Barbara’s DNA Surprise

This transcript was generated automatically. Its accuracy may vary.

Speaker 1

Hi, I'm Alexis, host of DNA Surprises.

Speaker 2

Hi, I'm Debbie, Life coach and founder of the DNA Surprise Network.

The day is here.

Registration is open for the 2024 DNA Surprise retreat.

The retreat is happening September 19th through 22nd, 2024 in Phoenix, AZ.

This transformative retreat is for NP ES donor conceived people and adoptees who've gone through the life altering experience of Adna Surprise.

It is the right place for you if you want to work through the trauma of Adna Surprise.

Registration is all inclusive and includes a three night stay at a rustic ranch in Phoenix, 8 delicious meals, 6 expert LED sessions on generational trauma, inner child work, breath work and more.

You'll also experience connection with others who understand you.

And we make plenty of time for fun.

Registration is limited to 30 attendees, so reserve your space now.

We can't wait to see you.

Register today at dnasurpriseretreat.com.

Speaker 3

I think I have my answers.

I think I just wish I could tell them how this makes me feel and have them understand.

I think I just want to be understood.

But I did when I had the one conversation with them where I blew down to see them and I basically trapped them in the living room and said you need to sit here and listen to me.

And then I won't talk about it anymore.

And as I'm crying, I said you have no idea.

You need to understand that this really affects me, effects my life.

That's embarrassing, that I didn't know this about myself.

You know, I consider myself accomplished and I don't know that I'm 50%.

I know that being Jewish was a ethnicity.

Would I have wanted to be Jewish?

I don't know, really.

I'm not religious at all, but maybe I would have identified with that.

So I think I want my mom and dad to just understand the trauma that this has caused me.

You know you want your mom and dad to understand you and to help you.

Welcome to DNA Surprises, a podcast that delves into the world of unexpected DNA discoveries.

I'm your host, Alexis Soursault.

In July 2021, my life took a surprising turn when I found out that I'm an NPEA person who has experienced a non paternal event.

In other words, my biological father isn't who I thought he was.

Join me as we explore the stories of NP ES adoptees and donor conceived people and their families.

Get ready to unravel the astonishing journeys that begin with a simple DNA test.

This is DNA surprises.

In this week's episode, we delve into Barbara's DNA surprise story.

Barbara grew up with a strong connection to her German heritage before discovering in her 50s that she was donor conceived and of Jewish descent.

She discusses the challenges she faced, the shock she felt after her discovery and the impact it had on her relationship with her parents and her sense of self.

She also shares the joy she experienced in connecting with some of her half siblings.

Thank you for sharing your story, Barbara.

My name is Barbara.

I am from the Northeast.

I currently live in New England and I am 56 years old.

I had to go back and look at the dates and I think it's been about four years now.

So for Christmas for fun, in 2018, my mother-in-law brought my oldest daughter.

Adna kit.

So she bought her an ancestry kit and then my husband, not knowing what to buy me, bought 23 meat kit.

It was kind of like the gift that year, you know, everybody was buying them and we just kind of spit in the tube.

And my husband's all Polish, His family mostly Polish, Irish and I grew up German and Irish, so thought that my mom's side was Irish, Scottish and my dad's all German.

So we send these tests off and my daughters comes back first and she's my oldest daughter.

I think she at the time was 2425 something like that.

And her results came back and said she was the biggest shock was 25% Ashkenazi Jew and I'm looking at it saying that makes no sense.

I'm not Jewish.

I was raised Lutheran and not religious at all now, but looking at it, saying that doesn't ring a bell.

Just kind of put it aside and didn't even look at it again like so many people say that they do.

Mine came back another week later and opened it up and it's 50% Ashkenazi Jew.

And again, I'm like, what in the world, you know, where does this come from?

How am I Jewish?

It's just a strange thing.

It's absolutely bizarre to me.

And then the other half was I guess what you would expect.

So we look at DNA relatives and again I look at mine and.

There are so many second, third, fourth cousins, all with Jewish last names.

And I just it's kind of like being rushed into Alice in Wonderland.

You're looking around going, where am I?

Like, who are these people?

I've never met any of them.

Speaker 4

Did you believe the results when you got them or were you thinking there was an error?

What did you it's?

Funny, I never thought that there was an error.

