PREFACE:
I have been dying to tell this story for some time, but I have delayed for several reasons. First reason was, the story was continuing to develop, and I needed to have some questions answered. I currently feel that I have enough information, and permission to share my story with you. I intend to compose this post conversationally from the top of my head. While you may feel that my details are possibly verbose and possibly not important, I include them because they all add into the fabric of my overall story. The situation I am about to describe is one of the most fascinating, and life changing things that has ever occurred to me. The odds involved are pretty staggering. The gravity of the story is important enough to me to take some time and include all the details in respect to the story itself.
1: Lets Get Together
I help to manage a Facebook networking group for professional people involved in what I do for a living. This brings people together from all over the world. One of the members from Texas comes to my area now and again. Recently, his mother bought a house in Florida near mine, so I volunteered to be a liaison for him should his Mom ever need anything. The owner of the Facebook group lives in New Jersey. They both happened to be coming to my area around the same time (March 2019). We agreed to meet at my karaoke show at Grind Gastropub on a Monday night.
The fellow from New Jersey brought his girlfriend along. We were introduced and of course I asked where in NJ she lived. She mentioned to same small beach town that I moved from in 1968. I asked her if she knew THIS person..."yes"...THIS person? "One of my best friends". This family? "Oh yeah, all of them...", and on and on. So of course, I added her to my Facebook friends and we agreed to stay in touch. After she returned to NJ, we had a couple of Messenger chats comparing notes about who we may or may not know, and people that moved here from there to see how many mutual friends we could come up with.
2: Ancestry
I have been a member at Ancestry.com since 2010. I used the site to develop a family tree based on records available (what I call "chasing the paper"), and had a pretty good jump on tracing my maternal and paternal lines. My sister Maggie was working on one at about the same time. Maggie and I do not network really closely, so research was being done largely independent of one another, and occasionally we would reach out to one another to fill in the blanks. No one else in my immediate family has any interest in family trees or DNA testing. My brothers are vocally against it.
Five or six years ago or so, I decided to use Ancestry DNA, and I got Lori a DNA kit as a gift, mostly so that we could determine where most people who share our DNA came from...that is, "Ethnicity Estimate". Ethnicity estimates can change over time and become more accurate as more and more people test. I decided to make my DNA information public in the interest in finding other family members, cousins, and letting the story of who I am actually unfold. Working Ancestry DNA is fascinating on many levels where you can see other members around the world who share your DNA and in what percentage. What really grabs your attention is your close family members...first and second cousins, and trying to identify them and where on your tree they land; what your relationship with them actually is. Sometimes, you see names, message the person and they do not respond for whatever reason (abandoned account, not tech savvy to know how to message, or just not interested).
3: Is This You?
Around Dec 2019, my new female friend from NJ messaged me at Facebook and asked if I had used Ancestry...to which I said YES! She said that I connected with her sister as a cousin. I looked on my account, found her sister, looked at the numbers and tried to come up with an association, but did not immediately. I told her that I assumed that she was somehow distantly related thru one of my many uncles or aunts. I threw around a bunch of the family surnames to see if any jumped out, but none did. Admittedly, she said she did not know all of the extended family that well, but that there were others in her family who did that she could ask. Her sister's Ancestry account did not have a lot of public info. I asked my friend if she and her sister had the exact same parents, which they did, so I said, "well, I guess that makes us cousins either way, and we will figure it out one day". We operated on that premise and occasionally compared notes, but with no urgency.
4: Out Of The Blue...
September 2021...my sister Maggie contacted me. She was telling a story of how she was contacted by a woman who said she was our sister. This was a fascinating development. I was starving for details. The details were coming to me very sketchy, and inconsistent. There was an initial report that this person had a twin, so there were two...and other tidbits that I was craving to understand. The timeline was odd. My parents married in 1953. It was a second marriage for both of them. My oldest brother was born in 1958, 5 years after the wedding. This new sister would have supposedly been born JUST before my oldest brother. So, it would appear that my dad had at least one child outside of his marriage.
My heart genuinely broke for my sister. She has a first and middle name that really has no history that I know of in our family. I remember hearing at one point my dad had a boat that had a name similar to my sisters, and we were always thoughtful that the boat was named for her. Maggie told me at one point she asked my mom who she was named after, and my mom jokingly dismissed the question by saying she was named for "your fathers girlfriend". Maggie had been talking to the "new" sister to get details on her, and found that the new sister's birth mother had the SAME first and middle name as Maggie. My heart really did break for her, as she was so upset by all of this new info.
