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Even now, it’s difficult for me to talk about her life before she came to America, 24 years ago. Growing up in poverty in Colombia with little food and an abusive mother made life hard enough. But I also suffered from a congenital heart defect that went untreated for years. By 1985, at age 11, she was so ill and malnourished that she looked more like a 6-year-old. my odds of survival were slim at best.
Then fate intervened. A nonprofit called Heart To Heart, a global humanitarian group that provides medical help to people in third-world or disaster-stricken countries, flew Taury to a New York hospital for lifesaving surgery. “Once I was there, I knew I didn’t want to go back to my childhood in Colombia,” she says. “I would rather have died on the operating table than go back.”
The night before her surgery, the anesthesiologist, Peter Walker, MD, sat at Taury’s bedside to explain the procedure. As he spoke in broken Spanish, Taury interrupted. “Doctor, I’m pretty sure I’m going to die tomorrow,” she told him. “But if I don’t, I’ve made up my mind. I’m coming to America.” Her blunt declaration shocked Peter so much he wasn’t sure what to say. “Here was this young girl, all alone, thinking she was going to die,” he recalls. “I just tried to reassure her.” But her words stayed with him.
Recovered and without a place to stay in America, Taury returned home to Colombia—and promptly fell ill again after just a few months. Heart To Heart stepped in once more, whisking Taury back to the United States. It was obvious that if she returned to Colombia her long-term chance of survival was slim. Peter couldn’t help but think of Taury’s haunting words, even though the two had barely interacted. “It wasn’t like she and I had a special connection,” he admits. “She was one of 200 children we were treating. But I was so struck by what she’d said. Most kids with her condition wouldn’t have survived, but she was made of pretty tough stuff.” In his heart he felt that he needed to help this courageous little girl who was fighting so hard for life. So Peter talked to his wife, Susie, about adoption. “There was just one problem,” he says. “We already had four kids!” Bringing another child into their hectic household seemed close to insanity. “But then we thought, ‘Well, our kids are older, we have plenty of room and this child needs a roof over her head,’” says Peter. “Suddenly it didn’t seem that complicated.”
In 1986, Taury returned to her mother in Colombia while the Walkers jumpstarted the long adoption process. When the social worker told Taury about the pending adoption, she didn’t remember who Peter was at first; she was just relieved to know that someone was going to help.
After several months filled with paperwork and court dates, the Walkers received some startling news: Taury had a twin sister, Ariadna. Peter and Susie were speechless. “We took one long look at each other and then I said, ‘In for a dime, in for a dollar.’” Their home and hearts were big enough to welcome both girls.
A year and a half after first meeting Taury in the hospital, Peter and his oldest daughter, Katharine, then 18, flew to South America to bring home the 13-year-old twins. They were shocked by the dismal living conditions: cinderblock walls, a dirt floor, no toilet, a naked lightbulb dangling from the ceiling. At night, Taury and Ariadna would lie in the bed they shared with a younger brother, watching scorpions climb the walls. (The mom terminated rights for the twins, but the brother and a younger sister stayed in Colombia.)
What awaited the twins in America couldn’t have been more different. The Walker home, a spacious four-bedroom with a big backyard in Cold Spring Harbor, New York, was light years away from their life in the slums of Colombia. The night they arrived, the girls sat down to eat dinner on the patio with their new parents and four older brothers and sisters, ranging in age then from 14 to 18. The experience was a revelation. “We weren’t used to sitting down and having meals together,” admits Ariadna. “It was wonderful, but also intimidating.”
The transition wasn’t easy for anyone. “All eyes were on us, and honestly, it was scary,” says Ariadna. Two of their new siblings were welcoming, but the others seemed threatened, and the twins’ first reaction to the resulting turf war was to fight. “It took awhile for us to explain to them that that wasn’t the way to resolve differences,” says Susie. It wasn’t the only lesson the girls would need to learn. Everything in America was new to them—especially having parents who cared. “I didn’t really get to know my new parents until after I came to live with them, so it surprised me that they would care about me so much,” admits Taury, whose medical prognosis by this time was good. “If it hadn’t been for them, I probably wouldn’t be alive.”
Over the next few months, she and Ariadna slowly began to master life as American teenagers, improving their English, learning to ride bicycles, trying out different sports, making friends at school and—most gratifying to Peter—bonding with their siblings. “The kids started giving Taury and Ariadna advice and helping them with their homework,” he says. “Watching that happen was wonderful.” Slowly but surely, they were becoming one family. “As time went on, the girls weren’t guests in our home, they were blood.”
For Taury, the defining moment happened a year after the adoption—when she and her sister became U.S. citizens. “That was the day I really felt like part of the family,” she says.
Now 37, Taury and Ariadna are both devoted mothers, and their lives are filled with recitals, soccer games and homework—just like many other American moms. Of course, life isn’t always perfect. Taury had to have a second heart surgery last year and she’s currently going through a painful divorce. “But when I’m down,” she says, “all I have to do is look at what’s right in front of me: supportive parents who listen to my worries, brothers and sisters who always check up on me—my family. If I hadn’t come to America, I know that I never would have had this.”