I didn't go there.

I don't think I ever not believed it.

There was a name on my daughter's and mine as AI think it's what it said originally because we've adjusted the CMS and now it says half niece and she was on my daughter's as must have been like a first cousin, half first cousin, whatever you would call it and mine.

So I messaged this young girl and that was like the first kind of step and she did get right back to me and said I'm trying to figure this out, my symbol, she said.

I bought the DNA kit for Christmas.

And she must brought both of them, bought one and then quickly did the second one.

And she said, you know, my dad has such a small family, I wanted to learn more and I'm like, well, I don't know either, but somehow we're related and we can't figure this out.

And she threw out the same thing.

It says I'm 25% Ashkenazi Jew.

So that kind of just started the whole thing.

About a week later I called my mom and I said, you know, mom, I took this DNA test and it says I'm Jewish.

My dad is from a very German family.

We actually owned a German bakery growing up, so everything I knew was German.

And I said to her, is there any chance that?

They were like escaping the Holocaust and kind of called themselves German and not Jewish later on.

And she kind of was very vague and said, oh, I don't know, wow, don't mention it to your father.

She kind of really put me off.

And I hung up and thought, OK, that was odd.

But he said no, So, you know, I don't know.

So my oldest daughter is very bright and she and I, she's like.

A dog with a bone and starts, you know, doing a lot of research on the Internet and there was another guy's name on there that she's like mom.

This guy looked in particular like like he doesn't quite belong.

He's two years older than you and he had a Jewish last name.

And then there was only one person that was a close relative that had a full name.

So I actually ended up getting in touch with her.

So my daughter brings out her website and I look at her.

She actually has her own website because she has a PhD and she's.

A doctor.

She's a a psychologist and she kind of looks like me and my daughter's like mom and I'm very athletic.

I run, you know, and I was, this is four years ago, I was still running a lot in my 50s.

He was mom.

In her bio it says she runs and you know, and she looks like you mom.

And I'm like, wow, that's really bizarre.

I reached out to her and you know, we end up talking.

So my back story is my mom and dad met when they were 16 in high school.

Small small town in the northeast, very small town and they got married very young when they were 19 turning 20 and didn't have me till they were 23.

So this is the 1960s and there was no reason for them to take birth control.

So I knew that they kind of had a hard time having me.

I also knew the story was always my mom almost died in the operating room.

So the thing like I knew being pregnant was difficult.

We also have an adopted middle brother, which is so bizarre in the 1960s, and that was strange.

And then I have a younger brother who's nine years younger than me.

So I have a very odd, odd family.

It just the family never really went together, if that makes any sense.

But again, this is the 1960s seventies.

I had no idea that, you know, there was a different way of making a family even in fact then other than the adoption.

So, so Fast forward.

I did put in contact with this woman, but it turns out she's my half sister.

She knew the story that she's a great psychologist and did not want to out it for me.

She wanted me to figure it out myself.

And not not in a rude way, just more in a like a gentle way.

So I got the idea that my parents must have.

Done some sort of insemination and somebody must have stole my dad's sperm.

That's where I went with this.

So I'm trying to tell her that my dad might be her dad.

OK, so yeah, it's so interesting to me, the mental gymnastics that we do right of.

Just trying.

To make it make sense, but also where it doesn't make us the NPE in the situation.

Yeah.

And again, Alexis, never in a million years did I think I was an MPE or donor conceived.

I mean, so finally one day I get to this point where it hits me.

And I said, Oh my goodness, I'm looking at the Ancestry account.

I see some of my mom's distance relatives and I'm walking the house.

And I said to my husband and I go, oh, my goodness, I go, my dad's not my dad.

That's what it is.

I didn't see one.

Ancestral name on my relatives that belong to my father and I I just, I was so in shock, I I just couldn't believe it.

So you know, another going back to that story again, my mom's whole side of the family, very curvy women.

They all have boobs and they have hips and they have kind of thighs and they're, you know, just curvaceous.

I am.

I've always been a stick.

My, my dad's tall and lanky, so my go to was always I look like my dad, you know?

Did I look like my dad?

Not really.

We both have sharp noses, but other than that, he's just kind of thin.

And I was thin.

So you know, I just assumed.

Again, like you said, where your mind goes to this.

