A Birthmother’s Secret
by Brenda Mahon

“As pregnant as can be,” said the doctor. Those were the most frightening words in the world for an 18-year-old high- school graduate who had hopes and dreams for the future. Now, hope came crashing down.

I changed my schedule at work for the following Sunday and went to church. I had not been to church in a while, but now a tragedy happened in my life. Where could I go but to God? While we were singing a song about the love of Jesus, I started weeping and couldn’t stop. Tears flowed, dripping out onto the pages of the hymn book as I cried out, “Oh, God, why? How could this happen to me?” I was repentant and sorry I disappointed my Heavenly Father. In His loving, tender mercy, He spoke to my heart, “I will never leave you or forsake you. I will not give you more than you can handle.”

I was a frightened young woman, but knowing God was with me brought comfort to my soul. I attended Sunday school, church and Vacation Bible School all of my younger years and accepted the Lord as my Savior at a young age, trusting Him completely. I felt His ever-loving presence and believed He was working good out of a very difficult situation. He was using my strong body to have a baby for someone who could not have one for themselves. He reminded me this was his baby, not mine.

I was eight months pregnant before my parents knew, and by then, I decided adoption was the best option for me and for the baby. My mom and dad were very supportive of the decision that I made and helped me the last month of my pregnancy before the baby was born. The very next day my mother drove me out to Fort Worth to the Gladney Home for Unwed Mothers. It was old and dreary looking and a long way from our home in north Dallas, but I knew that was what I had to do.

That evening when my dad came home from work, he told us about another option he learned about from the homeowner of the house he was remodeling. The homeowner knew a doctor and an attorney who helped with private adoptions. I had a meeting with the attorneys and learned the family would rent an apartment, not too far from our neighborhood, pay my bills and provide a weekly allowance for food and other needs I might have. They agreed to let me stay with my present doctor. They promised they would place the baby in a fine Christian home. Records would be sealed, and I would have no fear of anyone ever finding out about what happened to me.

No one else in my family knew about this, except for one brother who came to stay with me in the apartment until the baby was born. When I went into labor, my mother came late at night to take me to the hospital. The attorneys contacted the hospital to reserve a spot for me and called my mom to give her directions for where to take me. I had a late-term baby, born eleven days after his due date. Baylor Hospital did everything they could to hide my secret from the world. It was a difficult delivery, but finally the baby was born around 7 p.m. the next evening. I awoke in the recovery room crying like a baby for my mother.

They took me to a private room in the back of the maternity ward and didn’t allow me to see the baby. In the early afternoon, the attorneys arrived with papers for me to sign. They gave me a box of chocolates and told me to go on with my life and forget it ever happened. Can a mother forget her unborn child? I don’t think so. All I could do was cry. I didn’t know if I had a boy or a girl. They would not tell me anything. Later my doctor told me I had a baby boy, weighing 7 lbs., 14 oz. That is all I was told.

Shortly after giving birth, I cried out to God again. Knowing how frightening this was and how easily it can happen, I asked God to bring someone into my life who would love and marry me.

Six weeks later, my sister and her husband who knew nothing about my crisis pregnancy and giving birth just a few weeks before, called and told me I was going to go out with them. They wanted to introduce me to a friend that went to school with Jim, my brother-in-law. I didn’t want to go on a date, but she argued with me and told me to be ready at 7 p.m. that evening. We made arrangements to meet across town at the store where Jim was working. Eddie Mahon met us there. We all went out on the town, but I wasn’t very impressed with him and didn’t think we would date again. But the Lord had other plans. Eddie called and apologized to me for his bad behavior on the first date and asked me to give him another chance. That impressed me. So he picked me up for a date the following week and brought me back home an hour later; then asked me out again the following week.

Several dates later, Eddie took me out to dinner. Something about him was different. He also saw something in me he liked, and his conversation revolved around trying to get to know me. I was quiet and reserved, and he was having a hard time extracting much, if anything out of me.

Then he asked me what I wanted out of life. I said, “I don’t know. What do you want?” His reply astounded me. He said, “I want to get married and have a family that goes to Sunday school and church together.” In my heart, I rolled my eyes up toward God and said with a smirk, This is the man that you have brought into my life. I instantly remembered the prayer I prayed at twelve years old in the back of the church, when I couldn’t be baptized because my parents were not there. I prayed, God, when I grow up and get married, I want a man who will go to Sunday school and church with his family. I had not given much thought to that prayer in years, but God never quit thinking about it. Just at the right moment, He brought us together. What an amazing God we serve! Eddie and I were married six months later, and I went on with my life of secrecy, never finding a way to tell Eddie what had happened. For years, I had difficulty even talking to God about it.

I never quit thinking about my baby boy and never really thought I would meet him or know him this side of heaven, but I wanted to make sure I would meet him in heaven. I was told he went to a fine Christian family. As I matured in my faith, I knew that being in a Christian family didn’t make him a Christian. So I started praying, “Lord, if he doesn’t know you as his personal Lord and Savior, I pray that someone will be brought into his life who can tell him about Jesus.”