Keep in mind, everyone involved at this point has passed away other than us "kids". I needed more info. I was not getting a clear picture. I studied my Ancestry results closer. I realized that Maggie had tested at 23andMe, not Ancestry. They are 2 different companies, and they do not share or overlap results. Whichever company you choose to test with, your results are limited to the people who choose the same company, leaving a lot of relatives off the table.
October 2021...So, it made sense for me to run right out and buy a 23andMe DNA kit, and test myself, to create my own relationship with the new sibling.
5: Uh Oh...
When you test at Ancestry, they can tell you the numerical amount of DNA you share with other testers, and then based on that, approximate what the relationship is based on what information they have. They will say something like "you are likely cousins, but based on the number you could also be these other relationships", depending on where on the tree you find yourselves.
Ancestry is an exceptional tool for chasing paper. I decided to let my 23andMe tree be all DNA based, and my Ancestry tree paper/document based.
So I got my results back from 23andMe and was very excited to compare lines, overlap info and meet my new sister. She was not there. My existing sister appeared as a half sibling. That basically meant that we only shared one parent. One of us was going to have a surprise.
A sure way to confirm it...get a known blood relative of my dad to test. He has a daughter from his first marriage in MN, so we contacted her and tested her. She connected with my sister, and did not appear on my matches. This clearly meant that the person I knew as my father was NOT my biological father.
6: So We Restart The Journey...
So now the questions arise; who is my father, how did this happen, would this be a surprise to my dad or to my biological father? Did my mother have any clue? Did my father have any clue? But these questions would go unanswered, unless my biological father were somehow still alive.
So, armed with the info I have at Ancestry, with distant cousins that I have names for, and my new DNA tree at 23, I create a cross reference of contacts that I try to make sense with. I try to separate my maternal and paternal lines to get a better grasp of who is on my paternal line and what common relatives we may share, and if that will lead me to my father.
Once I have a better picture of things, I reach out to my cousins. I send a screen shot of my info to my new friend/cousin in New Jersey and ask if anyone looks familiar. She says "yes...that person is my daughter" (who had DNA tested at 23andMe).
Major breakthrough. Now I start quizzing her about her family...how many brothers and sisters does her dad have? Do you recognize any of these names of my cousins by DNA? Yes, one stuck out, her Aunts son. Another close cousin of mine. This was clearly showing me where to look for my father, and it was not going to be one of her aunts, my father HAD to be a male, which limited it to 3 people, her dad or one of his brothers. This was aligning with the projections I was seeing at 23andMe.
7: Whodunit
Wasn't thinking it was her dad since our suggested relationship was cousin. Her other uncle would have been in the military out of the area around that time, and the most unlikely candidate. Another uncle was looking good because he was in the area, well known, and in a position to make it likely. So, in my mind, I would need a child of the other uncle to test to see how closely we matched. In addition to my old friend in NJ who I was talking regularly with about this (and who was SUPER cool about it), I had phone conversations with her aunt's son, and became friends with their family. I became Facebook friends with the daughter of the brother that was in the military, who also was very helpful with information and not unhappy to hear from me. This adventure was made easier by a large amount of cooperation, and acceptance from the family members I had contact with.
What was proving MORE elusive was getting that final confirmation, which would involve getting the son or daughter of the local uncle to take a test to see if we were matched as siblings. I reached out and could not get that done. My cousin working with me on that felt that it would be heartbreaking for them, and based on what he knew about the family, it was MORE likely that the other brother, my cousins dad, was the culprit.
I needed my friend in NJ to take a 23andMe test. Her sister had already done Ancestry, so I needed someone on the blood line to jump to the other company with me to compare apples to apples. She agreed, but, accidentally ordered the Ancestry test instead...which was still helpful. This provided more info into the system, and since she had more of a public setting than her sister, it showed the DNA thru lines, which basically confirmed that she and I were siblings not cousins.
8: Revelation
Based on this info, with a very high degree of confidence, we determine that the girl that I met randomly at work in 2019 is my sister, and we have the same father. I have since done an extensive amount of research on their family to get an idea of the family history and where my DNA story goes to.
This has created an ongoing internal dialog with myself. There are so many things that this helps me to understand about myself, as there were always things different about me than my siblings. There were always times when me being me was going against the grain, and some of that makes sense now.