I just assumed I look like my dad.

It's it's just so strange to me now that I was so wrong, you know?

When that realization hits you and you go My dad is not my dad.

How are you?

Feeling when that hits.

Sickening.

I was sick because again, correct this.

This is I just can't wrap my head around my and I say uneducated with love.

They didn't go to college.

My uneducated parents went.

To, it turns out went to New York City for a sperm donation.

Like does that in the 1960s.

Like how did that even come about?

I I was so in shock I couldn't believe that this happened.

So you know you Fast forward a little bit So I putting the pieces together because again I knew my mother brushed me off and I knew it wasn't something I was going to go back to her.

So, you know, I walked into my husband, said, Oh my God, my dad's.

Not my dad.

And I must be Jewish.

You know, They must have used someone Jewish.

So again, that name that I told you before that was two years older than me.

I put it together, he and I, he had a tree on ancestry and he and I are related when one of his, I don't know, cousins was also one of my cousins.

And that's kind of what put it all together.

He was actually very gracious.

I end up getting in touch with him.

He's a psychiatrist.

So all these again, I'm from a blue collar family with all these professional half relatives.

I end up talking to him.

He was very kind.

He goes, I had no idea this was actually his father that he was raised with, that I said to him, I think your dad is my biological father And he goes, I don't know, you're gonna have to prove it to me.

And I said well.

Here is your second cousin or your first cousin, and she's my second cousin.

Why would that be?

And he goes, wow, I need to think about this.

So his dad is deceased, died years ago.

And he said, you know, I could see my dad doing that.

He might have given sperm back in the day.

So he had two sons.

And I think as an OBGYN resident in New York City, the world was so small he didn't advertise.

That you were doing this.

It was the fertility clinic, which I later found out from my parents that it just had started and I think it was a word of mouth thing that they would call a doctor.

Hey, I have somebody coming in at noon today.

Can you come in?

And I think this, that this other guy, I can call him EE, it was his dad that that was my daughter.

Quickly realized that you were donor conceived.

Before you made that connection, did you wonder, like did your mom have an affair or anything like that?

Or were you instantly like I was?

I was donor conceived.

Never, ever, ever thought my parents had an affair.

Been married years.

Next year.

Never ever, ever went there.

Never thought that wasn't even a thought to me, that my mom had an affair.

So you you put the pieces together, you connect with your technically your half brother, right?

And.

He says OK, that that sounds about right.

Must be at At what point do?

You go to your parents and say I figured this out.

So then maybe this is the spring of 2019 and as I'm talking to E.

He says to me, let me send you some pictures of my dad and you know, you can see all these pictures.

So I have three children.

My youngest looks nothing like my husband, absolutely nothing like my husband.

She looks like me, but I can't put my finger on who she looks like.

And I said to my mom over the years, my my youngest daughter, she looks like And my mom would always say no, I don't know, just kind of brushing me off, brushing me off.

And he sent me these pictures.

And it was like a Saturday morning.

I remember it so clearly.

I get up in the morning, wake up, look at my phone, and I have a bunch of pictures.

And I open the picture of his dad, my biological father, and my daughter looks exactly like him.

And I that's, you know, you say that you have the emotional moment.

I think you said when you left your meeting, your bio dad you came home and he was just.

Like, lost it, basically.

That was that was my moment.

I cried and cried and cried for an hour or two, and I hadn't had any tears really until then.

But there's something about being a mom and looking at your daughter and she looks exactly like this man you've never met, who was awful, So awful.

I ended up making myself sick.

I ended up having colitis that summer.

I did all this testing, ended up having a a blood clot.

I went to my bowel.

I mean that's like a lot of information maybe you don't need.

I completely know that it was from stress because I am a very healthy person.

I have no stomach issues, nothing wrong with me.

It was absolutely from stress.

And again, I hadn't talked to my parents.

I'm doing this all myself.

I knew my parents would wouldn't take it well so.

You know all that's going on.

So my youngest looks exactly like the donor.

In between, I'm talking to the half sister that I've come to love, the one that had her full name on my site.

And so I'm flashing this all out myself.

It took another year before I told my parents, and the reason is that.

My dad is a sweetheart.

He's a super, super nice guy.

Climate.

He's got a gentle heart and he's very simple, not well educated, worked in this bakery as a Baker his whole life and he's just simple.

