I Returned Home from Work to Find My Adopted Twin Daughters, 16, Had Changed the Locks and Kicked Me Out

Those first years were a dance of healing and hurting. The girls were sweet but wary as if waiting for me to change my mind. I’d catch them whispering to each other late at night, making plans for “when she sends us away.”

It broke my heart every time.

“We’re having mac and cheese again?” seven-year-old Dana asked one night, her nose wrinkled.

“It’s what we can afford this week, sweetie,” I said, trying to keep my voice light. “But look — I put extra cheese on yours, just how you like it.”

Carrie, always the more sensitive one, must have heard something in my voice. She elbowed her sister.

“Mac and cheese is my favorite,” she announced, though I knew it wasn’t.

By the time they turned ten, I knew I had to tell them the truth. The whole truth.

I’d practiced the words a hundred times in front of my bathroom mirror, but sitting there on my bed, watching their innocent faces, I felt like I might throw up.

“Girls,” I started, my hands trembling. “There’s something about your father and how you came to be my daughters that you need to know.”

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