My Mom was not born in a hospital, but was delivered at home by a physician. According to what she was told later by her Mother, since she was born two months premature, they did not think that she would survive, so her Mother was told to “leave her on the bed for awhile, and she will die soon.”
It shocked me when she told me this, since I had not known about this, in my fifty-eighth year of life. Also, I also did not know that between the time her (older) brother and her own childbirth, her Mother (my Grandmother), had lost four children, who had been born stillborn, and had not survived. Further, Mom also stated that two other children also did not survive childbirth sometime after her birth.
Wow, that meant that out of eight children she had, only two survived, my uncle Ernest, and her!
Needless to say, my Mom did not die, and has had a full, and satisfying “lively” life, as she would probably say now in her seventy-eighth year. This was so interesting because when she informed me of this, we were having a discussion about my Son, who was also born two months premature, and we were also told that he probably would not survive. A coincidence, you say? I don’t believe so. She would probably say that since we are all born from the same “mata” (plant), we all have the same roots. Simple as that….
Another thing learned is that since she was given up for dead, no one ever registered her and she never even had a birth certificate until the day she applied for her U. S. Passport to go overseas to see my Brother Bill and family. It turns out that the U. S. State Department had to do some further research before granting her a passport. They found out she was in numerous census activity, therefore, they did grant her a passport. Believe it or Not!
Robert Collazo, 7/25/10
