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The following touching story was contributed by one of our readers, Donnette Liotta.

                                                                        For My Paco    

     I am a healthy twenty-three year old, born with normal vision, normal hearing and normal speech.  My twin sister, Dawn, was not born so lucky.  My mother was very young when she had given birth to my sister and me.  Because we were born so early we were placed in incubators until we were three weeks old.  While in the incubator, the doctor administered too much oxygen to my sister.  She was later diagnosed with cerebral palsy, a nervous disorder which causes a malfunction in the sensory motor skills and also brain damage.  She had undergone several unsuccessful surgeries to restore her sight which was completely gone in her left eye and only 68% detectable in her right eye.  Along with a slow developing brain, and legal blindness, it was also determined that she was legally deaf in her right ear.  She had to wear braces on her legs and she had to walk with crutches.  She stuck out like a sore thumb connected to all these contraptions, often causing people to stare and point.
     While growing up a twin, I felt my identity was not my own.  I wanted to just be Donnette, NOT DAWN'S TWIN SISTER.  We lived in a small neighborhood where my sister was the only 'different' child.  We were both constantly picked on, and we never had any friends because of my sister's condition.  I began to loathe my sister, and I did everything and anything to get her into trouble to get back at her being born mentally retarded and physically disabled.
     I felt like she was a constant thorn in my side.  I was embarrassed to be seen with her, so I made fun of her right along with the other children.  When I turned twelve my mother was so disgusted with my behavior towards my sister, she figured I was old enough to know better, and that I should love my sister for who she is, for that is the way God created her.
     My mother threw me in my bedroom and gave me a thick yellow book which looked to me like a photo album.  What I saw in that book changed my life and my attitude about the way that I viewed my sister and other handicapped people like her.
     There were numerous baby pictures of my sister and I dressed alike, the only difference: Dawn was hooked up to tubes and needles and machines.  She had her hands and fingers taped so that she would not compromise the patch on her eye from surgery.  She looked like a mummy.  I looked small and peaceful.  There were also several pictures of the two of us in the hospital until we were three years old.  Once again, Dawn was wrapped up in a glorified mummy outfit, with tubes and needles attached to her everywhere.  If you looked closely, you could see the pain reflected in her eyes.  The picture that stood out the most was a Polaroid snapshot of the two of us in the crib hugging each other.  The caption below read, 'I am so happy to get a visit from my twin sister, Netti.  The doctors make me cry.  She makes me laugh.'
     I noticed one common factor in all of the pictures: even though she was in a great deal of pain, and suffering so much, this baby girl, who some would call a handicapped retard, smiled so big for the camera.  I realized then what my mother was trying to show me.  I felt ashamed at the way I treated her, and I cried myself to sleep.
     Later that evening, my sister crawled over and woke me up for dinner.  I kissed her and hugged her and profusely apologized for my behavior.  She looked at me with uncertainty in her eyes.  I knew she did not know what I was talking about.  But I knew, I knew.
     From that moment on, I was my sister's protector.  No one was going to hurt her for any reason.  If the children in the neighborhood did not want to play with us because of my sister, so be it.  We would play with each other.  We did not need them.  We were inseparable.
     Now as I look back, I realize that I never once took my sister's feeling into consideration.  I did not want to know my own sister's story of why.  I was so caught up in my own selfishness that I never saw her pain.  I never put myself in her shoes.  I never had to struggle to do normal, everyday activities.  I could run and jump all on my own, without crutches.  I never knew how blessed I truly was, or how special Dawn is.
     I know that I made it worse for her, because she longed to be 'normal' like me.  Strangers do not understand her because they do not know how to deal with her, nor do they have experience dealing with her, so they treat her indifferently.  But I am her sister, her blood, and I should have been there for her straight from the beginning.  I am her other half, just as she is my other half.  When Dawn hurts, I hurt: that is the unbreakable bond Dawn and I share.  After all, I AM DAWN'S TWIN SISTER, and she is my world.

     'I love you, Paco!!'

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The Day I Found Out

I was an only child. For some reason it never occurred to me that I should have brothers and sisters, or did I ever miss not having them. I was a happy child never feeling deprived of anything. Since I was the center of my parent’s devotion I was a contented child, happy with my life.

My earliest memories are of being kissed and hugged. I remember my Mama’s soft, sweet fragrance. She smelled like "cashmere bouquet", the talcum powder she liked to use.

Perhaps somewhere in the back of my young mind I understood I was an adopted child and as such would not have brothers and sisters. When I was about 6 years old my friend Patsy informed me one day that I was adopted. I began to cry and my friend Billy T. G. rode me home on his bicycle. My mother took me on her lap and held me as I cried, while telling her what had happened.

She asked if it would make any difference to me and I said, "uh huh". In other word, yes it would. She didn’t respond but just continued to hold me and hug me, so I knew is was true. She never confirmed or denied it and my father never spoke of it to his dying day.

As far as they were concerned I was theirs and later my mother would tell me she couldn’t believe I didn’t actually come out of her body. I was 10 days old when my mama and daddy got me.

Patricia Louise Carberry
Missouri, USA

When I was very young I remember playing with the girl next door, making mud cakes. We lived in a small house behind the high school in Alton. One day my dad took our picture, mud cakes and all.

My dad took a lot of pictures with his blue Kodak camera. He developed the pictures himself in our basement. I remember helping him. All the lights had to be turned out while we transferred the negatives from one pan to the other. It was a lot of fun for a small boy.

My dad often came home from work for lunch, I suppose because it was a way to save money since it was during the depression. While he was eating lunch one day I drove nails into three of his tires. Not too long after he left to return to work he called home saying that he had just pulled into a service station with a flat tire, only to find out he had three flat tires.

When my dad questioned me about the flat tires I said, "when you had a flat tire last time, and you were pumping it up with air, and I wanted to help, you said the next time you had a flat tire you would let me pump it up. (I guess I just didn’t want to wait.)

Some time later, my dad was going fishing with one of his friends. I wanted to go with him, so while he was getting ready, I got in the back seat. When they got ready to go they tried to get me out of the back seat and I just "held on for dear life". Finally, they gave up and let me go with them. I reportedly later told my mother, " the next time you want to go somewhere just get in the back seat and hold on".

One of my best memories was going to the movies with my dad. We saw a lot of Gene Autry movies. I remember riding on his shoulders on the way home, just the two of us. My dad later would tell over and over the story of how I would hold his hands and sing to him a song I learned from one of the movies. I would sing "Ou R My Ucky Star. My Ucky Star is What Ou R". He never forgot me doing that. Those were good times.

These memories are from my short life before I was in the first grade. I know this for sure, because one day right before my sixth birthday my mother told me that I was going to sleep with my dad that night. She said we were going away. I didn’t know what all that meant. I remember my dad breathed deeply in his sleep and snored a little. The next day we moved in with my grandparents in another town.

I missed doing these things with my dad.

Anonymous
Missouri, USA

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