Idk if posts like these are allowed(or if it's to late), I was working in the Venice/Sarasota area after hurricane Ian hit Florida and a young lady went out of her way to help the crew I was working with out by doing our laundry. You really don't know how generous that is for someone working 16 hours a day in this god awful Florida heat. I was wondering if someone could help find her so I could thank her in person.

I posted it before, and got hundreds of replies, and due to so many FAQs a lot of people couldn't get a one on one reply, so I'll post again with the FAQs up front, while at the same time trying to make this read like a story with a sequence of events.

But also, to answer one of them now, one week ago she decided she wants to call me "Daddy." I never told her to do that, but when she did it was the best day of my life next to adopting her!

FAQs:

When did this happen?

In March of 2023, I filed for custody, with the intent of permanent placement. A grueling and whirlwind five weeks later it was granted, and after a week of being able to visit her while she was being prepared for the transition, I took her home as her permanent legal guardian on April 30th 2023. Three months later, the formal adoption went through. I was 22 then, now 23. She was four, she's now five.

The only difference was as permanent legal guardian, I was legally recognized as her cousin, but in the capacity of acting parent and her decision maker. With the adoption I became legally her father, same status as if she were biologically mine and had been with me all along.

What happened?

Terrible abuse and abandonment. Her dad loved her, but died of brain cancer when she was 2. Her mom abandoned her and died shortly thereafter of alcohol poisoning. So she was in the custody of her grandparents, who were my aunt and uncle. (She was the granddaughter of my paternal uncle, daughter to my first cousin) They were beating her, from what doctors determined from injuries in various stages of healing, an average of twice a day. They would hit her with virtually anything handy and cover her marks with makeup and long sleeves. She had an open wound that required treatment. Their neighbors discovered it when she was in their yard playing with the kid next door. No one knew until they were hauled off to jail and CPS took her. I visited their house and didn't know. I knew my uncle since birth, and my aunt, his second wife, since I was 8. No one in the family would have guessed it. But they are out of the family now. As for the neighbors, I reached out to introduce myself, and recently took them out to lunch to personally thank them and to tell them of all her progress since they saved her.

Was there sexual abuse?

No, thank God.

Why me?

I was the only blood relative willing and able to take her in. I could never let my family go into foster care. So I hired an excellent family law attorney and we fought for her.

Do I take her to therapy?

I did, at first. Between CPS taking her, and me taking her in, she spent six weeks in a psychiatric hospital for children, partly because of what needed to be done in that regard, and party because CPS decided to hold her there in light of my petition for custody, rather than another move between to a foster home, so a lot of progress was already made. I took her to a few sessions, until the child psychologist advised that we could discontinue for now, due to the progress and that we don't want to keep beating a dead horse and reminding her of her trauma at regular intervals. We can resume at any time it's needed.

How can I afford this at my age, and how can I raise her alone?

Some hard work, but a lot of luck and happenstance, really.

I work from home, which allows me to always be there for her. I started my web design. company a while back and it's been very successful. I'm not rich, but I'm upper middle class. I also received a sizeable inheritance from my grandfather, and I bought a 1600 square foot, 3 bed 2.5 bath house in the suburbs in full.

I also have a 66 year old great aunt who lives next door to me. That's part of the reason I bought that house, though that was before we found out about the abuse. It was about being close to family. My great aunt, along with my whole mother's side of the family, was not a candidate for an administrative placement at the time, they were looking for either a blood relative or someone who had been a long time presence in her life.

But my great aunt, now her great aunt, is my daughter's first safety net. I've got it set up so she gets custody if anything happens to me, and she is also an emergency contact and authorized pickup person for school, and she has a standing medical authorization form, so she can make decisions and approve medical treatment for her in the event I cannot be immediately reached.

Are you dating?

No. And not for the foreseeable future. For a number of practical and personal reasons that effect the both of us. I am perfectly content with this.

What race/nationality am I?

Well this was asked more than once for some reason, so white American.

Was I scared?

Not as much as I was determined, but at first, yes. Very much so! But I couldn't let that show, because I needed her to be one hundred percent confident in me and trust me. I had to think of every scenario, foresee every danger, and all this before I took her home. Words cannot describe how surreal things were the first day. "I've done it. But now I have a 4 year old in the house. Now what?"

I knew that was coming, was warned that was coming, prepared for it as much as a person can prepare for such a thing, but nothing truly prepares a person for the moment it's happened. The first night I was so afraid for her that I slept outside her bedroom door.

How is she adjusting?

Amazingly! She was happy to come live with me, because she remembered me from family visits. But at first she was afraid of everything from someone taking her away from me, to her grandparents coming back and hurting her again. I'd sit up with her a lot as she had nightmares for the first few weeks.

