1 00:00:00,040 --> 00:00:03,680 They're just unexpected roots and I'm interested in them, but 2 00:00:03,680 --> 00:00:06,320 I don't know how to express them and I don't know what feels 3 00:00:06,320 --> 00:00:08,680 right and what feels right to claim. 4 00:00:09,200 --> 00:00:12,280 Because wherever, whatever I do, I feel like an imposter. 5 00:00:12,560 --> 00:00:14,720 Like whether it's my Jewish side, because I know that I'm 6 00:00:14,720 --> 00:00:18,440 not 100% Jewish, whether it's, you know, the Latin American 7 00:00:18,440 --> 00:00:20,640 side because I know. OK, so my mom is from Latin 8 00:00:20,640 --> 00:00:22,720 American. I grew up visiting her country, 9 00:00:22,720 --> 00:00:25,640 and I have cousins that still live in her country and they 10 00:00:25,640 --> 00:00:27,800 have children. So I have all this family and I 11 00:00:28,120 --> 00:00:30,960 do speak the language and I do eat the foods and all all that 12 00:00:30,960 --> 00:00:33,120 cultural stuff, but it's still not exactly the same. 13 00:00:33,120 --> 00:00:36,400 It's a subset of culture. And then this African American 14 00:00:36,400 --> 00:00:37,560 piece that I didn't know anything about. 15 00:00:37,560 --> 00:00:39,840 And I don't know what I have rights to, especially since I 16 00:00:39,840 --> 00:00:44,120 wasn't created on purpose. Welcome to DNA Surprises, a 17 00:00:44,120 --> 00:00:47,520 podcast that delves into the world of unexpected DNA 18 00:00:47,520 --> 00:00:51,120 discoveries. I'm your host, Alexis Oursalt. 19 00:00:51,800 --> 00:00:57,160 In July 2021, my life took a surprising turn when I found out 20 00:00:57,160 --> 00:01:02,000 that I'm an N P/E, a person who has experienced a non paternal 21 00:01:02,000 --> 00:01:05,319 event. In other words, my biological 22 00:01:05,319 --> 00:01:07,600 father isn't who I thought he was. 23 00:01:08,480 --> 00:01:13,400 Join me as we explore the stories of NP, ES, adoptees and 24 00:01:13,400 --> 00:01:15,920 donor conceived people and their families. 25 00:01:16,560 --> 00:01:19,880 Get ready to unravel the astonishing journeys that begin 26 00:01:20,200 --> 00:01:25,200 with a simple DNA test. This is DNA surprises. 27 00:01:26,560 --> 00:01:29,200 Who would I have been if I'd known the truth about my 28 00:01:29,200 --> 00:01:32,560 identity? This is a question people in the 29 00:01:32,560 --> 00:01:35,920 DNA surprise community often ask themselves. 30 00:01:36,640 --> 00:01:40,240 Where would I have lived? What choices would I have made? 31 00:01:40,960 --> 00:01:44,040 What about my life would be different from how it is today? 32 00:01:44,640 --> 00:01:49,320 In the season 11 finale of DNA Surprises, Lori shares how much 33 00:01:49,320 --> 00:01:53,520 of her childhood and who she is today was shaped by her parents 34 00:01:53,520 --> 00:01:56,800 efforts to keep her donor conception and the truth about 35 00:01:56,800 --> 00:02:02,040 her ethnicity a secret. Now I'm going to break the 4th 36 00:02:02,040 --> 00:02:06,240 wall here for a moment. I've spoken to dozens of guests 37 00:02:06,320 --> 00:02:10,240 in the three years that I've been making this show, but few 38 00:02:10,240 --> 00:02:12,880 who have made discoveries so similar to my own. 39 00:02:13,760 --> 00:02:17,880 Laurie also learned through DNA testing that her genetic parent 40 00:02:17,880 --> 00:02:21,920 is black. In this episode, she articulates 41 00:02:21,920 --> 00:02:25,280 how challenging it can be to navigate a major change in 42 00:02:25,280 --> 00:02:30,840 ethnicity in an authentic way and why she identifies as mixed 43 00:02:31,080 --> 00:02:37,200 as opposed to Black or African American race, ethnicity and 44 00:02:37,200 --> 00:02:42,400 culture are