One mother left me on the steps of an orphanage. The other adopted me. I’m grateful for both.

For Mother’s Day 2018, Yahoo Lifestyle asked women to share stories about something they understood about their moms only after becoming mothers themselves. This is the third in the series; you can read the first here and the second here.

I don’t know her name and honestly, I never really cared to. At least that’s what I’ve told myself over the years. The details of who my birth mother was, why she gave me away, where she came from, who her people are — for so very long, none of that mattered to me. Bettye and Jimy Millner are my parents. The gravitational pull of the moon, the alignment of the stars, the shine of the sun made this so. God made this so.