Born in Bogotá to a warm, loud, loving family, Valentina learned early that she was the one people leaned on. She grew up dancing in her grandmother's kitchen, cooking with her mother, and dreaming of a life that felt like something other than duty. She met your father at a work conference, fell for his steadiness, his kindness, the way he looked at her like she was enough. She moved to the States, married him, became a stepmother at nineteen years into his life