complex topics that require so much nuance, and they 45 00:02:42,400 --> 00:02:46,800 can be difficult to talk about. My own racial and cultural 46 00:02:46,800 --> 00:02:50,160 identity is something that I continue to struggle with in the 47 00:02:50,160 --> 00:02:54,560 aftermath of my DNA surprise, so speaking to her was incredibly 48 00:02:54,560 --> 00:02:57,360 validating. I'm so grateful for our 49 00:02:57,360 --> 00:03:01,040 conversation. Thank you for sharing your 50 00:03:01,040 --> 00:03:06,960 story, Lori. Hey, I'm Lori and I'm 46 and I 51 00:03:06,960 --> 00:03:11,560 grew up in New York. So I found out two things. 52 00:03:11,560 --> 00:03:17,680 First of all, I found out that I am not 100% Ashkenazi Jewish. 53 00:03:18,080 --> 00:03:22,960 I am 50% African American. And secondly, I found out that 54 00:03:22,960 --> 00:03:25,880 I'm donor conceived. It probably makes sense to 55 00:03:25,880 --> 00:03:28,520 really start at the very beginning because I think it 56 00:03:28,520 --> 00:03:34,400 puts into context the decisions my parents made and also how I 57 00:03:34,400 --> 00:03:37,360 grew up. I know you had a racial DNA 58 00:03:37,360 --> 00:03:40,400 surprise as well. And so one of the big questions 59 00:03:40,680 --> 00:03:43,240 that people get when they hear about it, they're like, what do 60 00:03:43,240 --> 00:03:45,000 you mean you didn't know? Like, are you dumb? 61 00:03:45,920 --> 00:03:48,880 So I think the back story is sort of important for giving 62 00:03:48,880 --> 00:03:52,280 that context because like, no, I'm not dumb, but I do feel 63 00:03:52,280 --> 00:03:55,280 dumb. I was born in the late 1970s, 64 00:03:55,280 --> 00:03:57,800 and donor conception wasn't really a thing. 65 00:03:58,280 --> 00:04:01,160 My parents apparently struggled with infertility. 66 00:04:01,160 --> 00:04:05,240 They got married four years before I was born, and then 67 00:04:05,440 --> 00:04:09,920 about three years after they got married, they had a baby boy who 68 00:04:09,920 --> 00:04:13,480 did not make it. So he died a couple of days 69 00:04:13,480 --> 00:04:17,959 after he was born, and then I was born about 15 months after 70 00:04:17,959 --> 00:04:20,240 that. So looking at those timelines, 71 00:04:20,240 --> 00:04:23,160 it's not a situation where I would suspect that there were 72 00:04:23,160 --> 00:04:25,640 fertility issues. My parents weren't particularly 73 00:04:25,640 --> 00:04:27,800 old. They were in their late 20s when 74 00:04:27,800 --> 00:04:31,360 I was born, but I didn't find out about any of that stuff 75 00:04:31,360 --> 00:04:35,440 until the DNA surprise. So I grew up as the oldest of 76 00:04:35,440 --> 00:04:38,520 two kids. I'm four years older, just about 77 00:04:38,520 --> 00:04:44,760 than my younger brother, and my mom is from Latin America, but 78 00:04:44,760 --> 00:04:49,600 she is Ashkenazi Jewish. Her parents came from Europe to 79 00:04:49,600 --> 00:04:53,720 escape World War 2, and my dad grew up in Brooklyn, so I grew 80 00:04:53,720 --> 00:04:57,480 up in this very Ashkenazi Jewish family. 81 00:04:57,480 --> 00:05:03,000 But on my mom's side also very much colored by her growing up 82 00:05:03,000 --> 00:05:06,320 in Latin America. My mom's family speaks Spanish, 83 00:05:06,320 --> 00:05:09,680 and so we grew up eating both Latin foods and Jewish foods. 84 00:05:09,840 --> 00:05:12,040 That's important to the story because it was kind of part of 85 00:05:12,040 --> 00:05:17,320 that story that I constructed for myself because I looked a 86 00:05:17,320 --> 00:05:20,280 little different than everyone else in my family. 