So I really, really didn't know how to approach this.

But on the other hand, I'm so angry and it's inside of me being so angry.

I stick out my family.

I don't know.

I know.

Other people have said that a lot.

My all my cousins, maybe two went to college out of 12.

And not only did I go to a prestigious college, I ran Division One track and I also then got my MBA at another great school.

Married a guy who's professional athlete like we we just have this incredible kind of life story.

Did not fit in.

He's been telling me my whole life.

Where do you come from?

You just don't fit into this family.

That's always struggling for money that there's always something going on and he he always said to me, you just don't fit in.

So again, I don't want it.

My parents are so simple I didn't know how to approach it with them until finally we had another issue and I in an e-mail I said to them and I know that you know I'm you used a sperm donor.

So my mom actually called me after I wrote this terrible e-mail to them.

Mine wasn't so much terrible, and it was just saying that, you know, I knew what you did.

I'm so upset about it.

And all this other stuff is kind of coming out because of that.

So she did call me.

I've had two conversations with them and that is it.

In 3 1/2 years.

They don't want to talk about it, but the story goes that they couldn't get pregnant.

They got married when they were 19, turning 20.

And didn't get pregnant for years, which you know back in the 60s that wasn't acceptable.

She went to her family doctor and the family doctor said, I know of a clinic that's opening up in New York City and you could basically go see them.

So it's awful.

I don't know how much you know about the donor conceived industry back then, but they told my child.

It's really kind of laughable, but you you'll giggle when you hear this.

They told him he went with her and he gave a sperm donation and they mixed it, quote, UN quote, with someone else's sperm.

And you were supposed to go home, have sex again and not know if you got pregnant.

You close the book and you assume it's yours.

That basically was what happened.

They had, from what I know, no clue who they used for a donor.

They didn't know he was Jewish.

They didn't know anything about him, didn't know his health history.

You know, I am like such a deep thinker.

It disturbs me to no end that this is the way the industry was, that I don't know what's inside my body.

I don't know who I come from.

It's awful.

Absolutely awful.

Wow, that's a lot, right?

Yeah, it's a lot.

That's a lot to take in and right.

That sort of dismissal about, Yeah, the the weight of it is mind blowing.

I mean, they, you know, they said I'm sorry, 'cause I was crying, you know, I actually flew down.

They don't live near me to talk to them.

And I was in tears trying to describe what this has been like for me.

You know, I said here I am an accomplished, I own my own business.

I had a lot of big things in my life, and I don't know this about myself.

Interestingly enough, people have always assumed I was Jewish.

A lot of people in college, because we had AI think we had a big Jewish community at the college I went to.

But that's me.

You're Jewish, You're from the Northeast, you look Jewish.

And I'm like, no, not.

So your parents, do you still talk to them regularly, but you don't talk about this?

Or have you only talked to them three times since this happened?

No, no, no, no.

We it's re established a an arm's length relationship.

I've always been the parents in the family.

They don't know why.

I tell this story a lot because it's a great cocktail dinner story.

You know, when when it comes up or people say true nationality, my husband rolls his eyes and he's like, OK, you know, or you see the great for this story.

You know, people are always like, you should be on dateline or 2020.

And I'm like, yeah, I know.

So, you know, it's going back again.

I felt like the black sheep.

So again, my parents are very simple.

They own this family business or my grandparents did.

And I was always just very bright, you know, not knowing where it was from.

It was kind of played down in my family.

No one paid any attention to it.

I graduated second in my class.

I had a guidance counselor.

I was the 1st in my family go to college.

I had a guidance counselor that helped me go to prestigious university.

I also was a Division One athlete.

I'm like always felt so odd.

And then on top of that had so much guilt, so financially successful.

My parents still really, really struggle for money.

So I've always been kind of supporting them, helping them out.

I've had this very guilt laden adulthood of being the successful one in the family and not understanding there's a reason for it.

So I always felt guilty for that.

You know, like maybe I did more than they were ever able to do and I don't know why, but I've had a ton of guilt about that my whole entire life.

And then the struggle with how much do you help them, What do you do?

It's not my husband's fault that they mismanaged money and haven't taken care of things.

That's been the 1 silver lining to kind of come out of this is now I know that I don't have the same DNA that they have.

