I took an Ancestry DNA test, and my world was flipped upside down when I got my results July 26, 2021. Oddly enough, I finally decided to purchase my test kit during the Father’s Day sale that year. I will forever remember the day I got my results. For some reason, I can only think of my life as who I was before this day and now who I am after.

I grew up for the most part with my mother and my little brother. My lifelong father split up from my mom when I was really young. Some people who have gone through a DNA surprise call this their birth certificate father “BCF”, but I have no father listed on my birth certificate so lifelong father it is. My mom had my little brother when I was six. My mom worked nights and weekends as a bartender during our childhood, so most nights it was just my brother and me. I grew up quickly once he arrived. I think this is when I moved into complete survival mode – for the both of us. I don’t have many memories of my childhood but overall, it was chaotic, and I always felt like an inconvenience or burden.

There were a few things throughout my childhood that stick out to me now knowing what I now know. I remember going to the welfare office at one point when I was maybe 8 or 9. They make you bring your supporting documents to get assistance and I distinctly remember looking at my birth certificate vs my brothers and realizing I only had a mother listed. A fake story was quickly generated about how my lifelong father missed my birth / birth certificate signing, and we moved on. In intermediate school, we started learning about genetics and how certain traits are passed down. I remember how rare my widow’s peak was and that I couldn’t find a single family member that had a matching one. In middle school, one weekend at my dad’s he randomly blurted out “there’s a possibility that I am not your dad.” Again, a fake story was created, and I was still in survival mode, so I accepted it and moved on.

In high school, I started dating my now husband. He made me feel heard and that no matter what he would support me. I quickly moved out of my mom’s house as soon as I turned 18. I was finally out of survival mode. We got married in 2017 and bought our first home in 2020. In 2021, I really wanted to have a baby and after no luck I thought it would be necessary to give a doctor my medical history along with my family’s medical history. With all these questions swirling around my head I decided to do the ancestry test. I sent my sample off and six weeks later I got the notification on my phone that my results were in. My body froze. I was at my husband’s grandparents’ house, and I ran outside to see if my results came with any matches.

I had one “close family” match. We shared 27% DNA, and I had no clue who this person was. I instantly went to Facebook and came up with no results when I searched the name. At that moment the panic started to set in, and I told my husband we needed to leave immediately. I went straight to my mom’s house to get answers, but she wasn’t home. At this point, I was so overwhelmed we decided it was time to go home. I remember going into our guest bedroom and collapsing on the bed. I was screaming, crying, drooling, and shaking uncontrollably.

Then my phone rang, and it was my mom. She instantly went into defense mode.
I was hit with so many questions and comments, leaving myself more confused than I was when the call began.

“Why did you do this?”
“I thought it was X or X.”
“I think your test got mixed up in the mail.”
“Your dad isn’t your dad, and we all knew that there was no chance he was because I was already pregnant when we started dating.”

I had no clue that my lifelong father wasn’t really my father. I had never heard of the names my mom threw out so freely. I hung up and I sat in that guest bedroom for hours.

While I was getting myself together, my husband went into detective mode. He finally located the DNA match on Facebook. I took one look at this person, and I knew. I knew I had found someone that should have been a part of my life. We quickly connected the dots that due to the DNA match percentage; this person was my half-brother. This meant that whoever his dad was… was my dad too. I sent the information to my mom, and she told me who his dad was but was still in denial that he could possibly be my dad.

From July 26th, 2021 – October 26th, 2021, I kept this information to myself. My husband, best friend, little brother, mom, and lifelong dad were the only people that knew about this huge discovery I had made. I was afraid that the information would upset my lifelong family. I was worried that this information would blow up this other family’s life if I reached out. Like I said, I was made to feel like an inconvenience or burden my whole life and there was no way I wanted to inconvenience anyone else’s life. I was severely depressed. I felt like I had gone through an identity crisis. I had no clue who I was anymore. I couldn’t look in the mirrors in my home without crying.

On October 26th, 2021, my newfound brother logged into his Ancestry account and saw our DNA match.
On October 27th, 2021, I received a message acknowledging they saw the match and that they wanted to meet me.

I decided that it was time to rip the band aid off.

I responded and said I would love to meet. I called my mom to tell her they knew about me now and that she needed to tell the birth father that I exist because everyone will soon find out.

My mom and birth father met on October 29th, 2021, and she told him that I was his based on this Ancestry test and my DNA match to his son. I couldn’t bring myself to attend the meeting. I wasn’t sure how I would be able to proceed if the news was taken negatively from the birth father. My mom has told me that the meeting went well, he was just shocked. After their meeting he added me on Facebook and our slow journey to get to know each other started. We exchanged a few messages and I found out I had a 5-year-old sister! I was so excited as I had always wanted a sister, but then our communication stopped. I knew that I had sat with my results for months – processing and figuring out how I felt about it – he had just found out and probably needed some time to process.