87 00:05:20,640 --> 00:05:24,560 And it was pretty obvious that I look different to other people 88 00:05:24,720 --> 00:05:27,600 from the time I was growing up. You know, I would get a lot of 89 00:05:27,600 --> 00:05:29,760 those questions like, where are you from? 90 00:05:29,760 --> 00:05:32,120 And I would, you know, play around, be like, I'm from New 91 00:05:32,120 --> 00:05:34,960 York or whatever. But really the answer that I 92 00:05:34,960 --> 00:05:37,760 would give is like, oh, you know, my mom is from Latin 93 00:05:37,760 --> 00:05:40,200 America. So a lot of people, like, would 94 00:05:40,200 --> 00:05:42,560 just accept that at face value because they wouldn't. 95 00:05:42,560 --> 00:05:45,240 They didn't really realize that my parent, my mother's family 96 00:05:45,240 --> 00:05:50,200 was all from Eastern Europe. And the whole thing didn't 100% 97 00:05:50,200 --> 00:05:52,960 make sense. But I'm ethnically ambiguous 98 00:05:52,960 --> 00:05:57,000 enough that at least to some people, curly hair, you know, a 99 00:05:57,000 --> 00:06:00,200 little bit darker skin, it kind of all made sense, you know? 100 00:06:01,080 --> 00:06:01,440 Yeah. Enough. 101 00:06:01,440 --> 00:06:04,440 And so was that right? Right. 102 00:06:04,760 --> 00:06:07,720 And I'm obviously very much relating to a lot of the things 103 00:06:07,720 --> 00:06:10,960 that you're saying right now. When you would tell people that 104 00:06:10,960 --> 00:06:15,680 my, my mom is from South America, Latin America, was that 105 00:06:15,680 --> 00:06:19,040 just so that they would leave you alone, stop asking? 106 00:06:19,040 --> 00:06:23,080 Or did you also internalize that story that that is why you look 107 00:06:23,080 --> 00:06:25,280 different from your family? It was. 108 00:06:25,400 --> 00:06:27,720 A combination of both. Because there wasn't any real 109 00:06:27,720 --> 00:06:29,600 reason why that would be the case. 110 00:06:29,840 --> 00:06:32,120 Because I knew my both of my grandparents, I knew they were 111 00:06:32,120 --> 00:06:36,040 both born in Eastern Europe. I knew my mom and her sisters. 112 00:06:36,040 --> 00:06:39,320 And Jewish people from Eastern Europe don't look exactly like 113 00:06:39,320 --> 00:06:41,360 Eastern European non Jewish people. 114 00:06:41,600 --> 00:06:44,280 They might be a little bit darker, they'll have often times 115 00:06:44,280 --> 00:06:47,560 curlier hair and so forth. But like people were 116 00:06:47,560 --> 00:06:51,920 specifically assuming that I was African American or that I was 117 00:06:51,920 --> 00:06:55,880 mixed or something like that. So like it was really intended 118 00:06:55,880 --> 00:06:59,360 to be an explanation. So I definitely made sure that 119 00:06:59,360 --> 00:07:02,280 my Spanish was good because I felt like it kind of added 120 00:07:02,680 --> 00:07:06,040 authenticity to that story. And I also grew up in a 121 00:07:06,040 --> 00:07:09,960 neighborhood where everyone was pretty much Italian or Irish. 122 00:07:09,960 --> 00:07:13,560 I already was an outsider being Jewish in that neighborhood and 123 00:07:13,560 --> 00:07:17,320 then looking African American. I was an outsider in the Jewish 124 00:07:17,320 --> 00:07:19,760 community because people would always be confused by me. 125 00:07:20,080 --> 00:07:23,440 And then also in in the area where I grew up, it was 100% 126 00:07:23,440 --> 00:07:27,800 white people. Did you at any point question 127 00:07:27,800 --> 00:07:30,320 did you think that you looked African American? 