It makes me feel a lot better inside, if that makes any sense.

My parents can't deal with it.

My dad is.

And and this is where I blame my dad a lot.

My husband forbids my dad because he's like, listen, he's simple.

He can't go there.

My problem with him is it's all about him.

It's about his shame as a man back in the 60s not being able to have children.

And I look at it like, OK, let's forget about you for a second, Dad.

And my dad's almost 80, so, you know, it's hard.

But I'm like, dad, this is about me.

It's not about you.

You know, you did this.

It's not shameful anymore.

It is what it is, but I'm the one that has to put this.

It's it's awful.

I mean, I.

I hear that you know that that there would definitely be a stigma for him being the quote reason right for the infertility and probably like shame associated with that shame.

Yeah, yeah.

And what about your mom?

My mother buries things under the rug.

She just if it.

If she cannot talk about it and it can go away.

That's been my whole entire life.

So she faced it for the 45 minutes that I made them talk about it and then she never wants to talk about it again.

No one has ever asked me what are you doing with this?

What does it mean to you in your life?

I don't mention it.

I'm going to see my half sister later this week.

I won't tell them.

I just kind of blend the whole trip together because I'm going to see my daughter too.

And you know, I just don't talk about it.

I know it's not something that they want to talk about.

It hurts my feelings as well because I see that my dad maybe can't handle it as kind of a simple older man.

Now my mom, I would have wished that she had pulled me aside and had like a mom, daughter type of talk and said, listen, this is what we did back in the day.

I'm not sure if you are dads or not because after this it came out, she said.

We thought you were ours.

And I said OK, but I'm laugh going really.

I look nothing like them.

And then the other part of that too is I mentioned before my parents, while they were trying to figure out a way to get pregnant, put in for an adoption that ended up coming through.

That's in the works for years.

So I have an adopted brother who's three years younger than me.

And then my mom wanted another natural baby.

She wanted a, you know, I respect that.

So they went and did fertility again when I was nine years old.

And I clearly remember them going for fertility treatments, but I didn't know what that meant back in the day.

So they did the same thing, but very secretively.

And The funny thing is my younger brother was 9 when I left the house.

We're not very close.

We are so different.

Steve looks really Jewish.

And The funny thing is another Jewish donor you would that, you know, things would change nine years later.

They didn't.

He also has a Jewish doctor as a a donor and he sort of gotten the one thing that really stands out in my family.

My mom and dad have piercing light blue eyes.

So, like, we got German.

I guess my mom would be Scottish, Irish.

They'd both have really light blue eyes.

I've had kind of greenish grey eyes, which I just kind of said they're like my parents Again, I'm not a scientist, you know, I I think if I knew more science, I would figure this out.

My youngest brother has murky brown eyes, funniest thing now.

And about 20 years ago, I must have been reading an article on white color and genetics.

And I came home and said to my husband, do you think my brother is theirs?

And he goes, I don't know what you talking about.

He has really brown eyes.

And again you said we believe what we're told.

It's never told anything differently.

There was no inkling that there was anything done.

It was such a secret.

It was unbelievable.

So me, my youngest brother and my adopted brother, obviously, but none of us are my dad's.

And so when my mom is revealing this finally, and she said we thought you were ours.

And I said, but mom Jay looks nothing like you, why in the world you knew he wasn't yours.

And she goes, I know.

So I'm thinking to myself, well, if you knew my youngest brother wasn't yours, he kind of she very easily shuts her mind off and just doesn't go there.

How did your brother receive that?

So again, we're really different.

He's on a second marriage with two young kids.

I think he just doesn't have time for it.

I think he just doesn't want to.

It's funny though, he didn't have to figure it all out, which I think then so much trauma to me that I had to dig and figure all this out.

I sent him the DNA kit.

I couldn't stand it.

I called him up and said this is what I found out.

I don't think your dad's either.

I want you to take adna test because there's a lot of diseases that the Ashkenazi Jews carry.

I took a genetic test because we carry heart disease, we carry breast cancer.

I'm just so mornified by this whole thing.

My brother is remarried to a younger woman with two new kids and I'm like, she should know that diseases might pass through the family, lots of our heritage that we knew nothing about.

And did he take the test or was he?