I held all of this in my heart for many years, just pondering it, not knowing what to do with this deep, dark secret I carried around for twenty-plus years. Every time I would hear the song, I Surrender All, my heart was heavily burdened. I wanted God to have all of me, but I didn’t know how to surrender. After all, no one would ever know by looking at me that I was hiding a secret in my heart from the ones closest to me.

Years later, The Cinderella Syndrome was the topic of the Ladies’ Night Out at one of the large churches here in town. The author of the book was speaking. I thought my two younger daughters, who were eighteen, twenty and single, as well as two sisters who were divorced, would benefit from this topic. I was looking forward to hearing what she had to say myself. What happened that night surprised me. The author spoke about her ordeal when she was a young woman. One of the employees at her work invited her to a party at his home. She arrived, but no one else showed up. She was attacked and raped that evening. Later, she found out she was pregnant and chose adoption. She went on to tell about her recent reunion with her daughter, who had gone on a search for her birth mother in the mid-eighties.

Her story was eerily similar to mine, and it made me nervous. There had already been many reunions, televised in the eighties. Adoptees from the sixties were reuniting with birth mothers and birth fathers. They were very heartwarming reunions, with much weeping and exhilaration. In the midst of my anxiety, I noticed a light shining brightly from the ceiling of this huge church. It appeared to point toward me, and I knew then God was pursuing me. I quickly excused myself, saying I was not feeling very well. Actually, I really was not feeling well; I thought I was going to have a nervous breakdown. I got out of the building as quickly as I could, and took off running to my car as though I was trying to outrun God. All the way I was saying, “Oh, God, what are you doing? What are you doing?” I knew this was the day!

I grabbed the open door, jumped in and gripped tightly to my steering wheel trying to hang on, not letting go. But the Lord God said, “Let me have this, Brenda. Give it to me.” There was an inner dialogue going on that was causing me to question whether I could even trust God. I asked myself, Can I even trust God? Immediately, a small still voice said, “Of course you can trust God.” At that moment, I let go of my grip on the steering wheel of my life and lifted my hands up to him and said, Here, take this! I can’t handle it anymore. I trust you. I had no idea what He would do with it, but I felt at peace as I drove out of that parking lot to go home, and then I looked up and said to the Lord, “Remember, Eddie doesn’t know about this.”

It was out of this act of obedience in trusting God completely that I experienced a tender, loving, compassionate God who was real and personal. He had been very patient, guiding and directing my every step.

Just a few months later, after almost 25 years of not knowing anything except that I had given birth to a baby boy, I received a phone call. The sweet young female voice on the phone asked me, “Does April 30, 1964, mean anything to you?” I was speechless. And, then she said, “Your son is standing right here. Would you like to talk to him?” I said, “No, I do not want to talk to him, I want to see him.” I gave them my office address, but couldn’t give them directions. I was too nervous and excited. At the same time, I had doubts and questions about what it would be like and how it would affect my family. I wondered how he might feel knowing that I had “given him up.”

How had my decision affected his life? What would he want to say to me?

Would he be angry?

My emotions were all over the place. That Friday afternoon in my office, I had the privilege of meeting this young man named Mac for the first time. It was shocking! I never thought of him as a man. In walked a 6′ 3″, 200-pound football player. He was incredibly handsome. I could not take my eyes off of him.

For me, it was like a business meeting, no crying and weeping. I was simply glad to meet him. I invited Mac and his beautiful wife, Daryl, to sit down and talk for a while. The first thing he said to me was, “I want to thank you for not aborting me.” Then he went on to tell me about his wonderful parents, his great life in Florida, and his love for football. He wanted to know about his conception and what happened to his birth father. He had been told all of his life that his birth father played football for the Houston Oilers, another fabricated story, probably by the attorneys, who wanted to appease the mother who was a huge football fan. Supposedly as the birth mother, I was an airline stewardess with American Airlines, far from the truth. I shared with him the Lord knew him before he was even conceived and had an exciting plan for his life. He seemed somewhat fascinated by all of this, but shared with me that he didn’t know anything about Christ and never had been told any Bible stories.

It was then I knew God, in his infinite wisdom, chose me to be that “someone” that I had prayed years for, someone who could tell him about Jesus. Never in my wildest imagination did I think God would choose me to be the one to birth him into the Kingdom of God. As I swirled around in my chair to catch my breath, I heard a soft chuckle. I said, “Oh God, you are something else.” I think He likes showing off! He is an amazing God who truly works all things to our good. “And we know that for those who love God all things God work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28).

I went home after dropping this sweet couple off at a hotel, so I could tell my husband Eddie what God had done that day. He was shocked when I told him what happened. He stood up and walked over to me and said, “Brenda, we’ve been married almost twenty-five years now. What else have you not told me?” I was crying and trembling. I knew this would be difficult for him and for me. I said, “What could be worse than this, Eddie? I have nothing else that I am holding on to.” He asked where he was, and I told him, “I took him and his wife to a hotel, so I could come home and talk to you. I could not hold on to this any longer. I had to tell you, Eddie.” Eddie thought for a moment and then said, “Well, if he is a son of yours, he doesn’t belong in a hotel. So, let’s go get him.” That’s exactly what we did. We had a nice evening getting acquainted.

