May 27, 2025 • 49 mins
At the end of every DNA Surprises episode, I ask my guests two questions. I ask for advice for people in our community, and I ask for advice for parents keeping a DNA surprise from their child. Time and time again, guests implore parents to tell the truth. But when is the right time to tell? And are the ramifications different than when a DNA surprise is uncovered with a DNA test?
In this week’s episode, Meaghan shares how one day, her parents took for a long walk and revealed the truth - her dad is not biologically related to her. She then shares the fallout from that - connecting with new family members while balancing the fact that her biological father is not a safe person. Meaghan also shares how her DNA surprise led to her to create a book for people who have had similar experiences. I’ll be sure to share that when it’s available.
Thank you for sharing your story, Meaghan.
Find Meaghan at:
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
It felt surreal and I remember just really struggling to make
sense of it kind of going like, OK, so how is this person family
but also a stranger, which is just obvious, right?
Like yes, this is what everybodyfaces.
But those thoughts coming up like how is this person family
but also a stranger? And she's my sister.
So like I'm supposed to just love her, right?
(00:23):
Or are we supposed to figure outfor friends?
Or are we just exchanging information or like what are we
doing? But I actually found her just
really easy to talk to and superintelligent and I just was
interested in her and her life and I think the feeling was
(00:43):
mutual. Welcome to DNA Surprises, a
podcast that delves into the world of unexpected DNA
discoveries. I'm your host, Alexis Soursalt.
In July 2021, my life took a surprising turn when I found out
that I'm an N P/E, a person who has experienced a non paternal
(01:04):
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 theirfamilies.
Get ready to unravel the astonishing journeys that begin
with a simple DNA test. This is DNA surprises.
(01:29):
At the end of every DNA Surprises episode, I ask my
guests 2 questions, I ask for advice for people in our
community, and I ask for advice for parents keeping Adna
surprise from their child. Time and time again, guests
implore parents to tell the truth.
But when is the right time to tell?
(01:51):
And are the ramifications different than when Adna
surprise is uncovered with Adna test?
In this week's episode, Megan shares how one day, her parents
took her for a long walk and revealed the truth her dad is
not biologically related to her.She then shares the fallout from
that, connecting with new familymembers while balancing the fact
(02:15):
that her biological father is not a safe person.
Megan also shares how her DNA surprise LED her to create a
book for people who have had similar experiences.
I'll be sure to share that when it's available.
Thank you for sharing your story, Megan.
My name is Megan, I'm 44 and I'mfrom Vancouver Island in Canada.
(02:38):
I grew up here with my mom and my, I guess who I learned to be
my adoptive dad and a younger sister.
And I did have suspicions growing up, but they were always
sort of put to rest if I asked. And then I guess Fast forward a
(02:59):
whole bunch, I was married and Ihad two kids and we had always
talked about adopting and so being on that side of the triad.
And so we were in the process oflike learning.
And here in Canada, or at least in BC, there's like a whole
educational component. So we were sort of going through
those pieces and the whole time sharing what we were learning
(03:23):
with my mom and dad. And so there was a particular
night where we were talking about openness and we had shared
why we felt that was really important and what we had
learned about that. And my mom and dad were on board
with birth moms being involved, but not birth dads.
(03:44):
And it was this really interesting exchange because we
were going like, OK, so birth moms are cool, you're cool with
that. But birth dads like, what's the
hang up? And they said, what if, what if
he's dangerous? It was like, OK, but what if
he's not right? Like we don't know who this
person is. We don't know anything about
(04:05):
them, you know, etcetera, etcetera.
But they were just like, I don'twant to say unreasonably upset,
but like, there was no logical context for their being as
opposed as they were. And so after they left, there
was this conversation between myhusband and I where we were
going, like, just don't understand, is this a generation
(04:26):
gap or is it like, what's happening?
And so then a couple weeks went by and I was closing in on my
33rd birthday. And so I sort of mentioned it in
conversation to mom and dad. And there was like a bit of
attention that happened where, you know, there was a look
exchanged between them and they said, we, we have to talk to you
(04:46):
and can we go for a walk? And I thought, OK, let's go for
a walk. And I told the kids, like, go
put your shoes on and get the dog ready.
And they went, no, no, no, just you.
And my heart kind of like stopped.
I thought, oh, shoot, like, whathave I done?
What's happened? Who's sick?
Like all the thoughts racing of like, what is happening?
And so off we go on our walk. And we got like almost to the to
(05:10):
this sort of nature walk by our house where we were headed to.
And I said, so what's up? And they said, no, no, no, we
have to be further. We're not ready yet.
So they took me like a fair distance from the house into
nature, got us, you know, sitting down.
And then my mom spilled the beans, but very, very slowly.
She sort of stumbled around withher birds a lot.
(05:31):
And all she could get out at first was your father.
And then there was a long pause,but in my head my voice had
finished the sentence. Isn't your dad like I knew?
So you just knew you had an A knowing now, you said when you
were a child that you had questions and those were kind of
easily put to bed and you believed your parents, as most
(05:55):
people do. What kinds of questions did you
have at that time? Did you wonder if your dad was
your father? Were you wondering if you were
adopted? Like what were your questions?
Yeah, So my sister and I just never like had much resemblance.
I'm very fair and I've always had very big curly hair and like
(06:16):
I'm kind of lanky and freckles, all that kind of thing.
Whereas my sister, she's got like the olive skin and the
straight fine hair and differentbuild.
And we were just very different.And so as odd as this sounds, we
actually would have our friends and sometimes teachers would
even ask us, are you guys full sisters?
(06:37):
Like you both look like your mombut but you don't.
Both both look like your. Dad.
Wow, which is just so interesting, right, that people
comment to children on things like that, which is probably a
whole separate conversation. But but so when when people did
(06:57):
that to you, you would go, you maybe went home and did you ask
your parents like, Hey, why, whydo we look so different?
And what did they say? Yeah, so that's exactly what
would happen is I would tell them, no, of course we're fell
sisters. Like what?
And they would explain why they asked, right?
And then I would I'd go home andask, usually my mom, and she
(07:18):
would say, yeah, no, you're fellsisters.
Why would they ask you that? OK, I guess the other thing was
that as I got into my sort of teen years, what I started to
notice was that compared to my friends, I had a lot more rules
and there was a lot more like safety type things, like I
(07:39):
wasn't allowed to walk to the corner store alone or just some
of these things. And then again, as I got a
little older and then I started spending time in the city and
stuff, my mom would tell me justsort of strange things, like
she'd say, watch out for this particular last name.
Like if you meet people with this last name, tell me.
(08:00):
And I was like, that's really strange.
And she didn't tell you why. But no, no, like no explanation.
And and then there was sort of like, I think around 18/17/18,
there was a story that she shared about having an
ex-boyfriend that was quite violent.
And I remember after her sharingthat story too, being like, is
(08:22):
he my real dad? And she said, no, like, why
would you ask that? And I kind of said, well, why
would you tell me the story? Why share this if there?
And she said, well, because you're at an age where you're
dating and you're meeting men and I want you to know what a
not so great relationship looks like so that you don't get into
it. So I think probably she may have
(08:44):
been trying to build up the courage to tell me at that
point. And then sort of backed out at
the very end. But OK, it was enough to really
sort of stick into my brain thatthat was a real possibility,
even though she didn't confirm it.
OK, so you're on this walk with your parents, your mom?
(09:06):
Says your father. Long pause.
You finish the sentence in your mind.
What happens when she actually says it?
I just nodded and I said I know.Was she surprised when you said
that? Yeah, yeah, she was.
She was a little welled up already because I think just the
(09:26):
stress of the whole thing, like,I can't imagine holding a secret
for that long. And then now this is the moment
you're telling the secret, you know, I know my heart was
thumping. So I imagine her heart was just
thumping and she just did. How could you know?
And I said the way anybody knowsanything, you feel it right in
(09:50):
your heart and right in your gut, like it's just there.
At that point, how are you feeling?
Oh, that's a good question. I think my empathy for my mom
and dad was, and particularly mymom was so high that I think I
(10:16):
was really tuned into trying to just be OK and make it OK for
her. I remember asking like for some
details in that moment and they were willing to share just that
fact, but nothing else really. So I remember asking questions,
not getting answers, and then sort of accepting the defeat of
(10:41):
that moment, like, OK, this is all I'm gonna get this time.
And so we started walking back to the house in part way.
I volunteered. Well, I guess this doesn't
really change anything, even though inside it changes
everything. Yeah, I was gonna ask upside
down. I was gonna.
(11:01):
Ask Were you really feeling thator were you just wanting to
comfort your parents in that moment?
I think I was wanting to comfortthem and I think also it was a
real feeling of duality, like I could feel both things I was
able to hold space for like thisdoesn't change anything.
Like you're still mom and dad and our family is still our
family, but also hold space inside of me for actually this
(11:26):
changes everything. Absolutely.
So at that point, you're not getting any details.
What do you do next? Do you tell your children, your
husband? What do you do?
