Dear Lutheran Family Services of Nebraska:
In 1984, at the age of 17, I became pregnant. Considering adoption for my baby, a friend’s mother (who had placed a baby through Lutheran Social Service of Kansas/Oklahoma [LSS] 20 years earlier) suggested I talk to someone with LSS.
My caseworker/counselor/friend was in Oklahoma. She was wonderful, supportive, everything I needed… and I felt good about my decision to place my daughter with a loving couple who had prayed for a long time for a child. We exchanged a few letters over the years, and 2 precious pictures. I never doubted I made the right decision and I never had anything but positive experiences when dealing with LSS.
When her 18th birthday approached, I attempted to update my information with LSS, just in case someday she might look for me. I found the Oklahoma offices were closed and ran into dead-end after dead-end trying to find where the files went. I finally put it in God’s hands, feeling like I was getting nowhere, and knowing that I would most likely never find any more information.
On 12/8/04 my phone rang at 5:30 p.m. and on the other end was an angel named Jeanine Philbrook. As soon as she said she was with LFS, I said, “I need to sit down, don’t I?!”
My daughter had been searching also…and hit some of the same dead-ends I did, until she managed to get the right person on the phone from the Department of Human Services in Oklahoma City who knew exactly where the files went – to LFS in Nebraska.
On 12/11/04, I MET my daughter 19 ½ years after placing her in the loving hands of her parents. We live 10 minutes apart … seriously. It has truly been an act of God, I am blessed, she is blessed and this will be the BEST Christmas gift I ever receive!
Thank you LFS of Nebraska, Thank you Ms. Philbrook, and Thank God for LFS. Please let Jean know that “Precious” has reached out and found her birth mother and life is very good.
Sincerely,
Carol
