I Got Pregnant in Grade 10. Twenty Years Later, I Returned Home—and the Truth Destroyed Me
I was in Grade 10 when I found out I was pregnant.
When the pregnancy test showed two lines, I panicked so badly my legs gave out. My hands were shaking, my mind completely blank. Before I could even think of what to do, everything was exposed.
My parents looked at me as if I were something disgusting.
“You’ve brought shame to this family,” my father said coldly.
“From this day on, you are no longer my daughter.”
Those words hit me like a slap across the face.
That night, rain poured heavily.
My mother threw my old, torn backpack into the yard and pushed me out of the house.
No money.
No shelter.
Nowhere to go.
I held my stomach and walked away from what had once been the safest place in my life—without looking back.
I gave birth to my daughter in a tiny rented room in Quezon City, barely eight square meters wide.
I was poor.
I struggled.
People whispered behind my back.
But I raised her with everything I had.
When my daughter turned two, I left our province and moved to Manila for good. I worked as a waitress by day and learned vocational skills at night.
Then fate slowly changed.
I started selling products online.
Later, I built my own company.
Six years later, I bought a house.
Ten years later, I opened a chain of stores.
Twenty years later…
My net worth exceeded 200 million pesos.
I knew I had succeeded.
But the pain of being abandoned by my own parents—the thorn buried deep in my chest—never disappeared.
One day, I decided to go back.
Not to forgive.
But to let them see what they had lost.
I drove my brand-new Mercedes back to my hometown.
The old house was still there—more worn down than before.
A rusted iron gate.
Cracked walls.
A yard overgrown with weeds.
I stood at the door, took a deep breath, and knocked three times.
A girl around 18 years old opened the door.
I froze.
She looked just like me.
Her eyes.
Her nose.
Even the way she frowned.
It felt like I was staring at my younger self.
“Who are you looking for, ma’am?” she asked politely.
Before I could answer, my parents stepped out of the house.
When they saw me, both of them went pale.
My mother covered her mouth, her eyes filling with tears.
I gave a cold smile.
“So… now you regret it?”
Suddenly, the girl ran over, grabbed my mother’s hand, and asked:
“Lola… who is she?”
Grandmother?
My chest tightened.
I couldn’t breathe.
I turned sharply to my parents.
“Who is this girl?”
My mother broke down in tears.
“She… she’s your daughter.”
I froze.
I almost screamed.
“That’s impossible! My daughter has been with me her whole life! What are you talking about?!”
My father sighed, his voice trembling with age and regret.
“We… we adopted a baby that was abandoned at our gate… eighteen years ago.”
My blood ran cold.
“Abandoned? At this house?”
My mother walked to a cabinet and took out an old, yellowed piece of cloth.
I recognized it instantly.
It was the blanket I had wrapped my newborn daughter in.
My heart felt like it was being stabbed.
Through sobs, my mother explained:
“After you left… a few months later, the child’s father came looking for her. He wanted to take the baby back, but you had already gone to Manila. He went crazy—drinking, causing trouble—then disappeared.
Eighteen years ago… early one morning, I opened the gate and found a newborn baby left there. Inside the basket was only this blanket.
I knew…
I knew it had something to do with you.
I thought maybe you had met an accident… or worse… that you were gone.”
Her voice broke completely.
“We were wrong to you back then. But this child… we couldn’t send her to an orphanage. We raised her as our own. We never once hurt her.”
I trembled.
I remembered clearly—I had hidden that blanket inside a wooden box. No one knew about it.
If someone left that baby at my parents’ gate…
there was only one possibility.
The biological father of my child.
He had another child with another woman…
then abandoned her at the very place he knew I had once been cast out.
I looked at the girl—the child I did not give birth to, yet who looked terrifyingly like me.
She asked softly,
“Ma’am… why are you crying?”
I pulled her into my arms and broke down, crying like I never had before.
My parents knelt in front of me.
“Please forgive us,” they sobbed.
“We were wrong. But please… don’t blame the child. She’s innocent.”
I looked at them.
Twenty years of resentment shattered—not because they deserved forgiveness, but because I finally understood:
This child needed a family.
And I needed to close the door to my past.
I stood up and wiped my tears.
“I didn’t come back for revenge anymore.
I came back… to reclaim what belongs to me.”
I held the girl’s hand and smiled.
“From today on, I’m your sister.”
Behind us, my parents sat on the floor, crying like children.