No Mama, I Didn't Die: My Life As a Stolen Baby - Softcover

Bruch, Devereaux R.

3.35

31 ratings by Goodreads

9781426943683: No Mama, I Didn't Die: My Life As a Stolen Baby

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1426943687 ISBN 13: 9781426943683

Publisher: Trafford on Demand Pub, 2010

View all copies of this ISBN edition:

Devy Bruch, adopted in the late 1930s from the infamous Tennessee Children's Home Society, has lived a life of both privilege and despair. She searched for her biological family for the first seven decades of her life. In 1937, as an infant, she was stolen from her mother by the infamous Georgia Tann, bundled up, and sold to a wealthy couple from Pennsylvania. In her youth, Devy attended exclusive private schools, spent weekends at the Naval Academy, and experienced a debutante season befitting a fine upbringing. Then, as a young woman, she was plunged into deep despair when her husband left her with four young children and no income. She survived through her inner strength, determination, and spirituality. At the age of seventy-one, Devy made the decision to investigate her adoption and found that she had a sister that destiny had denied her for decades. She learned of the heinous truth of her origins-that of a small, sickly baby stolen from her birth mother and sold for profit during the depression. Now life has brought her full circle to enjoy both her own family and the birth family she finally discovered late in life.

"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.

About the Author:

I am Devy (Devereaux) Bruch, born Nell Howell in Tennessee, 1937. As an infant, I was stolen from my mother, Lena Mae Howell just eight hours after she gave birth and sold to a wealthy family through an illegal adoption in the state of Tennessee. Lena was a very young woman at the time and was told that she had given birth to a boy, who had died during delivery. My mother never saw me, nor held me. Many decades later, she went to her grave still suspecting that her baby may have survived. She had heard me cry. She knew in her heart that I could be alive, but she had nowhere to turn. One cold December day, just before Christmas, a chauffeur driven limousine with a nurse and Georgia Tann delivered me to my new home. The year was 1937 and I was a sickly, five-pound weakling, six weeks of age. I had been delivered to my adoptive parents totally sight unseen, until that knock on the door - “Here is your baby.” The years between my illegal adoption and finding my true origins were many faceted, as one climbing up a totem pole, falling down and getting back up to the top over and over and over again. At 71 years of age, I learned that I had sisters and a real, caring, loving family. Nothing in my life has affected me so deeply. It turned my life around. I now realize that I spent many years craving a big family. I always opened up my home to everyone, and provided a warm, cozy place for people to enjoy good food and drink. This was my way of creating family. I reached out to my confidants, my friends, and invited them into my heart, but all in their own way, drifted apart from me. The feat of abandonment was present in my life, but no more. The Howells and the Ganns of Tennessee are my people, my blood, my family. The love they have given me and the knowledge that we are one has brought me a joy and fulfillment I never imagined was possible. There is no denying my roots; the resemblance to them is unmistakable.

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.