Just two months after graduating high school, 19 year-old Hannah Mongie discovered she was pregnant. Both she and the baby’s father were ecstatic and planned to stay together through the birth of the child to see if they could make it work – until tragedy struck and Hannah’s world was turned upside down.

LiveActionNews.com is reporting on Hannah’s story, which began in the summer of 2015 when she discovered that she was pregnant. The baby’s father, Kaden, felt they should continue their relationship and was excited to find out that the baby was a boy. Just after he heard the baby’s heartbeat for the first time, Hannah got a call from Kaden’s mother telling her that he had just passed away. To this day, the cause of his death remains unknown.

What now? Hannah was suddenly faced with the hardest decision of her life – whether to keep her baby or give it up for adoption.

“Never once though did I let abortion become an option for me,” Hannah said in the video she made about her pregnancy.

“The second I became pregnant, I was no longer my own person. I became a protector of this little boy inside of me…. I am fighting for his rights, not abortion,” she said.

Months later, she gave birth to Taggart Kaden Marsh and by then, she had made her decision. Taggart would be placed in a loving home with a mother and a father.

In March of 2016, she laid her precious boy in the arms of his adoptive mother who wept with joy upon sight of him.

Just before giving him up for adoption, Hannah produced a video for Taggard to let him know exactly why she gave him up.

“I made this video so that you know how much I love you,” Hannah said tearfully in the video.

She goes on to tell him how his father felt about him, “He loved you from the very, very beginning,” she stated, and then tells him the sad news about his father’s demise. “Two days after he heard your heartbeat, his heart stopped.”

“From the day your daddy died, I had a hard time even considering placing you even with a different family, when you were my last piece of Kaden. But one day I woke up and I just knew you were supposed to be with someone else, so I went and searched for families.”

She goes on to explain how she met his adoptive parents, how perfect they were, and how she became good friends with this adoptive mother, Emily.

“And she’s one of my best friends now. And we’ve been getting really, really excited together for you to be in her home,” Hannah said. “And I helped her put a nursery together for you.”

Hannah displayed incredible personal courage and maturity when confronted with not only a pregnancy out-of-wedlock and the unexpected death of the baby’s father, but also the personal crisis of deciding what was best for her child.

Just as we teach in our Young Women of Grace program, a woman’s maternal instinct is what makes her capable of behaving in a selfless way, whether that be in a situation like Hannah’s, or whatever crisis life might bring.

Thanks to courageous women like Hannah, who are willing to put themselves aside for the sake of their children, babies lives are spared and childless couples can finally welcome the child they’ve been yearning for.

During this holiday season, which falls during National Adoption Month, let us give thanks for all the birth mothers in difficult situations who chose life for their children – and for all the generous women who are so willing to raise them as their own.