Photo: Getty Images
A baby girl surrendered to a Florida Safe Haven box has found a home with the first responder who was the one to first discover her. About six months ago, an alarm at the Ocala Fire Rescue signaled that someone had anonymously surrendered a newborn in the building’s safe haven baby box. The responding firefighter found the baby with her umbilical cord tied off with a shoelace.
The firefighter and his wife had been wanting a child for nearly a decade and they were immediately taken with the baby girl and started the process to adopt her right after rushing her to the hospital. The family didn’t want to get their hopes up, but soon got the call that they could visit the baby in the NICU. The baby’s new adoptive mother says that’s when she felt like it was real.
Now the adoption has been finalized and the firefighter and his wife have welcomed baby Zoey into their family. They’re grateful for the brave decision Zoey’s birth mother made in giving her up and want her to know that she’s with a caring family. “I think it’s very respectable, what she did,” Zoey’s adoptive mom says, “We really felt in our hearts that we wanted to let the birth mom know in some way, shape or form that she is safe, she is happy, and she is very loved.”
- Florida Safe Haven Laws allow parents to surrender their up to seven days old newborns at hospitals or fire stations.The climate controlled Safe Haven box in Ocala is one of over 130 across the country and the only one in Florida.
Source: WFLA