You know, what's funny is I don't actually remember exactly
how this played out. What I do know is from my
(11:46):
daughter recounting to me what she remembers.
So I must have just been absolutely in shock because I, I
really don't remember. But she remembers me coming home
and just going to my room and just spending a little bit of
time there alone for a few minutes after.
And my mom and dad, I'm assuming, left fairly quickly.
(12:08):
So she remembers me spending some time alone and then coming
down and having a little chat quietly with my husband.
And I do kind of remember that alittle bit.
I remember us doing dishes and me just kind of like muttering,
hey, so this is what they said and him going, oh, OK.
And it was like, and nothing. And that's it.
(12:28):
That's all I got. And I do remember telling my
kids, I don't know that my son would remember.
He was pretty young. I think he was like 7 or 8.
But my daughter was a little bitolder.
I think she was closer to 13 or so.
What happens next? Do you want to start digging in
(12:50):
and finding out who this person is?
You get this information, What do you do with it?
Yeah, and you know what? Without extra information, it
was really hard to do anything. There was sort of an assumption
in my head that I think maybe she confirmed, I'm not sure, but
I had the assumption that, OK, this was probably the person who
(13:11):
was the ex that that it was an unhappy, abusive relationship.
It's probably this person that she was talking about.
But beyond that, what does a person do with it?
I didn't have a name to go with.I didn't have anything.
Like there was nothing. So I was really without power
(13:33):
and kind of at the mercy of my mom's timeline, which is now a
lot of years have passed. So I can have empathy for that,
that, you know, she was preparedto share a certain amount and
she hadn't gone past that point yet.
So I had to wait for her to be ready.
So I cried a lot. I cried a lot.
(13:54):
I prayed a lot. I journaled.
I love an art studio so I did a lot of pottery and art and just
tried to be OK and and persuade her I guess to.
Yeah, because this was, this was11 years ago approximately.
So DNA testing wasn't as prevalent as it is now.
(14:17):
So at this point, I mean, were was Ancestry or anything like
that even on your radar in termsof finding your father?
Yeah, not at all, not at all. And even in terms of the
Internet, like it was around, but I didn't know.
I didn't know what I was called like.
And I remember going away and thinking about it and going, OK,
(14:39):
does this mean like I'm adopted then or what am I?
What does this mean? And then after searching online
for quite a bit, I think it was a couple years even then, I came
up across a forum for late discovery adoptees on Facebook.
I don't think we had the term inPE yet.
I think it was just LDA. That was all there was.
(15:00):
But I remember feeling great relief at just that, going, OK,
I have a name, there's a name for this.
And then really looking for resources.
I was in school for counseling to become a counselor at the
time. And I remember even then also
looking at all my course working, going OK, where's the
help for this? Where's the map?
How do we get better? How do we recover from this?
(15:22):
I'm just not really finding a lot, finding comfort with other
people online who had shared their stories, but I remember
all of us being or feeling like all of us were really just in
the same pool of despair and lostness and suffering and not
necessarily anybody knowing the way out.
(15:45):
How much time goes by before youmake progress in learning the
truth about your birth? So I think it was about six
months later that I I had a nameto work with.
So I had a last name and a firstname.
(16:06):
My mom finally told me. But before that, I was just
begging for really, like, bread crumbs, like, give me anything,
give me something to work with. And she said, OK, well, he was
Belgian. And I was like, OK, all right.
And like, and, and she said, andhe was athletic, OK.
(16:29):
And so I remember going online and, like, Googling Belgian
athletes and, like, just lookingat their pictures and going, OK,
that's the thing. And then reading about the
culture. And I read something about a
protest that involves French fries, something about people
eating a lot of French fries at this protest or a French fry
(16:49):
protest. And me going, well, I love
French fries. Like, I was looking for any
little crumb to identify this piece and go, OK, well, they
love French fries. I love French fries.
Yes. OK, that's it.
And then, you know, some time went by and then I did have a
last name to work with. And then the search actually got
a lot easier. I sat on the fence a lot about
(17:13):
whether or not to meet him and ultimately decided not to
because when she disclosed all the details of what had
happened, I just really wasn't super comfortable with it.
It was kind of like, OK, people change, but do people change
that much? I, I don't know.
At the time I put it on hold, I didn't make my mind 100%, but I
(17:36):
was like, I'm certainly going toput that on hold and we'll see
if we can find siblings first. So using one of the search
engines online, there was a website for people to connect.
I went looking for him, but whatI found was his daughter looking
for him. And so I went OK, so half
sibling. Cool.
OK, so she was the first half sibling that I met and she was
(18:01):
also placed for adoption. So she was also not raised by
him. And so it was kind of neat to
connect with. Yeah, like an older sister.
I was the oldest, but now I'm not the oldest.
Wow. All right.
So you find a sibling, I guess she probably doesn't give you
much information though about your family, but did you get a
(18:22):
chance to speak with her and andwhat was that like to connect
with somebody on your paternal side that you were related to?
And then from there the search was easy because our niece on
that side also found her throughthe same website.
And so then she contacted me oneday and she said how do you feel
(18:43):
about meeting a niece? And I was like perfect, hook us
up. And that was kind of cool
because she lives a lot closer to us.
She's in Vancouver as opposed tomy half sisters like across the
country. So I think it was like 2 years
post discovery we met my niece for the first time.
You're meeting these extended family members as you're
(19:08):
meeting. Do you share what you have
learned? Are you keeping that close?
How are you navigating that? Because you know, often when I
hear these stories, it's maybe it was an affair, he didn't
know, maybe he did know, but he had a family or something like
that. But there are these
(19:29):
circumstances where it there wasa reason why your mother didn't
want you to be around this man. So do you disclose those reasons
to the people that you meet? You're, you're asking like the
golden ticket question, right? Like what is the story?
What really happened? So I'll tell what really
happened in the best way that I can, because since writing my
(19:52):
book, I had to meet with a lawyer and they told me all this
stuff about you can say this andyou can't say that.
So I'm going to do my best to tell it as truthfully as I can.
So the story she discloses to meis that when she was 15 is when
she met my birth dad and he was in his mid 30s.
So like gigantic age gap, gigantic power differential.
(20:13):
And so he lures her into some form of relationship that they
were in from the time she was 15until 22.
He was married at the time. He had three other children with
that particular woman. He had many more children than
that, but he had three boys he was raising with his wife at the
time. And the one boy, the one in the
(20:34):
middle, was actually just a little bit younger than my mom
and was there for like, the whole relationship.
He was aware of it. He was expected to keep it a
secret. And so, yeah, big, big safety
issues, big red flags. And so, yeah, when I met my
mother, sister, I did tell her that when I met my niece, it
(20:57):
wasn't a secret what kind of a person he was.
And like, very quickly, often actually the first question was,
are you in contact with him, right.
So like when whenever I met someone, it was like, are you
gonna find him? Have you found him?
Because there was, there were safety issues or at least we
believe there's safety issues, right?
(21:17):
Right. So the niece that you met, was
she the child of one of the the children that he raised?
Yeah. OK, yeah, so she was the child
of the oldest brother. We got to know her a little bit.
And then she connected us, not with her dad, because that's a
whole other story, but with her uncle, the second boy that was
(21:42):
all friends with my mom. So she kind of said, do you want
to meet Uncle so and so? And I said, Oh yeah.
And I checked with my mom first.I said, do you mind if I meet so
and so? She said sort of of all of them,
that's who she would feel the best about me meeting, just from
(22:03):
what she could remember of him. So I said, yeah, go ahead and
give him my number. And then I waited for like a
year, long enough that I gave up.
Yeah, you've had a lot of patience throughout this
process. So when he reaches out to you,
what does he say? He says, hey, it's your brother,
(22:25):
and sorry it took so long. Yeah, it was really awkward at
first. We had some awkward exchange.
He cracked a joke that was like,if anybody in my normal life
cracked this joke, I would have been like, we're not friends
anymore. But because it was him, I was
like, I'm going to give him a chance.
He's probably just nervous. I'm really nervous.
It's going to sound maybe weird,But almost always my first
(22:47):
question when I was meeting family members was like, are you
a safe person? Because there was a lot of, from
what I could tell, there was a lot of really complicated family
issues. And I mean, maybe an unsafe
person isn't going to say they're unsafe, but I was still
going to ask. Yeah, you know.
(23:11):
Did your mom give you the information about your brother
being around and that he was a friend or did he fill you in on
some of those details? She did initially, Yeah, she
did. Initially.
She said that she remembered my brother as being really, really
kind and that they were really, really good friends and that
(23:31):
when she was needing to be caredfor, he was someone that we care
for her. So that that in itself kind of
paints a picture, doesn't it? How is your mom reacting as
you're pursuing learning more? It was so hard for both of us.
(23:52):
Every time I took a step forward, I always talk to her
about it and my heart always raced and my hands always shook
and I'm pretty sure hers were too.
I don't think it was ever a bridge she wanted to cross and I
think if I had have been happy to not cross that too, that
would have been so much easier for her.