But in the last 14 months she has become the sweetest, most playful and happy kid without a care you could ever see! Shes 5 now. She is no longer afraid. I enrolled her in preschool last September and she finished for the summer in June. She starts kindergarten in the fall, and already reads at a first grade level. She wants to be a veterinarian when she grows up and she may just get there!

And her physical scars are all long gone. I've got her eating healthy except for on special occasions and a dessert after dinner, and found great resources for child nutrition. She is in perfect health now and I've gotten her caught up on her childhood and annual vaccinations that were neglected for the last couple years.

She loves mini golf and bowling. (I have to get her bumpers. But hey, be destructive without actually being destructive LOL)

She loves the old school cartoons, Disney, Hannah Barbara, Scooby Doo and Popeye the Sailor Man. But her favorite of all is a VHS tape called "Little Sister Rabbit." A coming of age story that fits me! (I bought a CRT TV with a build in VHS combo and brought down all my childhood movies from the attic)

Her favorite musician is Frankie Valli. She loves his high pitched style of singing 😂

She loves Wheel of Fortune as much as I do, and we watch it together every night. We will both miss Pat Sajak.

One of her favorite places to go is a neighborhood fixture. An old style drug store with an old fashioned lunch counter. The whole building is about the size of a 7/11. She likes sitting on the stools at the counter where she feels like she's so high up, and she loves their fresh squeezed lemonade and limeades.

She loves reading and being read to every night :)

Do I see her as my daughter;love her as my own?

A thousand times YES!

Having her as my daughter has made me the happiest man alive. Its like she was always supposed to be mine. I only wish she could have taken a better route to get to me.

I'm in a unique position, so anyone who wants advice from my perspective, or has any curious questions, or just wants to talk, feel free!

I felt like I got high at work even tho I was just busting my ass (and havent been smoking). But I work with my wife. And I got a really uncomfortable feeling like idk what the fuck I'm doing with my life and that it was weird I wasn't a teenager just able to waste my life away. But then I looked up and saw HER. Everything felt like it was going according to plan bc she is mine and I am hers. Everything will be alright as long as I have her. She is my world. So r my kids but she was first. And she helps with every single thing I can't thank her enough. I ment to tell her about this moment I had but it's mine forever so ill tell her eventually.

So I just had to share this with someone! Me (30F) and my fiancé (30F) are taking a weekend getaway trip. It just a few hours from home, but it’s a nice place we are staying at. So I packed a snack bag for us in the car and got snacks on the way. I’ve also packed a bottle of wine so we don’t have to pay for a bottle at the resort we are at. When we got here and started unpacking and getting dressed for our nice dinner, she goes “oh, can’t forget these” and pulls two cans Canada Dry Ginger Ale. Now I usually pack some in my snack bag, but I forgot this time. I hadn’t said anything, but this amazing woman had thought to pack some for me. I asked her why and she looked at me and jokingly scoffed “like I don’t know my fiancé.” I teared up watching her put them in the mini fridge and talking about how she wanted to be sure I had some.

I swear. If we weren’t already engaged I would have proposed then and there. I just love this woman with my whole heart, and she brought my favorite drink on our trip to be sure I would have some. That’s it Reddit, I just wanted to share and my heart is so full.

Roughly around late fall / early winter of 2023, I found an injured pigeon hopping around outside my front door. It was clear he had hurt his wing as he couldn’t fly and it was a really cold and windy evening. I named him ‘Peter the Pigeon’ and I made up a little shoe-box bed with some bird feed and water, put Peter in the bed and took him inside our garage for the night (we have two bird-loving cats inside!). He was still there in the morning and eventually left some point in the late morning and I was just happy to help out a little guy in need.

Well, maybe a month later or so I noticed a pigeon that would chill out on my garden fence pretty much every single evening and I’d joke that it was Peter. Not long after that this same pigeon would always be joined by another pigeon, which I called ‘Pam the Pigeon’ and they would regularly mate on my fence lmaooo. The time passed and Spring came, Peter and Pam had made a nest in the tree in my garden and they had babies! I’d always watch them going back and forth from their nest and even got to see the whole process till the babies left the nest. Peter and Pam are still here everyday and last week I saw them setting up (or repairing?? idk) another nest in the same tree so i’m hoping for some new baby pigeons!! They’re still wild pigeons of course and behave accordingly, but I feel like we’ve built somewhat of a level of trust because i’m able to stand right underneath them when they’re on the fence and they won’t fly away.

Anyways I thought i’d share the story of the pigeon couple, Peter and Pam for everyone :)

https://preview.redd.it/xj7344t6u0cd1.png?width=2417&format=png&auto=webp&s=083b4944369bf1729cdd0653eba1e2d0e87c91c5

I have recently over the years been going through a really hard time quietly. Well my brother stopped in to town for a few days and saw a picture of how I have been. I have always been close with my family and when I hugged him goodbye I couldn't help but cry a bit. .

