Rape Victim Reunited With Daughter She Gave Up For Adoption 35 Years Ago

A woman who was raped at 15 was recently reunited with the daughter she gave up for adoption. Kathy Anderson held baby Katie just once in the hospital before she gave up custody of the child the day after giving birth. Anderson kept her pregnancy a secret from her parents until she went into labor.

After Kathy Anderson gave up baby Katie, she was adopted by Bill and Cindy Young, a Minnesota couple. When Katie was 20, she moved to Arizona and began the search for her birth mother. Her adoptive parents helped her discover that she had two sisters living in Texas. “Bill, my dad, was my main supporter and did everything to help me, like calling all the schools in Texas, going through yearbooks, etc.,” Katie said.

Kathy Anderson, now 50, recalls the moment she gave up Katie, now 35, for adoption as the “worst day of her life.” Kathy and Katie developed a bond almost instantly and wound up sharing a home after their reunion. Anderson said she gave birth to the “perfect little girl,” but doctors and social workers insisted that the baby be given up for adoption.
Katie Wynn had this to say in a blog she authored for WE TV:

“I’ve always wondered about my birth mother, who she was, what she looked like, if she thought of me on my birthday and if I looked like her. I would go thru spurts of wanting to find her and just feeling hopeless since I only had an extremely common name – Kathy Anderson.”

Katie Wynn spent years looking through records for people named Kathy Anderson in the Garland and Dallas, Texas area. One day she received a phone call from her Aunt Shirley. The aunt said she had known about Katie’s birth family for many years and informed her that she had sisters named Alicia and Portia.

While continuing her internet search for her birth mother, Katie stumbled across a website for Troy the Locator, a show that aids estranged relatives find one another. She talked to the producers, answering questions, and then a short time later, she was on her way to Austin to meet her family.

“We all bonded instantly and strangely, it doesn’t feel like we were ever separated. I lived in Austin now with my mom, Kathy, I see my sisters a lot and I love it,” Katie Wynn said.”My adopted parents have been to Austin and stayed with us and are coming back in July for my 30th birthday! My advice to those searching for someone is to let down your guard and jump in. My life is now complete and every day I feel like I’m dreaming with my eyes wide open.”

Kathy Anderson, who is recently divorced, had this to say about baby Katie being given up for adoption:

“I want to say I was 15 but I could have been a bit younger than that. I have an amnesia on some of the events. I was young and it wasn’t me saying, ‘I don’t want you.’ I wanted her. The choices were not really mine. My mother and everyone at the hospital were saying this would be the best decision for the baby and me. I felt like I had no choice. They felt it best to take the baby out of the room. However after some discussion, my mother, the nurses and the doctors finally brought her to the room. It was an instant bond. I cannot explain that baby smell. I can still so clearly see her face. It was the most beautiful little face I had ever seen. Having that baby leave and knowing I would never get to hold her again. That was tough.”

Kathy Anderson is also a staunch pro-life advocate who has wanted to speak out about the “horrors of abortion” for a very long time.

[Images via: Facebook and WE TV screengrab]