(24:14):
It wasn't easy for her, it wasn't easy for me.
It was hard. And what is your raised father,
your adoptive father? What is he doing during this
time and is he supportive of youpursuing these connections?
My dad that raised me was a really interesting human in
(24:37):
terms of parenting and I, again,I don't think it made sense
until hindsight, right? I think he was more hands on
with my sister. I feel like there's been a lot
of times where I felt like him and my mom maybe had something
of an agreement or he just realized that because I wasn't
his, he felt differently. So he wasn't super involved with
(24:59):
me all the time and certainly not emotional.
He was very reserved that way, so he really didn't have very
much to say. At the point that I met my
brother in person, he had something to say about that and
it it wasn't very nice, it wasn't very kind.
So when my brother and I agreed that we wanted to meet, he said
(25:21):
he wanted to check with my mum first.
So I went back to my mum and said he wants to talk with you
first and I'm OK with that too. And she said, OK, let's do that.
So then the two of them met first the day before us.
And I don't know all the events of that.
It sounds like it was really emotional and really hard for
everybody. He wanted her permission to meet
(25:43):
me, he wanted her approval. So she gave it.
And so we did meet the next day.He knew it was me right away.
Like I came in and he stood up and he went.
There's my sister. Oh big and.
Gregarious and huge hugs. And to hear that, it was
incredible and such a relief. Cause like I'm a fairly shy
(26:05):
person and so meeting new peopleeven without them being long
lost family or whatever, and allthe emotional baggage of that,
I'm nervous. So he stands up in big arms and
big voice. That's my sister.
And then he introduces me to thewaitress too.
This is my sister. I'm so excited.
So that was that was beautiful. I'm really welcoming and felt
(26:28):
good. That's amazing.
At any point did you do DNA testing to try to connect to
people I. Think it was probably a good
five or six years later. So like quite a bit of time went
by and my husband bought me Adnatest as a gift.
I didn't have doubt that we wererelated.
Like there was resemblance very strongly, particularly between
(26:53):
my daughter and my niece. And when I met my brother, I was
like, OK, we have the same eyes and my son has the same eyes.
But yeah, we did the DNA test and it connected me to other
nephews. I think we're the main people.
And then the whole family line story unfolded.
What had happened was my birth dad had a son with someone when
(27:18):
he was like in his teens, I think he was like 17 or
something, that son was placed for adoption.
And so then I connected with that son's son.
And then my birth dad had another daughter, which was the
daughter that I met from across the country there.
And then he got married and had the three boys that he raised in
(27:40):
amongst that he also had me. And then there's rumor that
there's there was a couple more after that.
And so part of my taking the test was also going, OK, well,
like if there's more maybe they'll they'll surface here.
And how are you sort of compartmentalizing building
(28:02):
these new relationships with these people who are safe and
seem welcoming and all of that with there's one big piece of
the picture that you do not wantcontact with.
So how are you navigating that? And maybe you didn't have to.
I don't, I don't know. No, it's a.
It's a really good question. It's a good question.
(28:22):
I think when I've met people, often the first question is for
both parties, are you in contactwith so and so?
And the correct answer is no, weare not in contact with so and
so because if you are, nobody wants anything to do with you.
Like this is not a safe person that we want in our life.
(28:43):
It actually felt like a huge relief when I got to know my
brother and getting to know him sort of provided that it filled
in a lot of pieces for me without needing to feel like I
needed to meet this other person.
And it also gave me some confirmation that that was the
right decision and feeling like,OK, I've made a decision on
that. And I'm firm on it.
(29:04):
That was a relief. It meant OK, like the rest of
the journey can look however it looks.
But this part, I know this is how I want it to be.
And I also know that this personis like aging.
They're getting on in yours and it is what it is, right?
OK, so it sounds like most people then many people in their
(29:27):
life, his life are estranged from him because of the choices
that that he's made. I guess my next question is
because, you know, when I, when I do talk to people, there's a
lot of energy and feeling aroundhow we were conceived and you
know, were we conceived in love?All, all of those kinds of
(29:52):
questions. You have a pretty clear picture
of what the circumstances were around your conception and your
birth. It's not a happy story,
traumatic for your mom. Obviously it does not define who
you are as a person, but did youhave to navigate any of those
(30:14):
feelings about who you were? I have.
The result of this? Absolutely.
Yeah. I, I remember writing a lot
about who does this make me? Because in the beginning, the
way that I interpreted my mum's reluctance to give me his name
and I wrote it down was what kind of a monster must he be if
(30:38):
I can't even know his name? And if his DNA makes up half of
who I am, then what does that mean about me?
I did grapple with that a lot. And I felt bad for my mom
because she had said to me, I don't want you to internalize
it. She said I don't want you to
make it. But it's unavoidable.
It's just human nature. I think anyone who has this kind
(31:00):
of discovery grapples with identity and has to sort of
rebuild from the ground up in a lot of ways.
And then I remember what kind ofbrought me comfort, at least for
a short time, was I had come across Khalil, Khalil Gibran's
He there's a poem called on Children.
And there's a line in this poem where he says, they come through
(31:23):
you, not from you. And then I sort of had this
vision of like, you know, an actual tree and how so much goes
through the tree to create the fruitage.
And it's just the tree is the vessel for the fruit.
I remember doing like artwork about it.
I I drew all these trees and allthis.
(31:43):
You know, like. All of this heavily processing
reflection. And so for a short time, it kind
of like allowed me to distance from it, go, OK, I came through
this, not from this. Later, my thoughts on that
changed dramatically. Like probably in the last two to
three years, I've done a lot of ancestor work and a lot of
(32:04):
ancestor meditation and, you know, like leaning completely
the other way. Yeah.
How has that changed? So what changed this last year
was that I guess about two yearsago my grandfather passed away.
So that was my mom's dad and we were really close.
So when he passed away, immediately, what I wanted to do
was go back to his home country of Malta because he never talked
(32:29):
about it very much, but it was abig part of who he was.
And I was curious. I don't know, I just wanted to
see it. I wanted to see it.
I wanted to feel it, smell it, hear it, eat the food, all the
things, and see if there was like some remnants of him and
myself there. So we planned the strict Malta.
We went there in March. And then just life being what it
(32:53):
is, our plane stops over in Paris.
And I don't know if you're familiar with the Paris airport,
but it is wildly enormous. Nobody is speaking English,
there is a lot of yelling there are like you have to take buses
within the airport to get to thedifferent terminals.
Like it is just chaos. Anyways, so we miss our flight,
(33:17):
our connecting flight, and the best the airport can do is tell
us to stay in Paris for like 2 days and then they will fly us
to Italy where we will wait another day and then get our
connecting flight. And so at first we were kind of
like, Oh my gosh, like worst nightmare, what is happening?
So we scramble, we find somewhere to stay.
(33:38):
But then it also felt really like a blessing in disguise
because the other pieces of MyHeritage, so my birth dad's
family was French, Belgian. So the French piece was a big
piece, and then also Italian came up very strongly, not just
on my grandpa's side, but also on that side as well.
(33:59):
And so when we were in Paris, I was still doing the work like I
was when we were on the trains. I was looking at the buildings
and going, OK, like, was my great, great grandmother here
and did she see what I'm seeing?There was something, it's hard
to even put into words, but there was something just inside
me that felt this curiosity and this comfort and this holding
(34:22):
and connection. And it's so much bigger than
maybe the vadnais of one person or the mistakes of one person or
many people. Like it was just, it was larger
than life. It was larger than me.
And then the same experience happened in Italy and then very,
very much so more in Malta. I had come across this
(34:45):
philosophy before we went that our ancestors really are within
us and so we carry them with us all the time and we always have
access to them. So like even without the facts,
we have those pieces in US. And so I really kind of leaned
into that emotionally and mentally while we were
travelling and felt that. Comfort.
(35:06):
I love that. That's so profound.
So I wrote this book and really just wrote it from my heart.
Like just rewrote somewhere in the middle.
I felt really unqualified. I was like, I am not qualified
to talk about someone not being raised by a birth mom.
Like I'm qualified to talk aboutsomeone being raised by a mom
(35:28):
who's like conflicted or where they've come out of something
that wasn't necessarily loving. But there are definite
limitations to what I can write about from experience.
And so I put a call out to the community that others could send
in their stories and contribute to be a part of it.
So I had a number of people write in.
(35:48):
And so those stories were gorgeous and generous and
vulnerable. And I'm so excited and happy to
have them in the book and thankful that people did that.
But the next step was that I hadto meet with a lawyer who
explained to me all of the legalities of, you know, helping
others tell their stories in ways that are responsible, which
(36:11):
is a side note to the asterisks.That is, I came to the
conclusion my mom really needed to approve of or at very least
read what I'd written for me to feel good about publishing it.
I approached her with that a fewtimes and she, the first few
times she was like, just absolutely not interested.
She was like, I really can't do it and I don't want to do it.
(36:33):
She expressed a lot of belief inme but wasn't willing.
