Warning – this is not an easy story to contemplate.
38 years after the event, a combination of DNA and genetic genealogy located the woman who in some confused and frightened state, gave birth to a baby in her apartment, and then dumped the living baby with the placenta still attached into a ditch in freezing weather in Sioux Falls SD when she was 19 years old.
The baby was found about 24 hrs later by a man test driving a car. The coroner ruled that the boy lived for about two hours before freezing and bleeding to death.
The woman did go on to marry the baby’s father who seems to have been unaware of either her pregnancy or the birth. She and her husband have two living adult children.
Haunted by this story, I did think “there are worse things than having been adopted.” This man would have been 38 years old. What kind of life might he have had? Would the outcome have been different if this young, single mother had had the encouragement and support that would have made her willing to keep and raise the boy?
Missing Mom 