Upworthy · 23 hours ago

A Case Worker Was Told She Couldn't Adopt a Foster girl. She Waited 6 Years to Make It happen.

For six years, caseworker Leah Paskalides was told she couldn't adopt Monyay - a conflict of interest with her job - so she watched a girl she loved navigate a system that was already preparing to let her go. Then a documentary about an adult adoption changed everything, and Leah asked Monyay a simple question: would she want this? When the adoption was finalized in 2021, and Monyay chose the name Paskalides, both of them wept - "it was held back emotions that just came out," Leah said. What this story quietly insists is that the hunger to be claimed by someone, to belong somewhere, doesn't expire at eighteen or nineteen or any age. Monyay spent years being told no by a system not built to hold onto her; it took one person who refused to let that be the final answer.