And so then this last maybe 3 months, 3-4 months, I approached
her again and I said, what if I send it to you like 1 chapter at
a time? And we talk about every single
chapter and like, if you see something in there that you're
remembering differently, you tell me.
(36:55):
If there's something in there I've written that you're
uncomfortable with, please tell me.
We are just going to team on this and hold hands through it.
And she agreed to that. And it's been really beautiful
and healing, even if my book didn't get published and come
into existence. Like the hugest success in the
(37:16):
world is that we're friends. For like the first time in my
life, I don't think we've ever been friends.
And so that's been wildly a giftthat I did not anticipate.
Yeah. Tell me more about the book.
So you said it's it's a bit of your story.
(37:36):
Sounds like you have some other stories in there as well.
Yeah. So initially what I did was I
had created a program that I guess you could call it an
expressive arts program for Ldasand NP ES.
And I think probably it would itwould spill over into the donor
conceived population as well. And so I had that on my website,
(37:57):
itwas@latediscoveryadoptees.com.It's still up there.
So I had that up there for free.And I had also created like a
visual map of how my recovery had went.
And then I also had started likegoing to support groups and
working one-on-one with individuals.
And I was always doing like checks and balances.
(38:18):
Like, is what I mapped for myself common?
Are other people taking these same steps to recovery?
And it seemed like what I had created really did resonate with
people. And so that actually just kind
of inspired me that I wanted it out in the world.
And then my husband, of course, is just like the most incredible
(38:41):
cheerleading, supporting kind ofa human.
And so part way through the pandemic, he was like, I don't
know why you're not using your extra time to write a book.
Like, why aren't you writing your book?
Everybody needs to hear your story.
And you know what now is also other people's stories and for
that to just exist in the world.So I think because I am a little
(39:04):
bit academic, I think it felt maybe a little bit too
vulnerable to just write my story and be like, OK, here's my
memoir. So instead I did all this tap
dancing around like, here's the process.
And but for each, for each thingthat I'm talking about, I do
actually share my own story and my own anecdotes.
(39:24):
And, and I think it allowed me to do that in little bite sizes
that were manageable for me. Is it actually like a guide?
Does it take people through discovery, through making
contact with family? Yeah.
In the opening, we talk about sort of all the language around
(39:45):
it, like what is NPE, what is you know, LDA, etcetera,
etcetera. So we sort of like lay the
groundwork for like what are we talking about?
And that it's going to be from my perspective and from the
perspective of other people likeme.
Then there's a section where others have written their
stories and shared them. The next section talks about
taking care of yourself while you're going through the book
(40:07):
because it's hard work. Like this is not an easy
journey. And so we really want to be set
up to take care of ourselves. The next bit outlines the
damage. Like what it what's the damage
done? Because you can't heal something
if you don't know it's broken. So we go through all of that and
it hurts. It's not an easy read, I'm not
(40:29):
going to lie. But we talk about what's been
hurt. And then for each of those
sections, I give my personal experience and others who wrote
in also wrote in according to those prompts.
And so you'll hear the experience of other people.
And then I outline what's the task?
What is it we're trying to heal in one sentence.
(40:52):
And then often what follows thatis an experiential activity.
It is sort of an invitation thatif you want to dig into this a
little bit deeper, here's what that looks like or could look
like. So then following that, it is a
long book. It's a big boy.
It's not, it's not little Following that is the map that
(41:12):
I've created. And it really is very much like,
OK, you can identify what stage you're in and it's sort of is
clusters of things that you're feeling or doing or thinking.
And then there's another clusterof things, feelings, doings and
a person can cycle through. I actually think people cycle
through those stages with every discovery because right, we have
(41:36):
the initial huge discovery that turns everything upside down.
But then what? Right when I when I heard that
is French, Belgian, that was another discovery.
When I heard, OK, he had a daughter he also put up for
adoption, that was another discovery.
And so each one of those pieces,there's a process to integrating
(41:57):
the information and getting to aplace of being OK with it.
And so that's there. There's a whole section of
medicine sort of exploring different modalities of healing
that are also sprinkled all through the book.
But there's like a little summary of that.
And then I did something really brave and I wrote a section for
(42:17):
the adoptive parents and families and people keeping the
secret. And the reason I did that was
because just in talking with people in my community, more
than half the time when I bring up this topic, someone says they
know someone who it's being keptfrom and their heart stops.
And they tell me about this and my heart stops and they go, but
(42:38):
it's not my place to tell them. And I go, aha, I've heard that a
lot. And so I'm hoping what comes of
it is that people understand more deeply what's happening
because it's a really big and common issue.
And I'm also hopeful that families can repair.
(43:00):
Like, it's taken 11 years for mymom and I to repair.
And that's happened because we both got to a place where we
were able to do that and find a way of doing that.
But boy, I would have liked it to happen sooner.
Oh yeah? Well, I'm excited to read the
book when it's published, and we'll be sure to include
(43:22):
information in the show notes for anyone who's listening when
it's released. I did want to ask you for your
perspective because you have read so many stories for this
book. You're sharing so many stories,
and you've been part of this community for a long time now.
Is there a difference in the impact when, for example, your
(43:44):
mother told you she did come forward versus the people that
take the test and then have somedifficult questions to ask?
I assume there's tons of similarities, but I'm curious
your take on what the similarities are or if there are
differences. It's.
A really interesting question. I'm sure during this podcast,
(44:08):
you hear the story all the time of like when people bring
forward the results. I think in in people that I
talked to whose family continue to deny it.
I mean, I find it really shocking the number of people
that say, well, those tests are garbage, they don't work.
They must have made a mistake. I just think wow, of all the
(44:31):
times and opportunities that youcould take to repair and own it,
that was it. That that was that was the off
ramp or on ramp, depending how you want to look at it.
I think there's a lot of anger there, a lot more anger because
I think it might be comparable to how I felt when when I had
the information, but my mom wasn't willing to talk about it
(44:53):
or share anything. The sense of powerlessness and
despair is so great that I, I imagine for somebody who's
finding out by DNA, that would be similar.
Yeah. Yeah.
I just want to say I I just think the more resources the
(45:14):
better for this community. So I'm just so happy to hear
that there's going to be anotherone that can resonate for
people. You also mentioned that you are
doing some consulting for a filmabout the NPE experience.
Do you want to share a little bit about that?
Yeah. I, I'd love to, this director
writer got in touch with me during the pandemic and he is so
(45:37):
lovely. And I'm not allowed to say his
name. I talked to him before and I'm
like, how much am I allowed to say?
He's like no names. And he's been working on this
passion project since then. He had written a script at that
point and he just sort of, he really wants to do it justice.
He wants to do our story justice.
He wants it to be accurate. He wants for our feelings to
come forward and for it to not just be a part of the adoption
(46:01):
propaganda machine that makes everything beautiful.
And so the first script that he had brought forward, he fondly
remembered in the summer we weretogether.
He goes, remember I told you andyou said that would never
happen. That was my feedback for him.
And now I think, wow, I probablysounded so weird, but it was
what he wanted and it's why we became friends is he wanted to
(46:22):
really do us justice. He's heard all about my story in
great detail and we've written the script quite a few times,
but I think he's landed on one that we're all really happy
with. Like, I couldn't believe how
well he integrated the feelings and the symbolism.
It's going to be incredible. Oh that's so exciting and just
(46:46):
how awesome to really want to dothese stories justice.
I think so often we see NP, ES and adoption and DNA surprises
in the media and it's used as a plot device to just throw a
little twist in there. But there's none of the fallout.
(47:06):
And people tend to just get overit really quickly.
They tend to just accept this wild new information about
themselves. So that's great.
And kudos to you for for voicing, hey, that would never
happen, you know? That's.
Really great. What advice do you have for a
parent who is keeping adna surprise from their child?
(47:29):
Oh, it would be to tell it. I mean, that's the really simple
short answer. And if you can't tell it because
you're just not ready yet, then go talk to somebody about how to
tell it. And then tell it.
What advice do you have for someone who just uncovered Adna
Surprise? Probably to go slow.
I'm guilty of this. This is why I can say this.
(47:51):
I think it's really human natureto want to jump to the end part.
And I don't just mean reunion, Imean jumping to this part where
you go, OK, I'm done, everything's fine.
I've I've cried, I've been mad. I did the thing and and we're
good now. Or to rush to try and like make
everything OK with the people that raised you.
(48:13):
Or like, just don't rush. Just take your time, take
breaks. Yeah.
Megan, thank you so much for coming on the podcast and
sharing your perspective. I love hearing stories of people
that have been in this for years, and I think it gives
people a lot of hope to see where you can end up.
Even when we've had complicated beginnings to our lives, you can
(48:38):
still reach a place of healing and growth and then helping
others. So thank you for reaching into
the community and. Lending your support.