I do wonder if my Dad (I will say DAD for the man that raised me and FATHER for biological) had any idea about any of this when I was born, or if he thought I was his. I study how I was treated over the years and wonder if he knew; and that was why he was the way he was, or if he did not know and just had his moments. My parents were NOT young when I was born. My dad was 47 when I came along, so he was getting too cranky to be happy about raising a kid anyway. I am not gonna dwell on that too much, or wonder about "what ifs" from the past, but it does explain a few things for me. I was not emotionally close to my father, we butted heads a lot and I found him to be quite unreasonable often. He was a good man in general, but he had a lot of issues and opinions.
There are things about me that are different from everyone I grew up with. My 2 brothers and sister march to different drummers than me. My brother Bill often said of me, "how come YOU are the only normal one?". I think things out differently, eat differently, a lot of things itemize that make me different.
9: The Fallout
I am at peace with everything, and actually find some sense of relief in understanding things more clearly. I regret not getting a chance to be closer to the deceased members of the new family, and look forward to knowing the others who seem quite cool and are well grounded in the area where I was born, which adds to my sense of connection there. This was a lot to take on, but I am processing it well, in a healthy productive way.
My sister Maggie is cool with it...she says she "still considers me family". She has a lot of weight to carry on her own journey, and I respect that.
I have not gotten any feedback from my brother Bill. From what I gather from Maggie, he knows the basic situation and does not doubt it. Bill and I no longer speak, as he has once again cut himself off from the family in the interest of being correct and not having to deal with people like me. There was some misunderstanding in regard to a national social situation, he felt strongly against, and he thought I was for it...but I had never said a word about it, but he roundly disowned me because he "has no time to deal with brainwashed people." If that is what the value of the relationship came down to, I guess I have to be at peace with that.
My other brother is in denial a bit. He initially said that "there is no way, our house was like Leave It To Beaver, and that raising 3 kids at home there was not time for such things, and our mom was not a slut". He and I have not had a deep dive conversation after the fact, in consideration of all the irrefutable evidence I have supporting my story. We need to go to lunch and I can fill him in with facts. He is largely not interested or impressed by DNA results or Ancestry, so I feel the news has probably troubled him more than anyone.
I have a large extended family on my Moms side, from her daughter Ruth. Ruth and her husband Richard have passed away, and left a great family of nieces and nephews who loved Ruth very much, and my mom. SO, this story may come as a shock and surprise to them and I hope I do not unintentionally ruffle any feathers by taking my story public; as it does kind of tarnish the reputation of both my Dad and Mom.
To be fair, my mother is not alive to inform us, or defend herself, and we do not know what the nature of the union between she and my biological father was, so it is not up to any of us to be judge and jury for her. It is what it is. But, it is not just MY story, it is our story, and I did not feel like keeping it secret to my grave.
My biological father passed away young in 1973. My sisters in NJ were very young as well and have limited memories and anecdotes to share. Fortunately, thanks to the internet and Facebook, I have access to people who knew him and can hear anecdotal stories to piece a few things together. He had an entrepreneurial spirit, which I share. Those who know me really well will appreciate that he also ran gas stations and bars, which also parallels my life experience.
10: EPILOGUE
That is my story. It is continuing to be written each day. I am happy that my sister in New Jersey found me randomly, and that she was so crucial in helping me put the pieces together. I thank the new cousins that helped me so much find my way. I am thankful to all the new friends and family I have found online who have been accepting and understanding. These events have triggered my enthusiasm for genealogy and ancestry research, and I am getting kind of good at it. I am looking forward to writing another blog tracing my maternal and paternal roots back further than the country was here, and over the ocean. Both lines were here in colonial times, in the 1600s. I am solidly American historically.
Thank you all for reading, and following my adventure...and for your understanding, and friendship.
(EDIT: 8/27/2022 - NEW INFO has come to me in the most bizarre way, again, randomly meeting someone who had incredible information. He is a credible person, who I have vetted and spoken with and followed up with, and his story WILL be able to be proven, or to proven to be not true. That is my current goal, and once I have a closure on that process, I will either have an interesting story to tell, or a major story to tell for others... Stand by...)
(EDIT 9/2022 = More new info, while trying to figure out a connection to a strong DNA relative that I could not identify...and after hours of research have found a plausible explanation that has opened yet another amazing can of worms that defies the odds, and that I have backed up in some physical evidence...another amazing chapter being written)
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