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Baby Girl Saal

Posted July 16, 2015 11:00 pm

By Pete Spitler The Herald Tribune

Words may never fully describe the time and effort Diane Wooden has spent finding her birth mother.

Born in Red Bud and raised in Collinsville, the now Staunton resident was adopted through Catholic Charities by LaVerne and Dorothy "Dot" Miller, who previously had a miscarriage and could not have any more children.

She was named Diane Marie Miller.

"I had a very good upbringing; I was sheltered a lot, but I had a lot of opportunities that other children weren't as lucky to have," Wooden said in an email to the Herald Tribune. "Since I was the only child, I was spoiled and I admit that.

"My dad worked for Jefferson Barracks and mom retired from Olin Mathieson in Alton so she could stay at home for me. The people who adopted me were so very happy they had a little girl to take care of and raise."

Growing up, Wooden participated in ballet, tap, Jazz, gymnastics, piano, volleyball and basketball. She traveled across the United States in a motor home during the summers when her father had vacation time.

"When I was in seventh and eighth grade, I had doctors, teachers and other kids asking me 'Don't you wonder about your birth parents?' Wooden said. "Or the inevitable form you have to fill out with the family history that always just said 'adopted' written across the section."

Wooden approached her adopted mother first about finding her birth mother.

"She didn't like that a lot; she was jealous," Wooden said. "And thought if I wanted to find my birth mom, then she wasn't good enough for me. So I quit (looking) because I loved my momma so much, I hated to hurt her."

When Wooden became pregnant in 1993, she tried again. Wooden said Catholic Charities told her it could cost $13,000 to take the organization to court to get the records.

"That was just wanting medical records because of my daughter," she said. "But that stopped me.

"In 2005, I decided to try again and went through Catholic Charities, but this time they said they had a few leads and sent some letters out, but nothing came back positive and it was going to cost money to go any farther."

Wooden said her husband, John Wooden, kept encouraging her to not give up.

"I was suffering from depression thinking how could my mom have given me up for adoption," she said. "'What kind of person doesn't want their own child?' is what I thought. I thought I wasn't wanted at all and I must of been a bad person for her to have given me up."

Wooden's adopted mother died in 2004 and her adopted father died in 2012.

"I was very much alone and feeling like an orphan," Wooden said. "(My dad) was the world to me. I was a daddy's girl but momma's baby.

"So thats when my husband started after me again to go and look for my birth parents somehow."

Wooden was able to find her adoption papers among her adopted father's documents that identified her birth mother as Tamara Jean Saal, who lived in Sparta at the time of Wooden's birth.

After contacting a local funeral home, Wooden was told Saal never married and had a sister, Danne Ogilvie, who had preceded her in death. Ogilvie had three surviving children - Jessica Ogilvie, Shane Ogilvie and Erick Ogilvie - who are Wooden's biological cousins.

Wooden found the Ogilvies on Facebook.

"I wrote each of them the same letter explaining who I was and letting them know it might be a shock, but that Tamara Jean Saal was my mother and they were my cousins," Wooden said.

Wooden was able to connect with the family and discover that her birth mother was 17 when she gave her baby daughter up for adoption.

"I was welcomed with open arms and a lot of love," Wooden said. "The opposite of what I thought happened, happened.

"Being unmarried and young, she was forced to give me up for adoption by my grandpa. I found out she wanted me all along and talked about me through the years, referring to me as Carrita or Carrie."

Joy Dobyns was very close with Saal - who was Dobyns' aunt-in-law - and spoke to the Herald Tribune about the family reconnection.

"In 1994 or 1995, Tammy called me about having to give up a baby for adoption when she was a teenager," Dobyns said. "A few years before Tammy passed away, we were going through Catholic Charities to see what kind of information we could get.

"They said they couldn't promise her she could get the information because it was a closed adoption. I think she tried just about anything a person could try to find (Wooden) before she passed away."

Saal passed away in 2007 and Wooden's biological father is gone as well.

"So I actually lost four parents within 10 years," Wooden said. "But the stories and the memories that my cousins tell me light up my heart and my eyes and I'm in a constant smile. I feel finally at peace."

Wooden said she is frequently reminded of how much she acts like her biological mother.

"She's so much like her mother without being around her," Dobyns said. "She has the same body language and it's crazy to see how genetics work."

While Saal never got to see the reconnection, Dobyns believes she would have been ecstatic.

"She might have had a heart attack and died that day," Dobyns said with a laugh.

Wooden thanked her husband and others for their help in finding her biological mother and family.

"Thank God for my husband who wouldn't let me give up and for my daughter, Madeline, who also encouraged me," Wooden said. "I went from thinking I was thrown away to knowing that I was wanted and am welcome.

"Also I want to thank God for my biological family and for bringing us together. I found my place in this world now to explore."

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