Thank you. Thank you for having such a
podcast like this. Just being able to tell their
stories I think is such a big part of healing so that we're
not alone and there's little bits of things we can learn from
(48:58):
each other. Thanks again to Megan for
sharing her story. If you have Adna Surprise that
you'd like to share, please submit your story at
dnasurprises.com and be sure to join me over on
patreon@patreon.com/DNA Surprises for early ad free
access to episodes. Until next time, this episode of
(49:24):
DNA Surprises was hosted, produced, and edited by me,
Alexis Ourselt. It was mixed and mastered by
Josh Ourselt of Siren Recording Studios.
It felt surreal and I remember just really struggling to make
sense of it kind of going like, OK, so how is this person family
but also a stranger, which is just obvious, right?
Like yes, this is what everybodyfaces.
But those thoughts coming up like how is this person family
but also a stranger? And she's my sister.
So like I'm supposed to just love her, right?
(00:23):
Or are we supposed to figure outfor friends?
Or are we just exchanging information or like what are we
doing? But I actually found her just
really easy to talk to and superintelligent and I just was
interested in her and her life and I think the feeling was
(00:43):
mutual. Welcome to DNA Surprises, a
podcast that delves into the world of unexpected DNA
discoveries. I'm your host, Alexis Soursalt.
In July 2021, my life took a surprising turn when I found out
that I'm an N P/E, a person who has experienced a non paternal
(01:04):
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 theirfamilies.
Get ready to unravel the astonishing journeys that begin
with a simple DNA test. This is DNA surprises.
(01:29):
At the end of every DNA Surprises episode, I ask my
guests 2 questions, I ask for advice for people in our
community, and I ask for advice for parents keeping Adna
surprise from their child. Time and time again, guests
implore parents to tell the truth.
But when is the right time to tell?
(01:51):
And are the ramifications different than when Adna
surprise is uncovered with Adna test?
In this week's episode, Megan shares how one day, her parents
took her for a long walk and revealed the truth her dad is
not biologically related to her.She then shares the fallout from
that, connecting with new familymembers while balancing the fact
(02:15):
that her biological father is not a safe person.
Megan also shares how her DNA surprise LED her to create a
book for people who have had similar experiences.
I'll be sure to share that when it's available.
Thank you for sharing your story, Megan.
My name is Megan, I'm 44 and I'mfrom Vancouver Island in Canada.
(02:38):
I grew up here with my mom and my, I guess who I learned to be
my adoptive dad and a younger sister.
And I did have suspicions growing up, but they were always
sort of put to rest if I asked. And then I guess Fast forward a
(02:59):
whole bunch, I was married and Ihad two kids and we had always
talked about adopting and so being on that side of the triad.
And so we were in the process oflike learning.
And here in Canada, or at least in BC, there's like a whole
educational component. So we were sort of going through
those pieces and the whole time sharing what we were learning
(03:23):
with my mom and dad. And so there was a particular
night where we were talking about openness and we had shared
why we felt that was really important and what we had
learned about that. And my mom and dad were on board
with birth moms being involved, but not birth dads.
(03:44):
And it was this really interesting exchange because we
were going like, OK, so birth moms are cool, you're cool with
that. But birth dads like, what's the
hang up? And they said, what if, what if
he's dangerous? It was like, OK, but what if
he's not right? Like we don't know who this
person is. We don't know anything about
(04:05):
them, you know, etcetera, etcetera.
But they were just like, I don'twant to say unreasonably upset,
but like, there was no logical context for their being as
opposed as they were. And so after they left, there
was this conversation between myhusband and I where we were
going, like, just don't understand, is this a generation
(04:26):
gap or is it like, what's happening?
And so then a couple weeks went by and I was closing in on my
33rd birthday. And so I sort of mentioned it in
conversation to mom and dad. And there was like a bit of
attention that happened where, you know, there was a look
exchanged between them and they said, we, we have to talk to you
(04:46):
and can we go for a walk? And I thought, OK, let's go for
a walk. And I told the kids, like, go
put your shoes on and get the dog ready.
And they went, no, no, no, just you.
And my heart kind of like stopped.
I thought, oh, shoot, like, whathave I done?
What's happened? Who's sick?
Like all the thoughts racing of like, what is happening?
And so off we go on our walk. And we got like almost to the to
(05:10):
this sort of nature walk by our house where we were headed to.
And I said, so what's up? And they said, no, no, no, we
have to be further. We're not ready yet.
So they took me like a fair distance from the house into
nature, got us, you know, sitting down.
And then my mom spilled the beans, but very, very slowly.
She sort of stumbled around withher birds a lot.
(05:31):
And all she could get out at first was your father.
And then there was a long pause,but in my head my voice had
finished the sentence. Isn't your dad like I knew?
So you just knew you had an A knowing now, you said when you
were a child that you had questions and those were kind of
easily put to bed and you believed your parents, as most
(05:55):
people do. What kinds of questions did you
have at that time? Did you wonder if your dad was
your father? Were you wondering if you were
adopted? Like what were your questions?
Yeah, So my sister and I just never like had much resemblance.
I'm very fair and I've always had very big curly hair and like
(06:16):
I'm kind of lanky and freckles, all that kind of thing.
Whereas my sister, she's got like the olive skin and the
straight fine hair and differentbuild.
And we were just very different.And so as odd as this sounds, we
actually would have our friends and sometimes teachers would
even ask us, are you guys full sisters?
(06:37):
Like you both look like your mombut but you don't.
Both both look like your. Dad.
Wow, which is just so interesting, right, that people
comment to children on things like that, which is probably a
whole separate conversation. But but so when when people did
(06:57):
that to you, you would go, you maybe went home and did you ask
your parents like, Hey, why, whydo we look so different?
And what did they say? Yeah, so that's exactly what
would happen is I would tell them, no, of course we're fell
sisters. Like what?
And they would explain why they asked, right?
And then I would I'd go home andask, usually my mom, and she
(07:18):
would say, yeah, no, you're fellsisters.
Why would they ask you that? OK, I guess the other thing was
that as I got into my sort of teen years, what I started to
notice was that compared to my friends, I had a lot more rules
and there was a lot more like safety type things, like I
(07:39):
wasn't allowed to walk to the corner store alone or just some
of these things. And then again, as I got a
little older and then I started spending time in the city and
stuff, my mom would tell me justsort of strange things, like
she'd say, watch out for this particular last name.
Like if you meet people with this last name, tell me.
(08:00):
And I was like, that's really strange.
And she didn't tell you why. But no, no, like no explanation.
And and then there was sort of like, I think around 18/17/18,
there was a story that she shared about having an
ex-boyfriend that was quite violent.
And I remember after her sharingthat story too, being like, is
(08:22):
he my real dad? And she said, no, like, why
would you ask that? And I kind of said, well, why
would you tell me the story? Why share this if there?
And she said, well, because you're at an age where you're
dating and you're meeting men and I want you to know what a
not so great relationship looks like so that you don't get into
it. So I think probably she may have
(08:44):
been trying to build up the courage to tell me at that
point. And then sort of backed out at
the very end. But OK, it was enough to really
sort of stick into my brain thatthat was a real possibility,
even though she didn't confirm it.
OK, so you're on this walk with your parents, your mom?
(09:06):
Says your father. Long pause.
You finish the sentence in your mind.
What happens when she actually says it?
I just nodded and I said I know.Was she surprised when you said
that? Yeah, yeah, she was.
She was a little welled up already because I think just the
(09:26):
stress of the whole thing, like,I can't imagine holding a secret
for that long. And then now this is the moment
you're telling the secret, you know, I know my heart was
thumping. So I imagine her heart was just
thumping and she just did. How could you know?
And I said the way anybody knowsanything, you feel it right in
(09:50):
your heart and right in your gut, like it's just there.
At that point, how are you feeling?
Oh, that's a good question. I think my empathy for my mom
and dad was, and particularly mymom was so high that I think I
(10:16):
was really tuned into trying to just be OK and make it OK for
her. I remember asking like for some
details in that moment and they were willing to share just that
fact, but nothing else really. So I remember asking questions,
not getting answers, and then sort of accepting the defeat of
(10:41):
that moment, like, OK, this is all I'm gonna get this time.
And so we started walking back to the house in part way.
I volunteered. Well, I guess this doesn't
really change anything, even though inside it changes
everything. Yeah, I was gonna ask upside
down. I was gonna.
(11:01):
Ask Were you really feeling thator were you just wanting to
comfort your parents in that moment?
I think I was wanting to comfortthem and I think also it was a
real feeling of duality, like I could feel both things I was
able to hold space for like thisdoesn't change anything.
Like you're still mom and dad and our family is still our
family, but also hold space inside of me for actually this
(11:26):
changes everything. Absolutely.
So at that point, you're not getting any details.
What do you do next? Do you tell your children, your
husband? What do you do?
You know, what's funny is I don't actually remember exactly
how this played out. What I do know is from my
(11:46):
daughter recounting to me what she remembers.
So I must have just been absolutely in shock because I, I
really don't remember. But she remembers me coming home
and just going to my room and just spending a little bit of
time there alone for a few minutes after.
And my mom and dad, I'm assuming, left fairly quickly.