Did he took, yeah, he took the DNA test.

He hasn't done any genetic testing, but he's got a whole family.

He reached right out to him and I think that's the difference in in ages too, that he's nine years younger than me, that's a whole a whole half sibling family that have a chat together and they were looking to get together for some sort of reunion, but then COVID occurred.

So he's never met any of them.

But his process has been so much easier than mine.

You said your brother, they he found half siblings and they tried to connect.

You found at least two half siblings.

I have 10.

You have 10 again.

So disturbing Alexis, it disturbs me to no end.

So I think I'm up to 10 older conceived, half siblings and he had two boys of his own.

They have like 5 girls. 5 boys have siblings.

A couple of them do not want to know anything about it.

They they know but they don't want like my brother.

They just don't care.

They like their own families.

They don't want to go there.

It's super interesting the different feelings.

But on a really fun note, I won't name names, but you and I can talk after.

I have 1/2 sibling that is the child of an extremely famous actress, extremely famous actress and it's not public.

I reached out to her because her name her.

She has a pseudonym on the Ancestry page that I was able to find on another website and had her real name.

And I'm Googling it and I'm like, Oh my goodness, that's her mother and it's not public.

She grew up thinking her father was a different Jewish Doctor Who is an older man.

And so I think when she got her results, she probably just looked at the ethnicity and she was like, yeah, that makes sense.

So when I reached out to her, I reached out to her a few times.

She just doesn't want to believe it.

But she and I look so much alike, and that's so disturbing.

So again, I never look like anyone in my family.

And all of a sudden I have all these people I look like.

Again, another thing, I think it's so interesting, all ten of us, the ones I know about anyway I have probably have PhDs or medical doctors.

The other half are all successful.

And again, you know, I joke with my husband all the time that it's so nice to meet 1/2 sibling and not have to pay for dinner.

That's the experience with my family.

As you know, if we go out, our credit card's always the one that's getting whipped.

That's just a sticking thing with me that's been so interesting.

Yeah, that you found these people who you all grew up for the most part, I imagine like separately.

I don't know if there's any sibling pods and then all have these similar.

Life experiences and you know, you're all intellectual and so have you.

I think you mentioned that you were going to meet 1/2 sister.

Yeah, so this 1/2 sister, the first one I found was like like finding a puzzle piece in my life.

When I met this first half sister, I talked to her on the phone and she goes, bro, she was Barbara.

I've always wanted a sister and you know, I could have cried because I've never had a sister.

And she and IA few years ago met in Chicago for a weekend and we did not stop talking.

And we are built absolutely the same.

Like I said, she runs, she's intellectual, she gets me.

I absolutely adore her.

I've seen her four times.

Maybe she was on the other coast, so that's a little difficult.

But she and her husband actually came out to meet with my husband and I.

We got along great.

We, the truth of us now are going to meet the newest half sister who is also a doctor this weekend.

So I'm really excited.

She's two years older than us, which makes me a little nervous because we are all 56 and this one sister is 58, which makes me think my donor either donated a couple times and then stopped for a while, or I might have a hundred siblings out there.

It's really disturbing.

I'm in touch with two male half siblings and then these two other women and that's it.

The other one, the famous actress daughter, doesn't want anything to do with anything.

And some people you can't find because they use just the first name and they're hard to, you know, locate.

But every, you know, six months to a year another one pops up.

So it's really interesting.

How do you feel when you see another one pop up?

Now I feel the more the merrier.

I'm fine with it now.

I think it's a little disturbing though that I think the industry disturbs to me that there was no controls that this guy probably from what I've read about it, made $2025 every time he gave a sperm donation, which I've read is several $100 today.

So he was supplementing his income.

Another really interesting fact that I'm so grateful.

I kind of grew up with the dad I have because my firm donor's actual son says he wasn't the greatest guy.

He was a narcissist, extremely intelligent.

He was part of Mensa, which I don't know if you know what that is.

And back in the day it was like a high IQ society, very bright that I love to read.

It explains so much.

I'm not walking around saying I'm part of Mensa, but I I just always been very academic.

Again in the family that that wasn't thing.

And I asked this guy too, I'm like, was your dad athletic?

And he said, you know, he didn't play an organized sport, but he was always on the basketball court or playing tennis or something like that.

