Her mother, born in 1946, the second oldest of four sisters raised in a strict Catholic home, was a victim of "date rape" as a senior at Purdue -- long before either society or law enforcement considered that a crime.
Her mother gave the baby, named Teresa Marie, up for adoption, but tried to find her through the years even after she married and started a family. After her mother confided in Trista when she was twelve, Trista, too, tried to find her half-sister. But on the day when Teresa Marie would have turned forty, her mother finally gave up hope.
Then a year-and-a-half later, she got a call from a woman named Kathy, "an ordinary call turned into one that couldn't have been more extraordinary." She'd been born on December 20, 1968 -- the day Teresa Marie was born.
A couple of days later, Teresa Marie-turned-Kathy met her birth mother, and she was welcomed to the family. "My mom is now bonded to a daughter she thought she would never meet," Trista writes, "and in the process has taught so much to all of us who know her story (myself included). With her help, I learned to keep moving forward in the face of life's hardships, to know that things happen as they are supposed to, and to be grateful for the bumpy road that leads to happy hearts."
Each chapter of the book -- including the one that has this tough story -- ends with suggested "happily ever actions" suggestions from Trista.
Find out more about about the book and what Trista Sutter's been up to over the past decade here.
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