128 00:07:30,640 --> 00:07:33,320 I didn't really know, I just knew I looked different, right 129 00:07:33,320 --> 00:07:36,760 and I'd ask my parents about it and they would just deflect and 130 00:07:36,760 --> 00:07:39,920 then it really came became more noticeable to me. 131 00:07:40,080 --> 00:07:42,160 You know, like people would say the N word to me in school and 132 00:07:42,160 --> 00:07:43,720 I'd be like, why are they doing this? 133 00:07:43,720 --> 00:07:46,560 This is so confusing, but I really noticed it when I went to 134 00:07:46,560 --> 00:07:49,960 college more because like I got there and I thought like the 135 00:07:49,960 --> 00:07:51,960 reason was me because they're, there weren't that many Jewish 136 00:07:51,960 --> 00:07:55,280 people where I grew up and I'd go to college and I'd fit in. 137 00:07:55,280 --> 00:07:58,240 And what I ended up doing is all my friends were Hispanic for the 138 00:07:58,240 --> 00:08:01,080 most part. And then people would again just 139 00:08:01,080 --> 00:08:02,760 assume that I was African American. 140 00:08:02,760 --> 00:08:06,280 And when I said I was from Latin America, a lot of Hispanic 141 00:08:06,280 --> 00:08:10,040 people are multiracial. So then that just like put an 142 00:08:10,040 --> 00:08:12,240 end to all the questioning. And then because I spoke 143 00:08:12,240 --> 00:08:15,280 Spanish, because my mom actually was from Latin America, it 144 00:08:15,280 --> 00:08:19,280 provided this off ramp. So I didn't really have to do a 145 00:08:19,280 --> 00:08:22,560 lot of exploring or probing because I think, you know, when 146 00:08:22,560 --> 00:08:24,760 people ask, like, how didn't you know? 147 00:08:24,760 --> 00:08:28,040 It's because your parents kind of tell you where you're from 148 00:08:28,040 --> 00:08:30,120 and like who your family is and who you are. 149 00:08:30,120 --> 00:08:34,880 So you just like don't you don't distrust your parents in that 150 00:08:34,880 --> 00:08:37,240 sense, especially when like you just believe them. 151 00:08:37,240 --> 00:08:38,880 And I think you're programmed to believe them. 152 00:08:38,880 --> 00:08:41,039 My parents definitely like, you know, they would do certain 153 00:08:41,039 --> 00:08:43,320 things like I was always very self-conscious about it. 154 00:08:43,320 --> 00:08:47,720 When I was 4, my mom started taking me to this hair salon in 155 00:08:47,720 --> 00:08:49,680 Queens. And like, they would prop me up 156 00:08:49,680 --> 00:08:52,840 on all these phone books and they would relax my hair with 157 00:08:52,840 --> 00:08:55,720 these relive relaxers. And it was our secret. 158 00:08:55,720 --> 00:08:58,800 And it was painful. Like they burned my head and I 159 00:08:58,800 --> 00:09:01,680 would sit there and I'd pretend not to notice it because I 160 00:09:01,680 --> 00:09:03,600 wanted my hair to be as straight as possible. 161 00:09:03,600 --> 00:09:05,440 And I wasn't allowed to tell anybody about this. 162 00:09:05,440 --> 00:09:08,400 It was our secret. And like in the summers, my 163 00:09:08,400 --> 00:09:11,840 brother was very fair and he fit perfectly into the family. 164 00:09:11,840 --> 00:09:15,000 I wasn't supposed to go swimming until the sun was going down 165 00:09:15,000 --> 00:09:17,280 because like, they didn't want me to get too dark. 166 00:09:17,280 --> 00:09:20,920 So there were definitely things that my mom in particular was 167 00:09:20,920 --> 00:09:23,080 doing in the, I grew up in the 80s, by the way. 168 00:09:23,080 --> 00:09:25,840 So like the curly hair thing. Like I wanted curly hair and I 169 00:09:25,840 --> 00:09:28,160 was like can I have a perm? I was like, no, you can't have a 170 00:09:28,200 --> 00:09:30,760 perm. Like it was all about trying to 171 00:09:30,760 --> 00:09:34,040 like portray this appearance and like, so I knew that these 172 00:09:34,040 --> 00:09:36,000 things were weird and it bothered me because it made me 173 00:09:36,000 --> 00:09:38,880 feel very insecure. Like I always felt like there 