text: A 72-year-old Indiana woman is hoping that a Christmas miracle will help her find the long-lost son she gave up for adoption in 1963. 
   
   When she was 19, Geraldine “Jerri” Kramer gave birth to a healthy, curly-haired boy on June 10, 1963, in Indianapolis, but was forced by her parents and her priest to give him up, she told ABC News today. 
   
   “They said [he] was not welcome in their home,” Kramer said. 
   
   Courtesy of Marie Henson 
   
   But Kramer said she always wondered and prayed about her first born, whom she named Jack after her father. She said there has been a “hole” her family since she last saw him. 
   
   “I went along with it,” Kramer said, adding that she bonded with the infant when the nurses let her hold him. “But, now I’m sorry [I did].” 
   
   Her younger sister was the only other family member who knew about her first pregnancy, Kramer said. She would visit her at the St. Elizabeth Girls Home in Indianapolis, where young girls would stay to receive maternity care. 
   
   But in 1988, when her eldest daughter contemplated giving up her third child for adoption, Kramer showed up to the hospital and revealed her secret, telling her she would regret it. 
   
   “It was the single most important thing to ever happen to me,” Marie Henson said. 
   
   Courtesy of Marie Henson 
   
   Not even her husband, Joseph, whom she married in 1966, knew about the baby boy she gave up three years before they wed, Henson said. 
   
   “He’s always been supportive and compassionate,” 49-year-old Henson said of her father when he found out about the baby. “It’s just as important to him to find him, for her sake.” 
   
   Kramer’s declining health inspired her to ask her children to help find their older brother, who would now be 52 years old. 
   
   Courtesy of Marie Henson 
   
   A meme created with a photo of her five children created reads, “If you were born 6-10-63 you’re our older brother; we’re looking for you.” The post been shared more than 41,000 times as of today. 
   
   The picture was taken on Thanksgiving day. 
   
   Since Indiana is a “mutual consent state,” agencies need consent from both parties in order to unseal the adoption records. If Kramer’s first born has not registered for mutual consent, they will not release his information unless he has died. 
   
   Henson said she “will not stop” until she finds her brother. 
   
   “I hope he’s had a wonderful life with great adoptive parents,” she said. “But I think there’s room in the heart for more people who love you.” 
   
   Kramer’s 43-year-old son, Marc, told ABC News he thinks his oldest brother would “click instantly” with the family. 
   
   “It would fill a void,” he said. “We would love to be able to give this to her.” 
   
   In addition to her five children, Kramer has eight grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. She said she’s “anxious” to find out if she has more. 
   
   All of Kramer’s immediate family lives in the central Indiana area, Marc said, calling his family "tight-knit." 
   
   "Maybe I know him," he said of of his oldest brother. "Maybe he lives near me." 
   
   Kramer said she already knows what she would say if she saw her first-born again. 
   
   "I would tell him that I’ve loved him for years and years and years,” she said. ||||| Geraldine "Jerri" Kramer was 19 in the summer of 1963 when she was forced by her parents to give up her newborn son for adoption. 
   
   Now, more than 50 years later, the ailing 72-year-old mom wants to meet the son she never knew – and her family has taken to social media to find him. Catholic Social Services, which took custody of Kramer's newborn, never told her where the infant she called "Jack" would be going. 
   
   "The nurses misunderstood that I was giving him up for adoption and so they put him in my arms right after birth before taking him away," Kramer told FoxNews.com. "I want him to know that I have always loved him." 
   
   "I want him to know that I have always loved him." - Geraldine "Jerri" Kramer 
   
   Kramer, whose maiden name is Hummel, was 19 and unmarried when she learned she was pregnant -- a secret kept from her own siblings. At the urging of her parents and a local priest, she spent a month at St. Elizabeth Girls Home in Indianapolis, where young women once stayed to receive maternity care and hide their pregnancies. 
   
   On the night of June 10, 1963, Kramer gave birth to a healthy, curly-haired boy at nearby Marion County General Hospital. Kramer, all alone, was lying in a bed for several minutes holding her infant son before he was taken by nurses. 
   
   "I named him after my father. His name was Jack," Kramer said. 
   
   Related Image Expand / Contract Kramer is pictured here at age 18 in 1962. (FoxNews.com) 
   
   Years would pass, but the memory of her first-born child -- and what might have become of him -- would never leave Kramer, who lives in Fortville, Ind., and whose health is failing. 
   
