Not every Wal-Mart haircut plays a central role in what you’d call “one of the most amazing days of my life,” but Wendy Maxey will tell you, it’s happened to her at least once.
Maxey, the executive director at Coastal Pregnancy Center in Savannah, Georgia and a self-proclaimed “very low maintenance” customer when it comes to haircuts, was making small-talk with her hair stylist Feb. 6 when the conversation turned personal.
Asked what she does for a living, Maxey told the woman about her role at the pregnancy center, which offers free pregnancy testing, community referrals, material aid and post-abortion care as a ministry of Bible Baptist Church.
The young woman’s response nearly knocked her out of her chair.
“In the middle of my now halfway haircut, she begins to cry,” Maxey said. “Big cry! She stopped. Put her tools down. Took me by both hands and raised me out of my salon chair. Her arms embraced me as she blurted, ‘Oh my God!’”
“She sat me back into my chair and proceeded to tell me that when she was 16 years old, she came into the pregnancy center. She said, ‘I thought you looked familiar. You talked to me about abortion and because of that my son is now 7 years old!”
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Understandably shocked, Maxey recalls that, not only were there four other chairs available at the shop when she went in, but she’d stopped into a different Wal-Mart than she usually visits when its time for a trim.
Pointing out that she doesn’t believe in coincidences, only God’s “constant activity in my life,” Maxey invited the young woman to come visit the center—and bring her son.
Later in the week, the stylist, Adriane, brought her son, Andrew, into the center to meet the people who enabled her to save his life seven years ago.
Tweet This: I was going to have an #abortion, but not after I saw my baby on #ultrasound #prolife #pregnancyhelp
Before the visit, Maxey had reviewed her records from Adriane’s first visit, which began serving clients with free services in 1985. A field on Adriane’s self-completed intake form indicated she was not considering abortion at the time—which seemed to conflict with Maxey’s memory of the encounter.
At the center last week, Maxey asked Adriane—now a wife-to-be and mother of three, including two step-daughters—which was off, her records or her recollection.
“It kind of threw me off, so I was sure to show her the card when she got here,” Maxey said. “She said, ‘Mrs. Wendy I lied about that. I was going to have an abortion. But when you showed me how God was growing my 9 week old baby, I knew then that I would not take its life.'"
to the woman who helped save his life.