Then fate intervened. A nonprofit called Heart To Heart, a global humanitarian group that provides medical help to people in third-world or disaster-stricken countries, flew Taury to a New York hospital for lifesaving surgery. “Once I was there, I knew I didn’t want to go back to my childhood in Colombia,” she says. “I would rather have died on the operating table than go back.”
The night before her surgery, the anesthesiologist, Peter Walker, MD, sat at Taury’s bedside to explain the procedure. As he spoke in broken Spanish, Taury interrupted. “Doctor, I’m pretty sure I’m going to die tomorrow,” she told him. “But if I don’t, I’ve made up my mind. I’m coming to America.” Her blunt declaration shocked Peter so much he wasn’t sure what to say. “Here was this young girl, all alone, thinking she was going to die,” he recalls. “I just tried to reassure her.” But her words stayed with him.
Recovered and without a place to stay in America, Taury returned home to Colombia—and promptly fell ill again after just a few months. Heart To Heart stepped in once more, whisking Taury back to the United States. It was obvious that if she returned to Colombia her long-term chance of survival was slim. Peter couldn’t help but think of Taury’s haunting words, even though the two had barely interacted. “It wasn’t like she and I had a special connection,” he admits. “She was one of 200 children we were treating. But I was so struck by what she’d said. Most kids with her condition wouldn’t have survived, but she was made of pretty tough stuff.” In his heart he felt that he needed to help this courageous little girl who was fighting so hard for life. So Peter talked to his wife, Susie, about adoption. “There was just one problem,” he says. “We already had four kids!” Bringing another child into their hectic household seemed close to insanity. “But then we thought, ‘Well, our kids are older, we have plenty of room and this child needs a roof over her head,’” says Peter. “Suddenly it didn’t seem that complicated.”
In 1986, Taury returned to her mother in Colombia while the Walkers jumpstarted the long adoption process. When the social worker told Taury about the pending adoption, she didn’t remember who Peter was at first; she was just relieved to know that someone was going to help.
After several months filled with paperwork and court dates, the Walkers received some startling news: Taury had a twin sister, Ariadna. Peter and Susie were speechless. “We took one long look at each other and then I said, ‘In for a dime, in for a dollar.’” Their home and hearts were big enough to welcome both girls.
A year and a half after first meeting Taury in the hospital, Peter and his oldest daughter, Katharine, then 18, flew to South America to bring home the 13-year-old twins. They were shocked by the dismal living conditions: cinderblock walls, a dirt floor, no toilet, a naked lightbulb dangling from the ceiling. At night, Taury and Ariadna would lie in the bed they shared with a younger brother, watching scorpions climb the walls. (The mom terminated rights for the twins, but the brother and a younger sister stayed in Colombia.)
What awaited the twins in America couldn’t have been more different. The Walker home, a spacious four-bedroom with a big backyard in Cold Spring Harbor, New York, was light years away from their life in the slums of Colombia. The night they arrived, the girls sat down to eat dinner on the patio with their new parents and four older brothers and sisters, ranging in age then from 14 to 18. The experience was a revelation. “We weren’t used to sitting down and having meals together,” admits Ariadna. “It was wonderful, but also intimidating.”
The transition wasn’t easy for anyone. “All eyes were on us, and honestly, it was scary,” says Ariadna. Two of their new siblings were welcoming, but the others seemed threatened, and the twins’ first reaction to the resulting turf war was to fight. “It took awhile for us to explain to them that that wasn’t the way to resolve differences,” says Susie. It wasn’t the only lesson the girls would need to learn. Everything in America was new to them—especially having parents who cared. “I didn’t really get to know my new parents until after I came to live with them, so it surprised me that they would care about me so much,” admits Taury, whose medical prognosis by this time was good. “If it hadn’t been for them, I probably wouldn’t be alive.”
Over the next few months, she and Ariadna slowly began to master life as American teenagers, improving their English, learning to ride bicycles, trying out different sports, making friends at school and—most gratifying to Peter—bonding with their siblings. “The kids started giving Taury and Ariadna advice and helping them with their homework,” he says. “Watching that happen was wonderful.” Slowly but surely, they were becoming one family. “As time went on, the girls weren’t guests in our home, they were blood.”
For Taury, the defining moment happened a year after the adoption—when she and her sister became U.S. citizens. “That was the day I really felt like part of the family,” she says.
Now 37, Taury and Ariadna are both devoted mothers, and their lives are filled with recitals, soccer games and homework—just like many other American moms. Of course, life isn’t always perfect. Taury had to have a second heart surgery last year and she’s currently going through a painful divorce. “But when I’m down,” she says, “all I have to do is look at what’s right in front of me: supportive parents who listen to my worries, brothers and sisters who always check up on me—my family. If I hadn’t come to America, I know that I never would have had this.”
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