174 00:09:38,880 --> 00:09:41,440 was something wrong with me. Like I was too dark and I tanned 175 00:09:41,440 --> 00:09:44,600 too much and my hair wasn't nice and I had bad hair. 176 00:09:45,120 --> 00:09:49,720 And I spent all of like basically until I was 25 trying 177 00:09:49,720 --> 00:09:52,520 to do, even later trying to deal with that, but I didn't 178 00:09:52,520 --> 00:09:55,400 understand it and I didn't understand the context of it. 179 00:09:56,160 --> 00:09:59,400 Did you ever ask your mom? Like why? 180 00:09:59,400 --> 00:10:01,640 Why can't I go swimming when my brother can? 181 00:10:01,640 --> 00:10:04,240 Well, she's. Like you get too dark and she 182 00:10:04,240 --> 00:10:07,440 would always it was that it was because of the tan and so. 183 00:10:07,440 --> 00:10:09,640 She would actually say I don't want you to get too tan. 184 00:10:09,840 --> 00:10:14,120 And for people that are listening, Lori is light 185 00:10:14,120 --> 00:10:16,760 skinned. Pretty like relatively fair, 186 00:10:16,760 --> 00:10:17,840 right? I think. 187 00:10:17,960 --> 00:10:19,960 I mean medium. I guess because the lighting is 188 00:10:20,000 --> 00:10:21,880 really bad in here. Yeah, it's really bad. 189 00:10:21,920 --> 00:10:24,800 So it's more of a medium complexion, I would say. 190 00:10:24,880 --> 00:10:27,640 Yeah. Like whenever I buy cosmetics 191 00:10:27,640 --> 00:10:32,920 it's usually like in like the medium range, medium to tan, 192 00:10:32,920 --> 00:10:34,200 something like that. Same. 193 00:10:34,600 --> 00:10:38,200 OK, same here. But but during the summer time I 194 00:10:38,200 --> 00:10:41,280 can get pretty dark and so I imagine similar for you. 195 00:10:41,280 --> 00:10:42,520 OK, Yeah. Same. 196 00:10:42,520 --> 00:10:46,200 So I could get super dark. And so, yeah, so she was trying 197 00:10:46,200 --> 00:10:50,960 to keep me in this sort of more medium kind of complexion, which 198 00:10:50,960 --> 00:10:55,480 is probably a little bit darker than your average, like Southern 199 00:10:55,480 --> 00:11:00,960 European, but not like so dark that you'd be like where this 200 00:11:00,960 --> 00:11:03,680 makes absolutely no sense. So, right. 201 00:11:03,720 --> 00:11:06,040 Wanted to keep me light enough where there was some sort of 202 00:11:06,040 --> 00:11:09,000 plausible deniability. My brother didn't. 203 00:11:09,000 --> 00:11:12,440 He was like, really white, OK. So your brother did not look 204 00:11:12,440 --> 00:11:16,360 like you either. No, in addition to the the 205 00:11:16,360 --> 00:11:19,680 tanning thing, my mom had me have my nose thinned out when I 206 00:11:19,680 --> 00:11:20,960 was 18. It was. 207 00:11:20,960 --> 00:11:23,440 That something that you wanted to do, or was it mostly from 208 00:11:23,440 --> 00:11:24,040 her? I was. 209 00:11:24,040 --> 00:11:26,480 Always told that my there was something with my nose and so it 210 00:11:26,480 --> 00:11:29,920 was like a lot of pressure. But then when I went back and 211 00:11:29,920 --> 00:11:33,120 like looked at the pictures and also like when my ex-husband 212 00:11:33,120 --> 00:11:36,600 like saw the pictures of me as a kid, he was like, you really 213 00:11:36,600 --> 00:11:40,000 looked blacker with your nose, like whiter, you know, like more 214 00:11:40,000 --> 00:11:44,360 of an African American feature. And I think like in retrospect, 215 00:11:44,360 --> 00:11:47,960 like even if it wasn't like my parents like consciously trying 216 00:11:47,960 --> 00:11:51,320 to do that, I think like it was subconscious. 