It was a reunion more than two decades in the making.
Gloria Lewis, 21, recently reunited with the firefighters who took her in as a newborn after her birth mother gave her up in 2003 by bringing her to a firehouse just days after she was born.
Lewis and the firefighters met again in October in Miami at a gala for A Safe Haven for Newborns, a nonprofit organization dedicated to putting an end to infant abandonment that helped facilitate Lewis’ adoption to Michael and Lori Lewis.
“This was a scenario that I never thought would actually happen. And to me, it was just a lot of feelings all mixed together at once,” Gloria Lewis tells TODAY.com about meeting firefighters Chris Florea, Jim Burge and Jennifer Ameerally.
Lieutenant firefighter paramedic Florea says he can vividly remember that Father’s Day in 2003 at Deerfield Beach Fire Rescue’s Station 66.
“When we opened the door, it was this woman holding a baby, an infant, a really small baby, and she just handed the baby to us, and she said, ‘Here’s my baby, and please take care of her.’ And she walked away crying,” Florea tells TODAY.com.
Lewis, who says she has never met or spoken with her birth mother, says she had wanted to meet the firefighters, but never believed the opportunity would present itself.
“I’ve thought about my birth mother, and I’ve thought about meeting them to an extent, but it was always more of a what if scenario. It was never really anything that I thought would happen,” she says.
The firefighters and Lewis were together for only a few hours that fateful day, but that was all they needed to bond.
“We spent about four or five hours with the baby, and, you know, changed her diaper, and we played with her, and just had a great time, and got emotionally attached,” says Florea, who is now with the Broward Sheriff’s Office Fire Rescue in Florida’s Broward County.
Lewis was allowed to be left at the station as part of Florida’s Safe Haven Law, which was new in 2003. “The child may be left at a hospital, emergency medical services station, or fire station,” the law states.
The firefighters named her Hope before they turned her over to other authorities. A Safe Haven for Newborns helped facilitate Lewis’ adoption to the Lewises, who named her Gloria Hope.
“It’s a life saved and a life provided,” A Safe Haven for Newborns founder Nick Silverio tells TODAY.com.
The gala was the first time Lewis reconnected with the firefighters who saved her.
“When she came up on the stage, and just the hug — because imagine the last time we saw her, she was two days old, and we were holding her, and then now we’re getting just the strongest hug from her, and it was just, I mean, we were all tearing up on stage,” Florea tells TODAY.com.
“It was so emotional, it was so joyful, it was so many different emotions. It’s hard to explain the feeling, what that was like.”
Lewis, who is now studying criminal justice and social work at Murray State University, says she can’t overstate her connection with the firefighters.
“It’s a very pivotal moment. And because I was a child, I was a baby, I can’t remember that, but it’s still very important in my life. And I’m really glad that I got the chance to meet them,” she says.
According to Silverio, A Safe Haven for Newborns has rescued more than 400 babies.
“We can’t save every infant and guide every troubled mother, but we can make a difference to as many as possible, and we will never, ever stop trying,” he says.
An unlikely encounter more than two decades ago continues to reverberate. And this time the parties involved will remain in contact.