On November 10th, 2021, I went to meet my brother for the first time. I was so beyond nervous. I kept thinking “Will he like me?” “Will we look alike in person?”. All the questions and all the emotions were so overwhelming. My brother walked into the restaurant we were meeting at, and my mind instantly calmed down. He walked over and said, “so are we going to hug or what?” I felt a sense of relief wash over me that I hadn’t felt in months. The day after I met my brother, he texted me saying his fiancé was pregnant and I realized I was going to be an aunt. I was so excited! I spent the next few months getting to know my brother and his family!

We started planning the baby shower for my soon-to-be nephew. At this time, I received a message from my birth father saying that he wanted me to take a DNA test with him before it would be appropriate for me to meet family members at the baby shower. I realized at that moment that both my mom and birth father were still in denial. I was upset. I had already offered to take a DNA test and I never was taken up on the offer. I immediately went to the nearest lab that offered paternity testing. I purchased the paternity test and did my portion on February 26th, 2022.

The baby shower was April 4th, 2022, and he had not done his part of the test yet. I was so anxious to attend the baby shower, but ultimately decided it was more important to be there for my brother. I go to the baby shower, and I lock eyes with my birth father for the first time. We both froze and were speechless, it was so awkward. I had just saw an older male version of myself. He left the shower early and I was devastated we didn’t get to exchange any words in person. During the baby shower, I was introduced to his entire family. This was almost as overwhelming as the day I got my results. There were so many family members and they all looked just like me.

From the baby shower in April 2022- November 2022 I was in deep depression again. There was nothing that could make me feel better. In November I reached out to start talking to therapists to try to work through this mess that had become my life. I talked to several before I found the right fit – someone that could keep up with the large web of issues and someone that made me feel like I wasn’t insane. I started seeing her weekly.

At first it was so weird for me to talk about my feelings, it felt immature for some reason. One of the first things she had me do was to just list off all the things that had happened and what bothered me most. While I was talking, she was writing down all the things I was saying. When I felt I had got it all out, she showed me the list and she said, “it feels like a lot because it is a lot.” This was the first time anyone had made me feel like what I was feeling was okay. Along with therapy I decided to join several Facebook groups and started listening to podcasts about DNA surprises and I finally started to feel less alone. I felt as though I was strong enough to tell other family members about what I had discovered. This is where my roller coaster goes back down. I would get responses like:

“Did you take the test because you don’t love us anymore?”
“We aren’t good enough?”
“You don’t need to talk to them!”
“The past is in the past, leave it there!”
“I don’t want to know or hear about this”
“We knew your dad wasn’t your dad, but we didn’t know who was”

I realized that everyone had been lying to me my whole life. I realized that they never thought through their lie about who my father really was. They never thought “hm, what will we do / say if / when she finds out the truth?” I felt more alone than I had the entire time since getting my results. Not only was I dealing with an identity crisis and severe depression, I also felt like I lost my entire support system. I shut out everyone for a while and when I was ready to talk to them again, I had to have some hard conversations.

My therapist gave me the courage to have conversations like “this is my truth and if you can’t support me then you don’t need to be a part of my life.” I explained that I had so much to figure internally that I couldn’t process any more negative comments or opinions and asked people to keep those to themselves. Those that couldn’t get on board with my new boundaries were not allowed access to me. Something I had to do to begin to heal the pain this discovery caused. I had to put myself first and everything else had to come second.

Today is July 26th, 2024. Three whole years have passed since the day I got my ancestry results, the day I feel like I died and was born as another person. The day my face changed forever. The day my whole world stopped. Three years later and I feel more content than I could have ever imagined back in 2021 + 2022, but it took a lot of work to get here. They say nothing will change but in reality, everything changes. I now understand that life will never “get back to normal” because this is my new normal. I have met most of my paternal family and I adore them. I feel complete in a way I cannot even express in words.

My relationships with my lifelong family members are a work in progress but slowly getting better. My birth father still has not completed his end of the paternity test, but he recently referred to me as his daughter and told me he loved me for the first time. My birth father even had a baby a few months ago so now I have a new baby sister. I went from having one sibling to now being the oldest of five – brother, 26, lifelong brother, 23, sister, 8, and sister, 2 months. Even though I am the oldest sibling, I was only able to be there half of my siblings being born.

I got my results at age 26 and I will always wonder what my life would have been like if I had known the truth from birth. I missed out on 26 years of time with my paternal side of the family – how would my relationships be with them today had I known them my whole life? On the flip side of that, I wouldn’t have my lifelong father’s side of the family for those 26 years so it’s like a game of tug of war in my heart and head whenever that thought crosses my mind. I get stuck in this constant cycle of happiness to sadness then anger and then grief. The rollercoaster of emotions will always be there, but I can ride the roller coaster without fear of completely falling off now.

I feel as though I could conquer anything after enduring this DNA surprise. I know who I am now and who I am going to be, and I am so proud of her. The quote “time heals all” is so true. Just be patient with yourself while you are waiting for the time to pass!