(12:08):
So she remembers me spending some time alone and then coming
down and having a little chat quietly with my husband.
And I do kind of remember that alittle bit.
I remember us doing dishes and me just kind of like muttering,
hey, so this is what they said and him going, oh, OK.
And it was like, and nothing. And that's it.
(12:28):
That's all I got. And I do remember telling my
kids, I don't know that my son would remember.
He was pretty young. I think he was like 7 or 8.
But my daughter was a little bitolder.
I think she was closer to 13 or so.
What happens next? Do you want to start digging in
(12:50):
and finding out who this person is?
You get this information, What do you do with it?
Yeah, and you know what? Without extra information, it
was really hard to do anything. There was sort of an assumption
in my head that I think maybe she confirmed, I'm not sure, but
I had the assumption that, OK, this was probably the person who
(13:11):
was the ex that that it was an unhappy, abusive relationship.
It's probably this person that she was talking about.
But beyond that, what does a person do with it?
I didn't have a name to go with.I didn't have anything.
Like there was nothing. So I was really without power
(13:33):
and kind of at the mercy of my mom's timeline, which is now a
lot of years have passed. So I can have empathy for that,
that, you know, she was preparedto share a certain amount and
she hadn't gone past that point yet.
So I had to wait for her to be ready.
So I cried a lot. I cried a lot.
(13:54):
I prayed a lot. I journaled.
I love an art studio so I did a lot of pottery and art and just
tried to be OK and and persuade her I guess to.
Yeah, because this was, this was11 years ago approximately.
So DNA testing wasn't as prevalent as it is now.
(14:17):
So at this point, I mean, were was Ancestry or anything like
that even on your radar in termsof finding your father?
Yeah, not at all, not at all. And even in terms of the
Internet, like it was around, but I didn't know.
I didn't know what I was called like.
And I remember going away and thinking about it and going, OK,
(14:39):
does this mean like I'm adopted then or what am I?
What does this mean? And then after searching online
for quite a bit, I think it was a couple years even then, I came
up across a forum for late discovery adoptees on Facebook.
I don't think we had the term inPE yet.
I think it was just LDA. That was all there was.
(15:00):
But I remember feeling great relief at just that, going, OK,
I have a name, there's a name for this.
And then really looking for resources.
I was in school for counseling to become a counselor at the
time. And I remember even then also
looking at all my course working, going OK, where's the
help for this? Where's the map?
How do we get better? How do we recover from this?
(15:22):
I'm just not really finding a lot, finding comfort with other
people online who had shared their stories, but I remember
all of us being or feeling like all of us were really just in
the same pool of despair and lostness and suffering and not
necessarily anybody knowing the way out.
(15:45):
How much time goes by before youmake progress in learning the
truth about your birth? So I think it was about six
months later that I I had a nameto work with.
So I had a last name and a firstname.
(16:06):
My mom finally told me. But before that, I was just
begging for really, like, bread crumbs, like, give me anything,
give me something to work with. And she said, OK, well, he was
Belgian. And I was like, OK, all right.
And like, and, and she said, andhe was athletic, OK.
(16:29):
And so I remember going online and, like, Googling Belgian
athletes and, like, just lookingat their pictures and going, OK,
that's the thing. And then reading about the
culture. And I read something about a
protest that involves French fries, something about people
eating a lot of French fries at this protest or a French fry
(16:49):
protest. And me going, well, I love
French fries. Like, I was looking for any
little crumb to identify this piece and go, OK, well, they
love French fries. I love French fries.
Yes. OK, that's it.
And then, you know, some time went by and then I did have a
last name to work with. And then the search actually got
a lot easier. I sat on the fence a lot about
(17:13):
whether or not to meet him and ultimately decided not to
because when she disclosed all the details of what had
happened, I just really wasn't super comfortable with it.
It was kind of like, OK, people change, but do people change
that much? I, I don't know.
At the time I put it on hold, I didn't make my mind 100%, but I
(17:36):
was like, I'm certainly going toput that on hold and we'll see
if we can find siblings first. So using one of the search
engines online, there was a website for people to connect.
I went looking for him, but whatI found was his daughter looking
for him. And so I went OK, so half
sibling. Cool.
OK, so she was the first half sibling that I met and she was
(18:01):
also placed for adoption. So she was also not raised by
him. And so it was kind of neat to
connect with. Yeah, like an older sister.
I was the oldest, but now I'm not the oldest.
Wow. All right.
So you find a sibling, I guess she probably doesn't give you
much information though about your family, but did you get a
(18:22):
chance to speak with her and andwhat was that like to connect
with somebody on your paternal side that you were related to?
And then from there the search was easy because our niece on
that side also found her throughthe same website.
And so then she contacted me oneday and she said how do you feel
(18:43):
about meeting a niece? And I was like perfect, hook us
up. And that was kind of cool
because she lives a lot closer to us.
She's in Vancouver as opposed tomy half sisters like across the
country. So I think it was like 2 years
post discovery we met my niece for the first time.
You're meeting these extended family members as you're
(19:08):
meeting. Do you share what you have
learned? Are you keeping that close?
How are you navigating that? Because you know, often when I
hear these stories, it's maybe it was an affair, he didn't
know, maybe he did know, but he had a family or something like
that. But there are these
(19:29):
circumstances where it there wasa reason why your mother didn't
want you to be around this man. So do you disclose those reasons
to the people that you meet? You're, you're asking like the
golden ticket question, right? Like what is the story?
What really happened? So I'll tell what really
happened in the best way that I can, because since writing my
(19:52):
book, I had to meet with a lawyer and they told me all this
stuff about you can say this andyou can't say that.
So I'm going to do my best to tell it as truthfully as I can.
So the story she discloses to meis that when she was 15 is when
she met my birth dad and he was in his mid 30s.
So like gigantic age gap, gigantic power differential.
(20:13):
And so he lures her into some form of relationship that they
were in from the time she was 15until 22.
He was married at the time. He had three other children with
that particular woman. He had many more children than
that, but he had three boys he was raising with his wife at the
time. And the one boy, the one in the
(20:34):
middle, was actually just a little bit younger than my mom
and was there for like, the whole relationship.
He was aware of it. He was expected to keep it a
secret. And so, yeah, big, big safety
issues, big red flags. And so, yeah, when I met my
mother, sister, I did tell her that when I met my niece, it
(20:57):
wasn't a secret what kind of a person he was.
And like, very quickly, often actually the first question was,
are you in contact with him, right.
So like when whenever I met someone, it was like, are you
gonna find him? Have you found him?
Because there was, there were safety issues or at least we
believe there's safety issues, right?
(21:17):
Right. So the niece that you met, was
she the child of one of the the children that he raised?
Yeah. OK, yeah, so she was the child
of the oldest brother. We got to know her a little bit.
And then she connected us, not with her dad, because that's a
whole other story, but with her uncle, the second boy that was
(21:42):
all friends with my mom. So she kind of said, do you want
to meet Uncle so and so? And I said, Oh yeah.
And I checked with my mom first.I said, do you mind if I meet so
and so? She said sort of of all of them,
that's who she would feel the best about me meeting, just from
(22:03):
what she could remember of him. So I said, yeah, go ahead and
give him my number. And then I waited for like a
year, long enough that I gave up.
Yeah, you've had a lot of patience throughout this
process. So when he reaches out to you,
what does he say? He says, hey, it's your brother,
(22:25):
and sorry it took so long. Yeah, it was really awkward at
first. We had some awkward exchange.
He cracked a joke that was like,if anybody in my normal life
cracked this joke, I would have been like, we're not friends
anymore. But because it was him, I was
like, I'm going to give him a chance.
He's probably just nervous. I'm really nervous.
It's going to sound maybe weird,But almost always my first
(22:47):
question when I was meeting family members was like, are you
a safe person? Because there was a lot of, from
what I could tell, there was a lot of really complicated family
issues. And I mean, maybe an unsafe
person isn't going to say they're unsafe, but I was still
going to ask. Yeah, you know.
(23:11):
Did your mom give you the information about your brother
being around and that he was a friend or did he fill you in on
some of those details? She did initially, Yeah, she
did. Initially.
She said that she remembered my brother as being really, really
kind and that they were really, really good friends and that
(23:31):
when she was needing to be caredfor, he was someone that we care
for her. So that that in itself kind of
paints a picture, doesn't it? How is your mom reacting as
you're pursuing learning more? It was so hard for both of us.
(23:52):
Every time I took a step forward, I always talk to her
about it and my heart always raced and my hands always shook
and I'm pretty sure hers were too.
I don't think it was ever a bridge she wanted to cross and I
think if I had have been happy to not cross that too, that
would have been so much easier for her.
(24:14):
It wasn't easy for her, it wasn't easy for me.
It was hard. And what is your raised father,
your adoptive father? What is he doing during this
time and is he supportive of youpursuing these connections?