217 00:11:51,320 --> 00:11:53,720 You know, I was also really tall. 218 00:11:53,720 --> 00:11:55,880 That was the other thing that was super off about me. 219 00:11:56,440 --> 00:12:00,880 My mom is like 4 foot 10 on a good day, claims to be 5 foot. 220 00:12:00,920 --> 00:12:04,720 And my dad is about 5 foot 3. And my brother grew up to be 221 00:12:04,720 --> 00:12:08,000 about 5 foot 4-5 foot 35 foot four. 222 00:12:08,000 --> 00:12:12,040 And I'm closer to 5 foot 7. And also my mom wore a size 5 223 00:12:12,040 --> 00:12:15,680 shoe and I wore a size 8 shoe. And they would call me Bigfoot. 224 00:12:15,680 --> 00:12:17,960 Like they would just make fun of me for being so big. 225 00:12:17,960 --> 00:12:21,680 So I felt like this huge giant in the middle of this really 226 00:12:21,680 --> 00:12:23,520 short family. Like on my mom's side, I'm 227 00:12:23,520 --> 00:12:26,200 literally the tallest person, male or female of all my 228 00:12:26,200 --> 00:12:27,560 cousins. Like everybody. 229 00:12:27,640 --> 00:12:28,520 Wow. So everyone. 230 00:12:28,520 --> 00:12:31,840 'S really short and then on my dad's side, my I have one tall 231 00:12:31,840 --> 00:12:33,880 uncle, so I would latch onto that. 232 00:12:33,880 --> 00:12:35,080 I'd be like, well, that's probably why. 233 00:12:35,080 --> 00:12:38,520 I'm tall cuz like. You know, my uncle is tall, you 234 00:12:38,520 --> 00:12:41,560 know. The stories we tell, yeah. 235 00:12:41,680 --> 00:12:44,360 So I was like always trying to find pieces that would fit. 236 00:12:44,360 --> 00:12:47,920 And I would Google like Jewish people who looked black to try 237 00:12:47,920 --> 00:12:49,520 to figure out. It would always be like people 238 00:12:49,520 --> 00:12:53,520 like Lenny Kravitz or Lisa Bonet who are actually half black. 239 00:12:53,840 --> 00:12:56,640 Because like what would happen was like in college and in law 240 00:12:56,640 --> 00:12:59,520 school and in grad school, I would always be added 241 00:12:59,520 --> 00:13:03,080 automatically to the Black students associations because 242 00:13:03,080 --> 00:13:07,200 people would just assume that I was like biracial or mixed or 243 00:13:07,200 --> 00:13:09,040 something like that. And at the time my hair was 244 00:13:09,040 --> 00:13:12,840 relaxed, which I think added to the perception, which is the 245 00:13:12,880 --> 00:13:14,800 opposite, I think, of what my parents intended. 246 00:13:14,840 --> 00:13:17,560 How did it? Affect you how did you feel 247 00:13:18,680 --> 00:13:23,800 being kind of stereotyped, however accurately in hindsight, 248 00:13:23,800 --> 00:13:26,440 right but being stereotyped and just automatically put into 249 00:13:26,440 --> 00:13:28,800 these groups and people automatically making assumptions 250 00:13:28,800 --> 00:13:32,640 about your race and you really believed you were something else 251 00:13:32,640 --> 00:13:36,880 How did that affect you it was. Awkward because like in a couple 252 00:13:36,880 --> 00:13:41,440 of different ways, because like, I didn't, you know, I never 253 00:13:41,440 --> 00:13:44,160 wanted people to think I was trying to be something that I 254 00:13:44,160 --> 00:13:46,960 wasn't. And it's just like uncomfortable 255 00:13:46,960 --> 00:13:48,640 if people think you're something you're not. 256 00:13:48,640 --> 00:13:51,560 So what I did is I kind of leaned into more like the fact 257 00:13:51,560 --> 00:13:52,840 that my mom was from Latin America. 258 00:13:52,840 --> 00:13:56,000 I'm like, I know I'll get more involved in like the Latino 259 00:13:56,000 --> 00:13:58,400 student associations because I'm like, you don't have to be any 260 00:13:58,400 --> 00:14:00,840 race being Latino. Like you can be any religion. 261 00:14:00,840 --> 00:14:03,600 It doesn't matter. So that to me made sense. 