Couple Adopts Husband’s Ex-Spouse’s Child Boy After She Dies (Unique)

• Christie Werts and her husband, Wesley, began fostering his ex-wife’s child when she died 5 days after giving beginning
• Werts tells PEOPLE she knew he wanted to be together with his brother and sister, Wesley’s youngsters whom he shares together with his late ex
• The mother has shared her blended household’s story in a e book and several other viral TikTok movies which have moved thousands and thousands of social media customers

Christie Werts by no means meant to revisit the foster care system in maturity. Her personal childhood experiences as a foster child formed her perspective and took adoption off her radar.

However every thing modified when tragedy struck a boy’s life simply 5 days after he was born, and Werts took the chance to deliver his remaining household beneath one roof.

Levi — who turns 3 in August — was born to Werts’ husband Wesley’s ex-wife in 2021. She died of a stroke shortly after delivering the toddler. The 2 ladies by no means met, however Werts says she did not hesitate to point out up for Levi in his earliest moments.

“I knew from the minute [Wesley] advised me that [Levi’s biological] mother wasn’t doing so good … I simply knew that he ought to be together with his brother and sister,” Werts tells PEOPLE, referring to the 2 kids Wesley shares together with his late ex, son Austin, 15, and daughter Dakota, 11.

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Werts flew from house in Ohio to see Levi in Texas when he was about 8 days previous. In her dedication to Levi, she let go of her long-held aversion to adoption and the foster care system.

“How I felt, my feelings, my trauma — the love for this baby simply trumped every thing. I’d’ve carried out something for him,” says Werts, who can be mother to daughter Megan, 22, and son Vance, who turns 16 in August.

Although she overcame her reluctance to revisit the system, it took time for Werts to unravel her unfavorable historical past in foster care. She says that she did not endure the darkest facet of it — “I’ve heard worse tales,” Werts notes — however she maintains that it is a troublesome solution to develop up, even on the much less excessive ends of the system.

“Lots of people assume since you have been a foster child, ‘Oh, do you need to be a foster mother or father while you develop up?’ I am like, ‘Nope,’ ” she explains. “I had no intentions, however that was most likely the foster child in me speaking, not the grownup girl speaking.”

Werts was required to finish interviews and lessons meant to vet and put together her to turn into a foster mother or father. Unexpectedly, the method additionally gave her the chance to heal.

“I used to be nervous as a result of I assumed if I advised them why I ended up in foster care, would they assume one thing’s fallacious with me? And it begins making you concentrate on your trauma,” she recollects to PEOPLE. “It was a little bit little bit of a therapeutic and emotional time having to turn into a foster mother or father while you have been a former foster child.”

Werts wove collectively each layers of tales — her childhood spent in foster care and her household’s expertise with Levi — to jot down her e book Life’s Unhappy Story, God’s Love Story: Remodeling a Kid’s Adversity right into a Story of Love. She additionally makes use of social media to share her journey on-line, and he or she’s reached thousands and thousands of viewers along with her viral TikTok movies about Levi.

In a video from March, Werts posted a sequence of clips exhibiting Wesley spending time with their son, Levi. She spotlighted her husband’s facet of the story in overlaying textual content, writing, “Watching my husband together with his [ex-wife’s] child. He adopted him after she handed so he would not go to foster care.”

Within the caption of her TikTok — which garnered over 698,000 likes — Werts added, “The information tales at all times share me stepping up. However my husband additionally did!”

The Ohio-based mother tells PEOPLE she knew her blended household had a narrative value telling, it being each “heartwarming” and “bittersweet,” as she describes. She felt compelled to share it with a wider viewers after Levi’s adoption was finalized, simply shy of him turning 2 years previous.

“I assumed if folks actually knew our story, they’d most likely be a little bit bit blown away … I made a decision to share that first video, and it ended up going viral,” she says. “I wished to deliver consciousness and compassion … how far love will go and the way resilient a human spirit will be.”

Then there’s the motivating issue that comes from inside, part of Werts’ previous that overlaps with Levi’s.

“I believe loads of occasions we do not present compassion in the direction of folks,” she says. “Despite the fact that I by no means met [Levi’s] bio mother, I take into consideration her on a regular basis.”

“I do know that she had struggles, however she’s a mother too,” Werts continues. “I simply wished to be sure that her kids have been liked and brought care of.”