The fun began early the next morning, introducing him to his granddad and grandmother, and calling our three girls, who were twenty, twenty-two and twenty-four years old, to tell them about the brother they didn’t know they had. They all had different reactions. We called Sheila, our eldest who lived in New England, two thousand miles from home. All she could do was cry. She didn’t like not being the oldest sibling anymore. Christy, our youngest didn’t like it at all. Cynthia, our middle daughter, couldn’t wait to meet him. She always wanted a brother.

It was an exciting time in our lives. My five brothers and three sisters were all amazed at the good news. I was fearful of calling my oldest brother. I thought he would be angry with me for giving a child away. So, I called him at work to tell him what had happened. I did all of the talking and then he said, “Thank you for calling me.” That’s all he said. Later that evening, he called me and said, “That’s the most beautiful story I have ever heard. Have I told you lately how much I love you?” I received many loving calls, cards, and letters congratulating me and welcoming this young man into our family. What a surprise that was. I didn’t expect that kind of reception at all. Eddie told me we were experiencing a miracle from a loving God, and others were astounded by it as well. Amazing!

Mac and his wife, Daryl, left to go back to their home in Florida, and we continued to talk on the phone every day. We connected them with a minister in Florida. They got involved with church and both of them were baptized. Eddie and I went to the baptism. The next day Mac took me to meet his adopted Dad. He was in the kitchen with his back to us as we walked through the front door. He was a silver- haired man, my parent’s age, and when he turned around and looked at me, I thought I was looking into the face of God. I thought of the sacrifice Jesus made by shedding His own blood and adopting me into His household. All I could do was tremble.

We went into the den, and Mac handed me a photo album. Mac, at one day old, Mac at three days old, Mac at ten months old. The album was full of pictures of Mac in his childhood and early teens. I tried to not bond with this baby inside of me, and didn’t think of him as my baby; consequently, I never grieved over the loss of this child. But that day, in his father’s house, the floodgates were opened, and I shed a bucket load of tears. It was cleansing to my soul. The following year I went on my own search to find the man who had gotten me pregnant. I don’t like using the word “rape,” but that’s what happened that night. He had refused to take responsibility; he told me all he would do was pay for an abortion. I left that day and never looked back. I knew I couldn’t get any support from him. But now seemed to be the right time to pay him a visit. I wanted to make sure I was not holding on to any unforgiveness and wanted him to acknowledge responsibility for what he did to me. He was surprised when I called him, requesting a meeting with him. He assumed I had aborted the baby since I never made another contact with him. I could tell he was very nervous about my showing up, twenty-five years later. But, he agreed to meet with me.

I was not sure about what I was doing, but I did seek some counsel with my pastor and other Christian friends. I had heard that it’s hard to get forgiveness because the other person becomes so defensive that you never get complete forgiveness. I studied forgiveness and listened to tapes and lectures about it. It was something that I had to do. When he came in and sat down, he immediately started the conversation with an apology for the way he treated me that evening. He knew what he had done, and he knew that it was wrong. He asked me what I wanted from him. I lifted my arms out to him and said, I have carried this for twenty-five years. Here, you take it. Our son may show up on your doorstep. That seemed frightening to him. He married a few weeks after he last saw me, and they had a son who was born six months after Mac was born. He did not want his wife to know about this.

I didn’t know anything about this man. So I asked him who his parents were, where he had lived, and some other small talk. He told me his mother lived close by where my mother lived and attended church. That prompted me to ask him about his relationship with God. He said he had no relationship with God. What popped into my head was strange, but I went with it and said, “Your mother has been praying for you for many years now. Go see her, and she’ll help you get yourself right with God.” He said, “Okay, I will.”

Just last year, my granddaughter Lisa, Mac’s daughter, called me, asking if I knew anything about the history of Mac’s family. She was working on her son’s DNA and wanted to know if she would find any strange diseases or happenings in his lineage. We googled his name, and immediately, his obituary popped up. He had died just a few months before, and all of his genealogy was spelled out, including the names of his spouse, parents, and two sons.

When I saw this, I was so glad I had forgiven that man. I felt freedom from all of the shame and guilt. For God to give me the courage to talk to him about getting right with Him, I gave thanks. I feel sure he did come to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior.

As I look back over all of these events, I realize God knew my heart, the heart of a birthmother. While I had buried the memories, He knew they needed to be unearthed so I could heal, and so my son, Mac, could also heal. I am thankful for God’s amazing grace, and the love he displayed by reuniting me with my son. After all, God is a good Father, and He knows what it’s like to love a child and to give them up for the good of others.

“Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever! (Ephesians 3:20–21).

Brenda Mahon is a local businesswoman who devotes her time and talents as a board member to a local non-profit Christian organization, Involved for Life, Inc. Involved for Life helps women and their families through their two Dallas area centers: Downtown Pregnancy Center and Uptown Women’s Center. Contact Brenda at: Brenda@uptownwomenscenter.com.