Couple’s Daughter Inspires Them to Adopt Ukrainian Orphan Born With Unusual Facial Features

A Texas couple whose daughter was born with the Treacher-Collins syndrome, resulting in unusual facial features, has adopted a Ukrainian orphan, Danica Wetmore, born with the same condition.

WFAA reports:

By the age of six, Danica Wetmore had only ever lived inside a Ukrainian orphanage. In all that time, Thom and Tami Wetmore were the only ones who ever visited her.

“She had been in an orphanage for six-and-a-half years and no one had visited her. Nobody had ever inquired about her. It’s just, you felt it in your heart. We knew, as soon as I saw her. I knew, in my spirit, ‘Go get your daughter, that’s exactly what I felt is, ‘Go get your daughter,'” Tami Wetmore said.

Danica was born with Treacher-Collins syndrome, resulting in deafness and bones missing from her face. Because of her challenges, the Wetmores were told, the chances were, she’d be turned out of the orphanage when she got older to live on the streets.

Six years later, she’s happy, loved, and safe with her family. “She’s quirky extremely inquisitive and very artistic. She loves drawing, painting, expressing herself,” Thom Wetmore said.

Their biological daughter, Juliana, was born into the family six years before Danica showed up, with an extreme case of Treacher-Collins syndrome, along with deafness – she was born without 40 percent of the bones in her face.

However, Thom said, “You forget that there’s anything different about her after she’s sitting there for five minutes.”

Juliana has endured 45 surgeries for her face but her body and her brain have always been perfectly healthy. Her spirit is always bright.

“Pure love. She loves everybody. She doesn’t judge anybody. She doesn’t see anybody as different, she just takes everybody as the same,” Thom said.

“My favorite thing to do is watch movies, watch TV, play on the computer, play with my sisters,” Juliana said, talking like a typical 12-year-old.

“Whatever you first think of somebody when you see them on the outside, that’s not what they are on the inside,” Thom said.

Juliana is the girl whose strength inspired her parents to find room in their hearts for Danica.