Feet First Into Purpose — Destined to Go My Own Way
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I Came in Backward — and That’s Exactly How I Was Meant To
I was born breech — feet first. Most people arrive head-first, following the map life hands them. Not me.
Before I even took my first breath, I flipped the script.
That single moment — before I had a name, before I had a voice — was already a message. A quiet rebellion. A sacred no, thank you to the ordinary way of doing things. The world expected me to enter one direction; I decided, this way makes more sense to me.
Looking back, it explains everything. I’ve always moved through life a little differently — learning in reverse, healing through instead of around, and hearing truth long before people said it out loud. Some call that difficult; I call it design.
I didn’t come into this world the wrong way. I came in my way.
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My mother carried me in Germany, far from the red clay of home, while my father wore the Army uniform that had already seen one war too many. Vietnam was over, but its fingerprints were everywhere — on his body, in his memories, and, though no one realized it then, probably in his blood. The soldiers called it Agent Orange: a defoliant the military sprayed to strip the jungle bare, never imagining it might scar the people who used it. Long after the uniforms were folded away, families learned what the chemical had done. My father never complained; he just kept walking, as soldiers do. But that shadow followed us all.
Meanwhile, my mother was young, homesick, and doing her best to follow doctors’ orders in a language that wasn’t hers. When morning sickness hit, they handed her a small white pill called Bendectin — the wonder drug of its day. During that time, it hadn’t been proven beyond all doubt that Bendectin caused birth defects in babies born missing limbs. But if you were to ask the mothers who took it — and the children like me who grew up counting fingers that never were — we’d all agree: people knew more than they admitted. Maybe not in the medical journals, but in their bones, they knew. And it could have been avoided.
Still, this isn’t about blame; you can’t rewrite time. And while I believe what happened could have been prevented, I’m also grateful that it wasn’t. Because it gave me me. That doesn’t mean I’ve stopped fighting for justice or the compensation owed for a lifetime of extra battles. It just means I’ve learned to live in that space between gratitude and grit — to hold both truth and thankfulness in the same hand.
Section 2 — The Delivery Room
When the time finally came for me to make my grand entrance, I imagine the scene in that German hospital was pure chaos — the kind of chaos that turns calm professionals into wide-eyed spectators. My mother had been pushing for hours, my father probably pacing, praying, and pretending he wasn’t terrified. Then came me. Feet first. Small but mighty.
What started as an ordinary birth quickly turned into a full-blown event. I’m pretty sure the number of people in the room doubled, then tripled — nurses whispering, doctors calling for more doctors, someone running for equipment no one ended up using. I picture it now and laugh, because if there’s one thing consistent about my life, it’s that I draw a crowd. The world has always wanted a front-row seat to my existence.
When I finally arrived, there was a stillness — that moment right after a baby comes out, when time freezes. Then the whispering started again. Something wasn’t what they expected. The missing arm. The leg that looked different. A room full of people suddenly forgetting the one rule they teach you in medical school: don’t let shock show on your face.
What they didn’t realize is that I was fine. Maybe not typical, but fine. More than fine — I was divine architecture wrapped in surprise. But to them, it was a problem that needed fixing, a mystery to be studied.
That’s when the conversation shifted from “It’s a girl!” to something colder. They told my parents I should be taken away — institutionalized, they called it — placed with “others like her.” They said I’d never have a real life. The word they used back then was retarded. Cruel. Heavy. Final. The kind of word that hangs in the air like smoke you can’t un-breathe.
They didn’t want my parents to take me home. They wanted to keep me there, tucked away somewhere quiet, where curiosity could study me without the inconvenience of love.
But love was already louder than their logic. My mother, exhausted and hurting, refused. My father, soldier-still, made sure no one came near me again without permission. They wrapped me up and took me home — no parade, no certainty, just love that wouldn’t let go.
That single act of defiance became the first chapter of my purpose. Before I ever spoke a word, my life had already proven something sacred: you can’t institutionalize destiny.
Section 3 — Reflection, Jaron’s Birth, and the Closing
From that first day on, eyes have followed me everywhere. I don’t mean just the doctors in that room; I mean the world. There’s something about me that makes people look twice, whisper, nudge, or simply stare. Grocery store, church, mall, it doesn’t matter—if I show up, attention shifts. At first it used to sting. Then it became a kind of soundtrack. Eventually, I realized I could conduct it.
When people watch you long enough, you learn stagecraft. I learned to smile on cue, to read a room faster than anyone, to sense energy before a word was spoken. What others might call survival, I call intuition. The same awareness that once made me self-conscious became my superpower.
So yes, I’ve always been watched—but I’ve also been seen. There’s a difference. Being watched is about curiosity; being seen is about recognition. I’ve learned to turn one into the other. If you’re going to look, you might as well witness something worth remembering.
Years later, when I gave birth to my son Jaron, the universe replayed the scene for its own amusement. Twenty people in the delivery room—no exaggeration. Apparently, everyone wanted to see “the little lady” give birth naturally. I still laugh about it: they came to see if I could do it, and I did it right in front of them. I pushed, I delivered, I mothered—feet first, spirit forward. Life has a wicked sense of humor, doesn’t it?
It was in that moment that I finally understood something deeper about my entrance into the world. The same God who let me come in backward made sure I would keep moving forward. Every limitation people placed on me became a platform. Every stare became a spotlight. Every assumption became a chance to surprise somebody.
When I think about the ingredients that built me—Agent Orange drifting through jungles thousands of miles away, Bendectin bottles in tidy German pharmacies, the hands of doctors who didn’t know what to do with a baby like me—I don’t see tragedy. I see orchestration. None of it was random. I was meant to come exactly this way: every difference deliberate, every detail divine.
And I know I’m not alone. There are others—children of that same era—born with stories written on their bodies just like mine. I’ve never met one face-to-face, but I can feel them out there, shining in their own corners of the world. Survivors. Thrivers. Proof that destiny doesn’t apologize.
Some days I still catch myself wondering what the nurses whispered as they cleaned me up that morning in Germany. Maybe disbelief. Maybe awe. Maybe both. But here’s what I know now: I was never their mystery to solve. I was their miracle to witness.
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I’m not telling this story for sympathy. I don’t need pity; I need presence. I tell it because I want whoever’s reading to feel something tug inside of them—the recognition that we all come into this life with purpose, no matter how backward or broken the delivery looks.
My story begins with doctors predicting what I wouldn’t be able to do. This book exists because I’ve done it all anyway. And this is only the first chapter.
So if you’ve made it this far, stay with me. The story only grows deeper from here. I came feet first into purpose—grounded, unplanned, unstoppable—and I’m still walking.