So I think so much of me came from this donor that I've never met, which is so bizarre.

With this brother that you found that that it was his.

You know, raised actual son, yes.

Have you established any sort of relationship with him or was it more like you got the information and then moved on?

It's a little quirky.

For instance, I asked him for some more pictures for this weekend.

I've asked him three times and he hasn't gotten back to me.

I actually had breakfast with him once when I was in the town that he was in and we chatted.

I don't think we'll have a real relationship.

He thought it was amusing that he had sisters because he never grew up with sisters.

But the pictures he shows me, he's like, he even said to me recently.

He goes, I saw your picture on Facebook.

You look just like my aunt, my dad's sister.

I have this really bizarre kind of frizzy, curlyish hair that I'm always constantly trying to straighten.

He never knew where this hair came from.

And I look just like his dad's sister.

She has the same hair.

And then the sister I'm going to meet this weekend, so has the same hair.

And the actress's daughter also had the same hair.

It's a an interesting, bizarre thing.

So as you mentioned at the beginning, you didn't realize that there kind of was this infertility industry back when you were conceived.

Have you since connected with other people who are around your age and share this experience?

Or how are you connecting with others, right?

There's Facebook groups.

So you know, interestingly enough, the first one I found was donor conceived.

DNA donor conceived.

He never found the MPE ones, which is why I wrote to you to say, hey, my story is so different.

I assumed everybody who found out that this children are conceived.

I never, it never occurred to me that people had dads because they were cheating or something or just covering up some crazy story.

So I've just found Facebook groups, not, you know, I've never gone to any groups.

It's a very isolating emotional, deep trauma that I am.

I feel very alone with.

I can talk to my half sister when I see her, but she's far away and we're on different time zones.

I saw a therapist for a while, I know a lot of people recommend that and she was really helpful.

She wasn't versed in any kind of donor conceived or adoption type of issues.

But she was gentle and she kind of made me look at the situation with my mom and dad and and basically said what's radical acceptance?

You need to accept them, well, not accept them.

So it's your choice to accept them.

But she was really helpful.

So that's kind of how I dealt with it.

But, you know, I have a very, very hard time.

You know, you said in yours, my husband's my rock, my husband is my rock.

I know he's not going anywhere, but he doesn't understand.

So, you know, that's hard for me.

I feel like people are sick of me talking about it.

Yeah, You mentioned growing up that your family owned a German Bakery and I think.

You know, a lot of people in the United States, I I can speak for myself that, you know, the quote UN quote, white side of me is like German, Irish, British Isles.

I don't have a strong connection to that, you know.

But you did have a strong connection to your German heritage.

How have you shifted as a result of this ethnic shift?

Do you still feel?

Tied to your German not ancestry, but just the roots in which you were were raised.

And how are you connecting with the Jewish side?

No, I don't at all.

I feel like nothing, if that makes any sense.

I don't feel like anything, which is really sad.

I don't feel any ties to the German other than, you know, knowing that I had these grandparents that came from there.

But yeah, you lose such a part of yourself going back again.

I think deep down my parents knew, you know, I was never brought up with a family that said, oh, you look like grandma or your nose is so and so's or you.

Wow, you got that hair from your aunt.

And I think deep down I knew something wasn't right, but I couldn't put my finger on it.

So again, I grew up with this German heritage, but I don't think I internalized it very much.

So even now I feel Jewish.

I think I identify with it.

That's why I really have a deep down feeling for it, no.

And I kind of feel a little bit cheated.

Honestly, what's next for you?

Do you think you'll look more into that or where are you at with it?

I think I'm too old to do that.

That sounds sad, but in my mid to late 50s, No, I think I have too much else going on in my life.

What's next for me would just be exploring.

I am just thrilled to meet this new sister this week and my one sister that I'm going out to see.

I have so much more in common with her.

I'm close to a cousin or two on my mom's side of the family.

Well, other than them, I just.

I don't identify with anybody in my entire family.

And it's so funny to meet people who right away you're like, Oh my God, I feel you.

I am you, you know.

You're what I've been looking for my whole life.

So, you know, if there's a silver lining, that is it.

It's it's wonderful.

It's the best thing ever to have these, especially this one woman in my life and then hopefully this other one.

