The Setup: A Relationship That Was Rotten From the Start
Gia's story begins before her daughter even arrived. She'd agreed with her partner — a man she describes as financially controlling, prejudiced, and deeply abusive — to be a stay-at-home mom during her pregnancy. The problem? Once she was pregnant and couldn't return to her job, she discovered he didn't actually have the financial stability he'd claimed. Suddenly she was trapped: no income, no independence, and a partner whose personality darkened by the day. By the end of her pregnancy, he wasn't just being cruel with money — he was putting his hands on her. And we mean literally, in the hospital, in front of nurses, while she was postpartum. This is the foundation the whole story is built on, and it is already a disaster.
The Hospital Nightmare Nobody Talks About
Here's where the story takes a turn that honestly made us stop and rewind. Gia gave birth — four hours, no epidural, she caught her own daughter — and instead of being celebrated, she was flagged. The staff, she says, noted that she'd referenced Jesus and her ancestors during labor, and that she was 'too sexual' while giving birth. Based on that, she was sent to a psychiatric facility while her newborn was still in the hospital. We want to sit with that for a second. A Black woman, in a room full of white medical staff, expressing spiritual language during childbirth, gets involuntarily committed. She was eventually evaluated by a doctor of color who cleared her immediately — no diagnosis, no medication, nothing. She walked out. But the damage to her early bonding with her daughter had already begun, and her abusive partner was left alone with a newborn.
“he gave my child to this company and this woman that worked for the company she fell in love with my daughter”
— Gia, the storyteller, describing what happened while she was incarcerated
Two Days Old and Everything Falls Apart
When Gia got home, things briefly seemed almost manageable — for about 24 hours. Then her partner escalated: verbal abuse, then physical, eventually strangling her and threatening her life. She ran, called police, and was told there was nothing they could do because she had no visible bruises. When she picked up a weapon in self-defense — without using it — she was the one who got arrested. Her daughter was two days old. Gia served a 30-day sentence. During that time, rather than caring for the newborn himself, her partner handed the baby over to an organization called Safe Families. That organization had a troubling history — Gia says it had been sued for negligence, including a case involving a child's death in their care. A worker there bonded deeply with Gia's infant daughter over the weeks she was gone. By the time Gia got out, her baby had essentially been placed with someone else, and the father had fully signed away his own parental rights — then petitioned to terminate hers too.
“I didn't need money to take care of my child but because I didn't have money I didn't win the lawsuit”
— Gia, reflecting on why she lost custody
The Fight She Couldn't Quite Win
Gia didn't go quietly. She spent over ten thousand dollars on legal fees fighting for her daughter. She moved to Las Vegas, worked at a club called Joseline's Cabaret, and was making real money. She tried to go public with her story on Instagram, and her account got shut down — twice — right as she was going viral. She believes she was being watched and deliberately silenced, though she acknowledges that's her interpretation. Eventually, she lost her job, her platform, and checked herself into rehab. She'd been sober for a year by the time she shared this story, and she looked into sober living facilities that allow children — but without the financial resources the court required, she lost the custody case. The foster mother who'd had her daughter since she was a few weeks old retained custody. Gia lost.
“be careful who you have kids with because they might end up being a psychopath”
— Gia, closing out her account
How it unfolded
- Trapped by PregnancyGia agrees to be a stay-at-home mom, becomes pregnant, and discovers her partner lied about his finances — leaving her financially dependent and increasingly abused.
- Birth and Psych HoldGia delivers her daughter in four hours with no epidural, but hospital staff send her to a psychiatric facility for expressing spiritual language during labor.
- Violence and ArrestBack home, her partner strangles and threatens her; police refuse to help; she picks up a weapon in self-defense and is arrested when her baby is two days old.
- Baby Given AwayDuring Gia's 30-day sentence, the father gives the newborn to an organization called Safe Families, where a worker bonds with the infant and eventually seeks to keep her.
- Custody Battle LostGia spends over ten thousand dollars fighting for her daughter, enters rehab, gets sober, but loses the custody case after the court factors in her financial situation.
Our take
The baby was gone within days of being born, and the person responsible for giving her away faced zero consequences. That asymmetry is what we keep coming back to — because it tells you everything about how this system decides who gets to be a mother and who doesn't. The parts of Gia's story that involve abuse, police inaction, and a hospital treating her spiritual beliefs like a psychiatric crisis? Completely documented patterns, especially for Black women navigating these institutions. We believe her there without hesitation. There are other elements of her account — the surveillance, the president — where we hold space without fully following, particularly given everything she's disclosed about her own mental health journey. But here's the thing: acknowledging that complexity doesn't cancel the injustice. She defended herself, got jailed for it, then lost her child partly because poverty made reunification impossible. That's not one bad decision — that's a cascade of systems failing one woman repeatedly. We're in her corner and we hope she keeps fighting.
Who you choose to have a child with can alter the entire trajectory of your life — and Gia's story is the most painful possible proof of that. The systems meant to protect mothers like her failed at every single turn.
Questions people ask
Can a father give a baby to foster care without the mother's consent?
In most U.S. jurisdictions, a parent with legal custody or physical possession of a child can voluntarily place that child with certain organizations in an emergency — but this can trigger legal proceedings that affect both parents' rights, as happened in Gia's case.
Can you lose custody of a child because of financial instability?
Courts are not supposed to remove children solely due to poverty, but financial stability is often considered as part of a broader 'best interest of the child' assessment — and in practice, lack of resources can significantly hurt a parent's case.
What is Safe Families for Children?
Safe Families for Children is a nonprofit organization that provides temporary hosting for children when parents face crises. It has faced legal scrutiny in some cases, as Gia references in her account.