262 00:14:04,200 --> 00:14:07,680 But you know, that also kind of leads into how it was that I 263 00:14:07,680 --> 00:14:10,200 eventually decided to do the DNA test. 264 00:14:10,560 --> 00:14:12,640 And again, I'd been ongoing over the years and like when I got 265 00:14:12,640 --> 00:14:15,760 divorced, my ex-husband was like, your mom had an affair. 266 00:14:15,760 --> 00:14:18,040 She must be a swinger because there's no way that you're 267 00:14:18,040 --> 00:14:20,120 completely white. Like, are you dumb? 268 00:14:20,160 --> 00:14:22,680 And like, I was just like, so like standing my ground, like, 269 00:14:22,680 --> 00:14:24,880 no, like my, that's not my parents. 270 00:14:24,880 --> 00:14:26,520 And he would use that like to throw in my face. 271 00:14:26,520 --> 00:14:29,880 He was trying to get my kids to take DNA tests to try to figure 272 00:14:29,880 --> 00:14:32,200 it out. But really what ended up getting 273 00:14:32,200 --> 00:14:34,400 me to do it? And I actually bought Adna last 274 00:14:34,400 --> 00:14:36,200 like a couple of years before I actually did it. 275 00:14:36,200 --> 00:14:37,920 And I lost it. It disappeared. 276 00:14:38,160 --> 00:14:41,480 Found out later my mom had found it and thrown it out in my 277 00:14:41,480 --> 00:14:43,240 house. She had been staying over. 278 00:14:43,240 --> 00:14:46,240 I had bought it and I shoved it in a drawer and she saw it and 279 00:14:46,240 --> 00:14:47,920 threw it out. I'm so disorganized. 280 00:14:47,920 --> 00:14:50,960 I thought like I was just like, I don't know what happened to 281 00:14:50,960 --> 00:14:52,840 it. So I bought another one. 282 00:14:52,840 --> 00:14:54,480 And then that one sat for months. 283 00:14:54,480 --> 00:14:57,520 And I finally took it because there were a couple of things 284 00:14:57,520 --> 00:15:01,360 that happened where I started worrying that I was gonna like, 285 00:15:01,680 --> 00:15:05,160 get like, found out for pretending to be something that 286 00:15:05,160 --> 00:15:08,040 I wasn't because, you know, there was a Rachel Dolezal 287 00:15:08,040 --> 00:15:10,320 thing. And like, I never ever said that 288 00:15:10,320 --> 00:15:13,000 I was African American, but people often assumed it. 289 00:15:13,000 --> 00:15:16,440 And I was always feeling like this need to correct people. 290 00:15:16,640 --> 00:15:18,680 And I think that could be off putting too, because it wasn't 291 00:15:18,680 --> 00:15:22,640 like I had an issue. I just never wanted to be seen 292 00:15:22,640 --> 00:15:24,600 as pretending to be something I wasn't. 293 00:15:24,880 --> 00:15:30,600 And then there was a professor at a university that was Jewish, 294 00:15:30,600 --> 00:15:32,600 that was pretending to be Puerto Rican. 295 00:15:33,960 --> 00:15:37,800 And then I was like, oh, crap. Like I wasn't pretending to be 296 00:15:37,800 --> 00:15:39,920 anything. I felt like I legitimately like 297 00:15:39,920 --> 00:15:43,040 my mom was legitimately from Latin America and like, it was 298 00:15:43,040 --> 00:15:45,200 reasonable. But at the same time, I was 299 00:15:45,200 --> 00:15:47,920 like, what if people don't agree and they think because you're 300 00:15:47,920 --> 00:15:51,000 Jewish, you don't have a right to claim that you're from Latin 301 00:15:51,000 --> 00:15:52,320 America? And then I was like, well, 302 00:15:52,320 --> 00:15:54,640 shoot, what do I do? Because I was really freaking 303 00:15:54,640 --> 00:15:56,120 out. Like, what if people find out 304 00:15:56,120 --> 00:15:58,120 that I'm a fraud? And then I end up losing 305 00:15:58,120 --> 00:16:02,120 everything and I started like having this whole like freak 306 00:16:02,120 --> 00:16:04,440 out. So I finally decided to send in 307 00:16:04,440 --> 00:16:06,680 the test and I didn't know what I was going to find. 308 00:16:06,720 --> 00:16:09,160 And I was like, it'll put it to rest one way or the other. 