I always ask this when I speak with donor conceived people because I think it's really important to center your voices when we talk about donor conception in the fertility industry and.

I'm curious what your thoughts are on any changes that should be made or what you would say are you know, best practices for a parent who may be considering using a a donor.

You have such mixed feelings.

You know, as a woman, I loved being pregnant and my heart goes out to anybody who can't get pregnant and perhaps has to use a donor.

I think I'm all about a lot of regulation, definitely a limit on how many they can have as I'm staring at, you know, there could be 100 half siblings out there in this world that I might have met and dated back in the day.

Who knows, You know, cause a lot of us were in the kind of tri-state area there.

So I'm all for regulation and so I'm not against it.

But I think no secrecy, I mean, there just can't be secrecy.

It's an awful thing.

You touched on some of this earlier, but I just want to make sure that I give you the space here.

You said you wish that your parents really understood how you felt and you talked a lot about how it felt to discover that you were donor conceived.

Can you talk more about that?

What does that being donor conceived mean for you?

I think for me it's that I don't know this person and my parents didn't choose him.

It was such a random act.

He could have been a guy on the street who was available and wanted to make $25.

It it's that's the part that being donor conceived that really bothers me.

Maybe if I was a child in the last 20 years where I know some parents who picked their donor and there was a reason and he has a name and you'll have a background.

For me, being donor conceived means I don't know where I came from.

I don't know what traits he had.

I'm relying on his son to tell me, and I'm lucky enough that I even have that.

But, you know, I think being donor conceived just means, especially in the time that I grew up, not knowing anything about myself.

And it's just very disconcerting, you know, I can't rely on anything I've been told in the past about what I thought was true.

You, you feel adrift.

I feel like I'm a boat drifting out in the ocean, if that makes any sense.

My half sister that I'm super close with now, her feelings and she's a therapist, a psychologist, and she is not nearly as traumatized as I am.

And the reason is that her parents told her about 10 years ago, her dad was feeling guilty and actually wrote her a letter and said this is what we did back from the day, you know, you're not ours.

Her discovery so much less traumatic than mine.

She was actually very grateful that her dad told her she forgives her mom because they did eventually tell her and her mom was just protecting her dad.

So that was one piece that I think the way I found out, I do have another half brother that I am in contact with who was also extremely angry.

His dad died and never told him and they ran a business together and he said that Jeff and Guy basically looked me in the eye every single day for the last 40 years.

Never told me this.

What advice do you have for a parent who is keeping Adna Surprise from their child?

I've listened to you say this to everyone and I agree.

I think you maybe there was one person who said you don't have to tell them, but we are going to find out.

The new generations are going to find out.

They're going to have cancers and they're going to do, you know, genetic testing.

Tell them.

It's so unsettling.

If my parents had told me years ago, I would have, it would have been part of my story.

You know, I would have gone through the the angst years and years ago, not when I was in my 50s, when it was just so much more difficult.

So you have to tell them, you know, honesty is always the best.

Secrets are terrible.

I firmly believe that.

And what advice do you have for someone who just found out that their donor conceived?

It gets low.

It's so complex and it's not going to be all good.

It's not going to be all bad.

I would say do your research, join your Facebook groups, do your reading, listen to the podcast and put your story together.

I think another person had said, think before you act.

You know, don't make those rational calls and just take it slow and be very forgiving of yourself.

It's so emotional.

Like I said before, I wish I had had more help.

I didn't know there were communities out there, and that's really what's so hard.

I thought I was the only one.

And I've had so much stress that somehow I had some mysterious clot form in my body and I don't want that to happen to somebody else.

So you need to talk to somebody, Know that there's a lot of other people out there like you and just take a lot of deep breaths and we'll say there were Silver Linings.

And you know, not everybody.

I know a lot of people are searching for those half siblings and it doesn't always happen, but if you find them, there could be some great Silver Linings to the story.

And that's kind of what I tell myself every single day.

Thank you for sharing that, Barbara.

Thank you for coming on the podcast and sharing your, you're right, very unique donor conceived story.

I'm so glad that you've been able to connect with your half sisters and that that's going well.

And I hope that things just continue progressing and that you find more and more peace with your story.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

Thanks again to Barbara for sharing her story.

If you have a DNA surprise that you'd like to share, please submit your story at dnasurprisespodcast.com.