You know when you think the hug is over and make a move to release from the hug but they don't let go right away, so you hug them back more? It was one of the longest, deepest, most meaningful moments of my life. To feel so heard and loved by someone like that. We have always been close but never connected on such an intimate level.

Since then I have started thinking about how much I have taken people in my life for granted. Hugs for granted. I have always found myself around friends and family that hug all the time and can share a vulnerable moment. Despite my mental health I am so happy to be around those who aren't afraid to be human.

This marked a turning point (I hope). But all in all I just wanted this off my chest. There is love out there for us even if we don't love ourselves

These last two days I (28f) was horribly sick (still am but not as bad), now because of being sick I could not work and spent the whole 2 days in bed (or bathroom). My kids of course were with me right there the whole time with me lying in bed. I decided to watch some High School Musical (I know I know I feel the judgement LOL but deep down I love these movies). SO, we are watching the 3rd one and if you guys don't know it is about prom and graduation. Well, they are singing about prom and my son (9M) looks at me and asks, "mom did you go to prom?" I said "yes, I did I went with a guy friend who is in the Navy." My daughters (5F, 6F) looked with big eyes at me and go "does that mean we can go to when we are older??" I looked at them and said of course why wouldn't you?

I kid you not my son goes "well did... that means you, did it?" I got a little bit nervous/confused and asked, "what do you mean by it?" Then one of daughters (6F) goes "well yea look they are doing it on tv" Believe me I'm looking hard at the tv, at the background maybe there is something I did not catch all these years where I though these movies were innocent. I look at my son and go "what do you mean it?" my daughters are giggling at this point and son smirks and goes "look at them they are kissing!" I burst out laughing "ooh that's what you mean" (RELIEF all over!) I looked at my kids and said, "you can go to prom and don't have to kiss anybody if you don't want to." All of them go "ohh we thought you had to kiss if you go to prom since that is what they are doing." Then of course I explained to them they are kissing and going to prom because they are boyfriend and girlfriend. But you can always go to prom by yourself or with group of friends doesn't have to be boyfriend girlfriend only. - We laughed it off and enjoyed the rest of the evening.

My teeth are no longer in jail. They feel and look amazing. I cannot explain what this has done for my confidence.

My 52 year old mum got a laptop and I’ve helped her set up Steam, Stardew Valley, Minecraft and Discord over facetime. We live across the country from each other and I thought it’d be fun to teach her to play games so we can hang out a bit more.

She’s not confident with computers at all and struggles a lot more after surviving a ruptured aneurysm in 2020, so I’m really proud of her for being up to try new things. I sent her the cat gif and hearing her giggle at it warmed my soul. Maybe you guys will find it wholesome too!

My 8 yr old autistic and non verbal little brother decided he wanted to try one of my boba teas today, I thought he wouldn't like it because he has sensory issues and I thought he wouldn't like the Boba balls in it because it's the ones that pop, but apparently, he did like the Boba balls, but in a different way then expected. When he first from them in the bottom of his cup, he thought they were little fish, so he filled the rest of his cup with water for the "fish" and is now watching transformers with the cup, saying that it's is pet.

EDIT 1: BEFORE ANYONE ELSE GETS WORRIED, Don't worry, he knows when he DOES eat said balls, he's supposed to chew, BUT, I think these ones are called gobi(not sure, my memory is right there with Dory) but they're the juice filled ones that pop super easily, so I don't think they'll get stuck, but even if they can, I'm being extra cautious with it, my anxiety won't let me NOT be cautious lol

I grew up in a home with parents with what I’d call high expectations. Get A’s in school, play varsity sports, just be the best type of stuff. Through out all of this me and my siblings never really were told that we did well/met expectations etc. I always thought that I was just scraping by as “good enough” as my parents really never said otherwise.

Fast forward 15 years. I’m married. I have kids of my own. I still talk with my parents weekly. But I’ve lived the past 8 years believing that my parents were not proud of me because I dropped out of engineering school to work IT instead.

A little more backstory, my parents are not tech savvy and they often “butt dial”. This past week a random voice message showed up in my text convo with my dad. It was 10 minutes long and it was a conversation between my parents. You could tell from audio quality that the phone was in my dad’s pocket.

My parents were talking about me and my siblings and how proud they were they we were all happily married and in successful careers. They talked about the road bumps that we had seen along the way but we had all overcome them. I ended up crying for like 30 minutes because it just overcame me with emotions. These were words I had wanted to hear for over half my life.

I have looked back at my childhood since hearing the message and realize that even though they had never explicitly said they were proud they never discouraged us. My parents are clearly reserved people and don’t know how to express these things to their kids so this is an amazing happy accident.

TLDR: My parents left a heartwarming message that changed my view of them of the past 15 years for the better.

With all the bad news that bombards us every day, I found a small glimmer of hope. I get an email from goodnewsnetwork.org. It’s a nice way you can start the day!