   "I pray for him every night," said Kramer, who suffers from diabetes and a serious heart condition, among other ailments. 
   
   Kramer married her husband, Joseph, on May 7, 1966, and together the couple have five children, eight grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. 
   
   Related Image Expand / Contract Kramer with her husband, Joseph, on their wedding day in 1966. (FoxNews.com) 
   
   On Thanksgiving, Kramer's children decided they would use social media to find their brother. On Nov. 27, the following day, the family posted a photo and message on Facebook that has now been shared by nearly 42,000 people. 
   
   "We have joined and searched adoption registries," the siblings wrote. "We're praying this may work, as it has for others. It has been Mom's decades-long wish to find you, and we would love to meet our big brother." 
   
   Marie Henson, Kramer's oldest child, told FoxNews.com that her mother "asked us to renew our search in earnest" after she had open heart surgery last year. 
   
   "My mom feels the need to see him," said 49-year-old Henson. "She's been marking his age this entire time and wonders about him every day." 
   
   Related Image Expand / Contract Kramer, 72, is pictured at her home in Fortville, Ind. (FoxNews.com) 
   
   The Kramer family is not alone in its quest. Thousands of people are turning to Facebook to help find a biological child or parent due to the legal difficulty of obtaining confidential adoption records. Kelley Baumgartner, also from Indiana, used the social media site to locate her birth mother who gave her to Catholic Social Services in South Bend in 1987. In February, Baumgartner posted her plight to Facebook -- which was shared by 340,000 people and seen by her biological mother, who contacted her two weeks later, according to local reports. 
   
   The process of locating a biological relative is a challenge, logistically and psychologically. 
   
   "I usually get about 40 requests like this a month," said Katrina Carlisle of St. Elizabeth Coleman Pregnancy & Adoption Services, a non-profit adoption agency that is part of Catholic Charities Indianapolis. 
   
   Carlisle, who cannot comment on individual cases, explained that Indiana is a "mutual consent state," meaning all adoption records are sealed unless both parties consent to have the records unsealed. Those seeking to locate a biological parent or child must file paperwork to join the adoption history registry with the Indiana State Department of Health, according to Carlisle. The state then looks to see if the other party has registered, in which case there is a match. If there is no match, families often ask Carlisle to do a search for a fee of $350. 
   
   "It takes a long time to track people down," said Carlisle. "But all my difficulties are in the emotional realm. The worst thing that happens to me is when I find a birth mother who wants no contact with her child." 
   
   "There is nothing I can do about that," said Carlisle, who has been conducting such searches for 24 years. "If they say no, it ends right there. And that is very painful for them." 
   
   The Kramer family, meanwhile, said they are praying their brother -- who would now be 52 years old -- is alive and able to contact them. 
   
   "I have this feeling it could happen before the holidays," Henson said. "We are praying for a Christmas miracle." 
   
   Cristina Corbin is a New York-based reporter for FoxNews.com. Follow her on Twitter @CristinaCorbin.
target: – Five siblings may have found their long-lost older brother thanks to a Facebook post. Their mother, 72-year-old Geraldine "Jerri" Kramer, gave birth to a baby in 1963, when she was 19 and unwed, but the Indiana woman's parents and priest made her give the boy up for adoption. Still, she bonded with the infant as soon as she held him, and never stopped thinking about him, she tells ABC News. Kramer, whose maiden name was Hummel, called the baby Jack, Fox News reports. He remained a secret from much of her family, even the husband she married in 1966. But in 1988, when her oldest daughter was considering giving up a child for adoption, Kramer told her the story and warned her daughter she'd regret parting with the baby. Then, as her health started to decline, Kramer asked her kids to help her find her own lost child. The five of them took a group photo on Thanksgiving and added the words, "You were born 6-10-63. You're our older brother, we're looking for you." They posted it on Facebook, where it's been shared nearly 45,000 times. "You were born June 10, 1963 in the wee AM hours, at Marion County General Hospital, in Indianapolis, Indiana. You were placed for adoption through Catholic Social Services," reads the post. "It has been Mom's decades-long wish to find you, and we would love to meet our big brother." In an update Monday, Marie Henson added, "I THINK WE FOUND HIM!! He saw the article, and DNA tests are our next step!" No further updates have been posted yet, but should Kramer—who also has eight grandchildren and four great-grandchildren—find her long-lost biological son, she says she'll tell him "that I’ve loved him for years and years and years." (When these two long-lost siblings met, they realized they'd known each other for years.)