My dad that raised me was a really interesting human in
(24:37):
terms of parenting and I, again,I don't think it made sense
until hindsight, right? I think he was more hands on
with my sister. I feel like there's been a lot
of times where I felt like him and my mom maybe had something
of an agreement or he just realized that because I wasn't
his, he felt differently. So he wasn't super involved with
(24:59):
me all the time and certainly not emotional.
He was very reserved that way, so he really didn't have very
much to say. At the point that I met my
brother in person, he had something to say about that and
it it wasn't very nice, it wasn't very kind.
So when my brother and I agreed that we wanted to meet, he said
(25:21):
he wanted to check with my mum first.
So I went back to my mum and said he wants to talk with you
first and I'm OK with that too. And she said, OK, let's do that.
So then the two of them met first the day before us.
And I don't know all the events of that.
It sounds like it was really emotional and really hard for
everybody. He wanted her permission to meet
(25:43):
me, he wanted her approval. So she gave it.
And so we did meet the next day.He knew it was me right away.
Like I came in and he stood up and he went.
There's my sister. Oh big and.
Gregarious and huge hugs. And to hear that, it was
incredible and such a relief. Cause like I'm a fairly shy
(26:05):
person and so meeting new peopleeven without them being long
lost family or whatever, and allthe emotional baggage of that,
I'm nervous. So he stands up in big arms and
big voice. That's my sister.
And then he introduces me to thewaitress too.
This is my sister. I'm so excited.
So that was that was beautiful. I'm really welcoming and felt
(26:28):
good. That's amazing.
At any point did you do DNA testing to try to connect to
people I. Think it was probably a good
five or six years later. So like quite a bit of time went
by and my husband bought me Adnatest as a gift.
I didn't have doubt that we wererelated.
Like there was resemblance very strongly, particularly between
(26:53):
my daughter and my niece. And when I met my brother, I was
like, OK, we have the same eyes and my son has the same eyes.
But yeah, we did the DNA test and it connected me to other
nephews. I think we're the main people.
And then the whole family line story unfolded.
What had happened was my birth dad had a son with someone when
(27:18):
he was like in his teens, I think he was like 17 or
something, that son was placed for adoption.
And so then I connected with that son's son.
And then my birth dad had another daughter, which was the
daughter that I met from across the country there.
And then he got married and had the three boys that he raised in
(27:40):
amongst that he also had me. And then there's rumor that
there's there was a couple more after that.
And so part of my taking the test was also going, OK, well,
like if there's more maybe they'll they'll surface here.
And how are you sort of compartmentalizing building
(28:02):
these new relationships with these people who are safe and
seem welcoming and all of that with there's one big piece of
the picture that you do not wantcontact with.
So how are you navigating that? And maybe you didn't have to.
I don't, I don't know. No, it's a.
It's a really good question. It's a good question.
(28:22):
I think when I've met people, often the first question is for
both parties, are you in contactwith so and so?
And the correct answer is no, weare not in contact with so and
so because if you are, nobody wants anything to do with you.
Like this is not a safe person that we want in our life.
(28:43):
It actually felt like a huge relief when I got to know my
brother and getting to know him sort of provided that it filled
in a lot of pieces for me without needing to feel like I
needed to meet this other person.
And it also gave me some confirmation that that was the
right decision and feeling like,OK, I've made a decision on
that. And I'm firm on it.
(29:04):
That was a relief. It meant OK, like the rest of
the journey can look however it looks.
But this part, I know this is how I want it to be.
And I also know that this personis like aging.
They're getting on in yours and it is what it is, right?
OK, so it sounds like most people then many people in their
(29:27):
life, his life are estranged from him because of the choices
that that he's made. I guess my next question is
because, you know, when I, when I do talk to people, there's a
lot of energy and feeling aroundhow we were conceived and you
know, were we conceived in love?All, all of those kinds of
(29:52):
questions. You have a pretty clear picture
of what the circumstances were around your conception and your
birth. It's not a happy story,
traumatic for your mom. Obviously it does not define who
you are as a person, but did youhave to navigate any of those
(30:14):
feelings about who you were? I have.
The result of this? Absolutely.
Yeah. I, I remember writing a lot
about who does this make me? Because in the beginning, the
way that I interpreted my mum's reluctance to give me his name
and I wrote it down was what kind of a monster must he be if
(30:38):
I can't even know his name? And if his DNA makes up half of
who I am, then what does that mean about me?
I did grapple with that a lot. And I felt bad for my mom
because she had said to me, I don't want you to internalize
it. She said I don't want you to
make it. But it's unavoidable.
It's just human nature. I think anyone who has this kind
(31:00):
of discovery grapples with identity and has to sort of
rebuild from the ground up in a lot of ways.
And then I remember what kind ofbrought me comfort, at least for
a short time, was I had come across Khalil, Khalil Gibran's
He there's a poem called on Children.
And there's a line in this poem where he says, they come through
(31:23):
you, not from you. And then I sort of had this
vision of like, you know, an actual tree and how so much goes
through the tree to create the fruitage.
And it's just the tree is the vessel for the fruit.
I remember doing like artwork about it.
I I drew all these trees and allthis.
(31:43):
You know, like. All of this heavily processing
reflection. And so for a short time, it kind
of like allowed me to distance from it, go, OK, I came through
this, not from this. Later, my thoughts on that
changed dramatically. Like probably in the last two to
three years, I've done a lot of ancestor work and a lot of
(32:04):
ancestor meditation and, you know, like leaning completely
the other way. Yeah.
How has that changed? So what changed this last year
was that I guess about two yearsago my grandfather passed away.
So that was my mom's dad and we were really close.
So when he passed away, immediately, what I wanted to do
was go back to his home country of Malta because he never talked
(32:29):
about it very much, but it was abig part of who he was.
And I was curious. I don't know, I just wanted to
see it. I wanted to see it.
I wanted to feel it, smell it, hear it, eat the food, all the
things, and see if there was like some remnants of him and
myself there. So we planned the strict Malta.
We went there in March. And then just life being what it
(32:53):
is, our plane stops over in Paris.
And I don't know if you're familiar with the Paris airport,
but it is wildly enormous. Nobody is speaking English,
there is a lot of yelling there are like you have to take buses
within the airport to get to thedifferent terminals.
Like it is just chaos. Anyways, so we miss our flight,
(33:17):
our connecting flight, and the best the airport can do is tell
us to stay in Paris for like 2 days and then they will fly us
to Italy where we will wait another day and then get our
connecting flight. And so at first we were kind of
like, Oh my gosh, like worst nightmare, what is happening?
So we scramble, we find somewhere to stay.
(33:38):
But then it also felt really like a blessing in disguise
because the other pieces of MyHeritage, so my birth dad's
family was French, Belgian. So the French piece was a big
piece, and then also Italian came up very strongly, not just
on my grandpa's side, but also on that side as well.
(33:59):
And so when we were in Paris, I was still doing the work like I
was when we were on the trains. I was looking at the buildings
and going, OK, like, was my great, great grandmother here
and did she see what I'm seeing?There was something, it's hard
to even put into words, but there was something just inside
me that felt this curiosity and this comfort and this holding
(34:22):
and connection. And it's so much bigger than
maybe the vadnais of one person or the mistakes of one person or
many people. Like it was just, it was larger
than life. It was larger than me.
And then the same experience happened in Italy and then very,
very much so more in Malta. I had come across this
(34:45):
philosophy before we went that our ancestors really are within
us and so we carry them with us all the time and we always have
access to them. So like even without the facts,
we have those pieces in US. And so I really kind of leaned
into that emotionally and mentally while we were
travelling and felt that. Comfort.
(35:06):
I love that. That's so profound.
So I wrote this book and really just wrote it from my heart.
Like just rewrote somewhere in the middle.
I felt really unqualified. I was like, I am not qualified
to talk about someone not being raised by a birth mom.
Like I'm qualified to talk aboutsomeone being raised by a mom
(35:28):
who's like conflicted or where they've come out of something
that wasn't necessarily loving. But there are definite
limitations to what I can write about from experience.
And so I put a call out to the community that others could send
in their stories and contribute to be a part of it.
So I had a number of people write in.
(35:48):
And so those stories were gorgeous and generous and
vulnerable. And I'm so excited and happy to
have them in the book and thankful that people did that.
But the next step was that I hadto meet with a lawyer who
explained to me all of the legalities of, you know, helping
others tell their stories in ways that are responsible, which
(36:11):
is a side note to the asterisks.That is, I came to the
conclusion my mom really needed to approve of or at very least
read what I'd written for me to feel good about publishing it.
I approached her with that a fewtimes and she, the first few
times she was like, just absolutely not interested.
She was like, I really can't do it and I don't want to do it.
(36:33):
She expressed a lot of belief inme but wasn't willing.
And so then this last maybe 3 months, 3-4 months, I approached
her again and I said, what if I send it to you like 1 chapter at
a time? And we talk about every single
chapter and like, if you see something in there that you're
remembering differently, you tell me.
(36:55):
If there's something in there I've written that you're
uncomfortable with, please tell me.
We are just going to team on this and hold hands through it.
