadn’t contacted him. And so it wasn’t until the event of her uncle’s death and her return to town that Scott would meet her. 

Teresa’s scream at her aunt’s introduction sent Scott literally running from the church with the entire family running after him. He never wanted to disrupt his birth mother’s life and so in the face of her shock, he ran. The family - grandmother, aunts, uncles and cousins ran, too. And, Teresa stood and cried and called for someone to bring him back to her. 

Scott went all the way home, and that is where Teresa called him on the phone. She explained that it was merely the shock that caused her reaction and that she loved him and wanted very much to know him.