How I Felt the Moment I First Laid Eyes on My Long-Lost Older Sister

My name is Martha. I have been searching for my sisters, Linda and Wanda, for many years. I was given your names by a dear social services caseworker. She has given me permission to write you with my desire to meet my sisters. 

As a little background on me, I graduated high school and attended college for two years. I have been married for several years. My husband and I live in Greer, South Carolina. I am employed with Allen Bennett Hospital.

At the age of four, I remembered that I had two younger sisters but we had been separated. I did not understand what had happened at that time. I grew up in foster care all my life. At the age of 16, I began my search for my sisters. I was told at that time that my sisters had been adopted at a young age, and that I could not see them until Wanda was age 18. I waited two more years to continue my research. At that time I was 22 years old, Linda would have been 21, and Wanda was 19. 

Let me express my feelings about my sisters. You cannot imagine the pain in my heart as I think about my little sisters and all the love I have in my heart for them. Just to know that there are two little girls out there who are my blood sisters, and I cannot put my arms around them to hug them and tell them how much I love them, brings tears to my eyes and an ache in my heart. 

Mrs. Haney, I do not want to hurt my sisters in any way. I just want to see them at least once before I die. If you can agree to this, it would make me very happy. Thank you for all you’ve done to take care of my sisters all these years. I look forward to meeting you so that I can thank you personally. 

Love, Martha

This is the letter my sister and I read as we sat on the couch at Mama’s house that Sunday afternoon. Wanda and I had never known we had an older sister. We knew we had been adopted, but our adoptive parents were not told about other siblings. 

After weeks of preparation, the day finally arrived. Daddy drove with Mama beside him, while Wanda and I sat in the back seat. The ride was surprisingly quiet that day. We were all thinking about how our lives were about to change. 

We walked quietly into the cold, white building and took the elevator all the way up to the seventh floor. We were instructed to wait in a small room while the social workers went to get Martha. The room felt cold and had no windows. I fiddled with the hem of my dress, and Wanda’s hands were shaking. 

“What does she look like now? Will she like us?” Wanda and I asked each other questions every few minutes. 

Suddenly, the door opened. A social worker in a blue suit and fluffy white shirt poked her head inside. 

“Girls, I’d like you to meet Martha, your sister.”

And there she was. Martha had cut her long hair so it was different than in the photograph sent earlier. It was brown and cut short up to her ears. She wore a beige checked top with tan slacks. She burst into tears as she grabbed both Wanda and me. Martha was much taller than both of us. She was so pretty, and her sweet smile was full of kindness. 

There wasn’t a dry eye in the room. I could hear everyone sniffling, even the social worker. 

We all hugged tightly for a long time, crying all the while. I looked over Martha’s shoulder as she hugged me and saw my daddy, wiping his face with his handkerchief—I had never seen my daddy cry.

There were so many questions to answer, but many of those questions had no answers for us, at least not now. 

“Well, girls, I have another surprise to share with you,” Martha said with a big grin on her face.

We couldn’t imagine what other surprise there could be.

“You also have a brother. His name is David. I have lost contact with him, but I think he may still live near the Greenville area. I’ll work on locating him if you want to meet him, OK?”

“Sure, we want to meet him, Martha!” I cried. “We had no idea there were four of us.” 

Wanda and I hugged each other tightly and began crying again. 

 I looked at Martha. “I used to look up at the moon before I went to sleep during my teen years, wishing I had an older brother to watch over me. Maybe in my heart, I knew he was out there.” Martha grabbed me with another bear hug. She promised to try to locate David for us so we could meet him, too. 

Here’s an excerpt from my upcoming memoir, The Glider:

What happened to us? Why had we been separated? Why were two of us released for adoption while two were not? Those were just some of the many questions that haunted us and which we are still researching today. Records indicate all four of us were rescued by the authorities from abuse, neglect, and abandonment. We had been placed in separate foster homes for about three years, moving as many as four times in one year. We ranged from only eight months old to age five when they found us, alone, in shock, tied to furniture, bleeding, and lying in our own waste for hours. The caseworker noted in her report that this was the worst case of abuse and neglect she had ever witnessed.

But our story did not end there. We were able to locate our brother. In 1990, all four children met in Columbia, South Carolina, at the Embassy Suites hotel and spent hours catching up on our lives. David, the oldest, cried the most. Even though he was only five years old when the authorities took us away, he remembered the day vividly. All those years, he blamed himself for not holding on to his sisters. We assured him it was not his fault, for he, too, was just a child. 

While each of us suffered scars, both externally and internally, God has enabled us to overcome many of our insecurities. Through our deep faith in Him and trust for our future, we drew closer each year, spending every holiday and birthday celebrating our reunion. 

The Glider hopes to illuminate the need for foster care and adoption reforms throughout the U.S. For me, serving on the Lexington County Foster Care Review Board made it clear that reforms are still desperately needed. I reviewed cases where the hands of the board were tied due to limitations and laws that still allow children to fall through the cracks of a broken system. 

At almost every meeting, I cringed when I heard the words, “There’s another child, failed by the system.” Currently, there are more than 4,300 children in the foster care system in South Carolina alone. 

I plan to work closely with the South Carolina Child Advocacy Agency, as well as the South Carolina Department of Social Services and other agencies, to get my book into the hands of people needing to understand the importance of change. It is my desire to help in enabling South Carolina to create a pilot project that could be adopted throughout the nation to create a successful system that works for—rather than against—children, foster parents, and adoptive parents. 

Like Harriett Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin raised awareness about the atrocities of slavery, so can The Glider be a powerful tool to raise awareness about the atrocities of the foster care and adoptive system. 

Change comes when we all work together.