And she agreed to that. And it's been really beautiful
and healing, even if my book didn't get published and come
into existence. Like the hugest success in the
(37:16):
world is that we're friends. For like the first time in my
life, I don't think we've ever been friends.
And so that's been wildly a giftthat I did not anticipate.
Yeah. Tell me more about the book.
So you said it's it's a bit of your story.
(37:36):
Sounds like you have some other stories in there as well.
Yeah. So initially what I did was I
had created a program that I guess you could call it an
expressive arts program for Ldasand NP ES.
And I think probably it would itwould spill over into the donor
conceived population as well. And so I had that on my website,
(37:57):
itwas@latediscoveryadoptees.com.It's still up there.
So I had that up there for free.And I had also created like a
visual map of how my recovery had went.
And then I also had started likegoing to support groups and
working one-on-one with individuals.
And I was always doing like checks and balances.
(38:18):
Like, is what I mapped for myself common?
Are other people taking these same steps to recovery?
And it seemed like what I had created really did resonate with
people. And so that actually just kind
of inspired me that I wanted it out in the world.
And then my husband, of course, is just like the most incredible
(38:41):
cheerleading, supporting kind ofa human.
And so part way through the pandemic, he was like, I don't
know why you're not using your extra time to write a book.
Like, why aren't you writing your book?
Everybody needs to hear your story.
And you know what now is also other people's stories and for
that to just exist in the world.So I think because I am a little
(39:04):
bit academic, I think it felt maybe a little bit too
vulnerable to just write my story and be like, OK, here's my
memoir. So instead I did all this tap
dancing around like, here's the process.
And but for each, for each thingthat I'm talking about, I do
actually share my own story and my own anecdotes.
(39:24):
And, and I think it allowed me to do that in little bite sizes
that were manageable for me. Is it actually like a guide?
Does it take people through discovery, through making
contact with family? Yeah.
In the opening, we talk about sort of all the language around
(39:45):
it, like what is NPE, what is you know, LDA, etcetera,
etcetera. So we sort of like lay the
groundwork for like what are we talking about?
And that it's going to be from my perspective and from the
perspective of other people likeme.
Then there's a section where others have written their
stories and shared them. The next section talks about
taking care of yourself while you're going through the book
(40:07):
because it's hard work. Like this is not an easy
journey. And so we really want to be set
up to take care of ourselves. The next bit outlines the
damage. Like what it what's the damage
done? Because you can't heal something
if you don't know it's broken. So we go through all of that and
it hurts. It's not an easy read, I'm not
(40:29):
going to lie. But we talk about what's been
hurt. And then for each of those
sections, I give my personal experience and others who wrote
in also wrote in according to those prompts.
And so you'll hear the experience of other people.
And then I outline what's the task?
What is it we're trying to heal in one sentence.
(40:52):
And then often what follows thatis an experiential activity.
It is sort of an invitation thatif you want to dig into this a
little bit deeper, here's what that looks like or could look
like. So then following that, it is a
long book. It's a big boy.
It's not, it's not little Following that is the map that
(41:12):
I've created. And it really is very much like,
OK, you can identify what stage you're in and it's sort of is
clusters of things that you're feeling or doing or thinking.
And then there's another clusterof things, feelings, doings and
a person can cycle through. I actually think people cycle
through those stages with every discovery because right, we have
(41:36):
the initial huge discovery that turns everything upside down.
But then what? Right when I when I heard that
is French, Belgian, that was another discovery.
When I heard, OK, he had a daughter he also put up for
adoption, that was another discovery.
And so each one of those pieces,there's a process to integrating
(41:57):
the information and getting to aplace of being OK with it.
And so that's there. There's a whole section of
medicine sort of exploring different modalities of healing
that are also sprinkled all through the book.
But there's like a little summary of that.
And then I did something really brave and I wrote a section for
(42:17):
the adoptive parents and families and people keeping the
secret. And the reason I did that was
because just in talking with people in my community, more
than half the time when I bring up this topic, someone says they
know someone who it's being keptfrom and their heart stops.
And they tell me about this and my heart stops and they go, but
(42:38):
it's not my place to tell them. And I go, aha, I've heard that a
lot. And so I'm hoping what comes of
it is that people understand more deeply what's happening
because it's a really big and common issue.
And I'm also hopeful that families can repair.
(43:00):
Like, it's taken 11 years for mymom and I to repair.
And that's happened because we both got to a place where we
were able to do that and find a way of doing that.
But boy, I would have liked it to happen sooner.
Oh yeah? Well, I'm excited to read the
book when it's published, and we'll be sure to include
(43:22):
information in the show notes for anyone who's listening when
it's released. I did want to ask you for your
perspective because you have read so many stories for this
book. You're sharing so many stories,
and you've been part of this community for a long time now.
Is there a difference in the impact when, for example, your
(43:44):
mother told you she did come forward versus the people that
take the test and then have somedifficult questions to ask?
I assume there's tons of similarities, but I'm curious
your take on what the similarities are or if there are
differences. It's.
A really interesting question. I'm sure during this podcast,
(44:08):
you hear the story all the time of like when people bring
forward the results. I think in in people that I
talked to whose family continue to deny it.
I mean, I find it really shocking the number of people
that say, well, those tests are garbage, they don't work.
They must have made a mistake. I just think wow, of all the
(44:31):
times and opportunities that youcould take to repair and own it,
that was it. That that was that was the off
ramp or on ramp, depending how you want to look at it.
I think there's a lot of anger there, a lot more anger because
I think it might be comparable to how I felt when when I had
the information, but my mom wasn't willing to talk about it
(44:53):
or share anything. The sense of powerlessness and
despair is so great that I, I imagine for somebody who's
finding out by DNA, that would be similar.
Yeah. Yeah.
I just want to say I I just think the more resources the
(45:14):
better for this community. So I'm just so happy to hear
that there's going to be anotherone that can resonate for
people. You also mentioned that you are
doing some consulting for a filmabout the NPE experience.
Do you want to share a little bit about that?
Yeah. I, I'd love to, this director
writer got in touch with me during the pandemic and he is so
(45:37):
lovely. And I'm not allowed to say his
name. I talked to him before and I'm
like, how much am I allowed to say?
He's like no names. And he's been working on this
passion project since then. He had written a script at that
point and he just sort of, he really wants to do it justice.
He wants to do our story justice.
He wants it to be accurate. He wants for our feelings to
come forward and for it to not just be a part of the adoption
(46:01):
propaganda machine that makes everything beautiful.
And so the first script that he had brought forward, he fondly
remembered in the summer we weretogether.
He goes, remember I told you andyou said that would never
happen. That was my feedback for him.
And now I think, wow, I probablysounded so weird, but it was
what he wanted and it's why we became friends is he wanted to
(46:22):
really do us justice. He's heard all about my story in
great detail and we've written the script quite a few times,
but I think he's landed on one that we're all really happy
with. Like, I couldn't believe how
well he integrated the feelings and the symbolism.
It's going to be incredible. Oh that's so exciting and just
(46:46):
how awesome to really want to dothese stories justice.
I think so often we see NP, ES and adoption and DNA surprises
in the media and it's used as a plot device to just throw a
little twist in there. But there's none of the fallout.
(47:06):
And people tend to just get overit really quickly.
They tend to just accept this wild new information about
themselves. So that's great.
And kudos to you for for voicing, hey, that would never
happen, you know? That's.
Really great. What advice do you have for a
parent who is keeping adna surprise from their child?
(47:29):
Oh, it would be to tell it. I mean, that's the really simple
short answer. And if you can't tell it because
you're just not ready yet, then go talk to somebody about how to
tell it. And then tell it.
What advice do you have for someone who just uncovered Adna
Surprise? Probably to go slow.
I'm guilty of this. This is why I can say this.
(47:51):
I think it's really human natureto want to jump to the end part.
And I don't just mean reunion, Imean jumping to this part where
you go, OK, I'm done, everything's fine.
I've I've cried, I've been mad. I did the thing and and we're
good now. Or to rush to try and like make
everything OK with the people that raised you.
(48:13):
Or like, just don't rush. Just take your time, take
breaks. Yeah.
Megan, thank you so much for coming on the podcast and
sharing your perspective. I love hearing stories of people
that have been in this for years, and I think it gives
people a lot of hope to see where you can end up.
Even when we've had complicated beginnings to our lives, you can
(48:38):
still reach a place of healing and growth and then helping
others. So thank you for reaching into
the community and. Lending your support.
Thank you. Thank you for having such a
podcast like this. Just being able to tell their
stories I think is such a big part of healing so that we're
not alone and there's little bits of things we can learn from
(48:58):
each other. Thanks again to Megan for
sharing her story. If you have Adna Surprise that
you'd like to share, please submit your story at
dnasurprises.com and be sure to join me over on
patreon@patreon.com/DNA Surprises for early ad free
access to episodes. Until next time, this episode of
(49:24):
DNA Surprises was hosted, produced, and edited by me,
Alexis Ourselt. It was mixed and mastered by
Josh Ourselt of Siren Recording Studios.
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