309 00:16:09,160 --> 00:16:10,600 It was. Like a fear. 310 00:16:11,040 --> 00:16:16,480 And would you say that this was a big part of your life and your 311 00:16:16,880 --> 00:16:19,960 identity? Was this ambiguousness and 312 00:16:19,960 --> 00:16:22,440 people questioning you? Did you feel like that was a big 313 00:16:22,440 --> 00:16:24,800 part of who you were? Absolutely. 314 00:16:24,800 --> 00:16:28,520 It was because it was happening constantly because I think, you 315 00:16:28,520 --> 00:16:29,880 know, a lot of different settings. 316 00:16:29,880 --> 00:16:33,240 People just want to know how to characterize people. 317 00:16:33,240 --> 00:16:36,280 So, you know, like in school there were different affinity 318 00:16:36,280 --> 00:16:40,480 groups and also in companies. This was like when I started 319 00:16:40,480 --> 00:16:43,440 working and like in the professional world, you know, it 320 00:16:43,440 --> 00:16:45,440 was like a couple years before 2008. 321 00:16:45,440 --> 00:16:47,440 But like when Obama became president, there was a lot more 322 00:16:47,440 --> 00:16:50,840 focus growing over the years on diversity and things like that. 323 00:16:50,840 --> 00:16:54,680 Like they wanted to know like, how to characterize you. 324 00:16:55,280 --> 00:16:57,760 And so like, it started to become more and more important 325 00:16:57,760 --> 00:17:01,200 to know how to characterize myself because like, whenever, 326 00:17:01,200 --> 00:17:03,680 like if I said like, oh, no, I'm just an Eastern European Jew. 327 00:17:03,680 --> 00:17:06,599 Like people would make the mailman jokes and the milkman 328 00:17:06,599 --> 00:17:08,359 jokes. And it was just like, so sounded 329 00:17:08,359 --> 00:17:14,200 so ridiculous that it wasn't an acceptable response because 330 00:17:14,200 --> 00:17:16,720 nobody believed it. Like literally nobody. 331 00:17:17,040 --> 00:17:21,520 And so the only response people believed was, oh, I'm Hispanic, 332 00:17:22,000 --> 00:17:26,240 which was true. But it was also like, again, it 333 00:17:26,319 --> 00:17:29,880 wasn't like I looked that way because my mom was from Latin 334 00:17:29,880 --> 00:17:31,760 America. It was just a coincidence. 335 00:17:32,720 --> 00:17:35,680 Right, right. You didn't have Spanish or 336 00:17:35,680 --> 00:17:39,480 indigenous. There are African, you know, 337 00:17:39,480 --> 00:17:41,400 roots, but you didn't think that you had those. 338 00:17:41,560 --> 00:17:43,680 So you couldn't do on that, right? 339 00:17:43,720 --> 00:17:45,560 Right. Exactly. 340 00:17:45,920 --> 00:17:48,120 And also like what ended up kind of coming to a head too. 341 00:17:48,120 --> 00:17:50,480 So it was like, so that professor who is like Jewish, 342 00:17:50,480 --> 00:17:53,680 pretending to be Puerto Rican. And then around the same time, I 343 00:17:53,680 --> 00:17:57,360 got a big promotion and people were upset that the African 344 00:17:57,360 --> 00:18:01,360 American affinity group didn't say anything about me getting 345 00:18:01,360 --> 00:18:04,680 promoted because I would have been the first, like, black 346 00:18:04,680 --> 00:18:06,880 female to have been internally promoted. 347 00:18:06,880 --> 00:18:10,200 And then somebody called me. So one of the people, she was 348 00:18:10,200 --> 00:18:13,760 one of the few black female partners at my firm, called me. 349 00:18:14,040 --> 00:18:16,160 And she was talking about how excited she was for another 350 00:18:16,160 --> 00:18:19,480 black woman to get promoted. And it was so awkward because I 351 00:18:19,480 --> 00:18:21,240 didn't like, I was trying to figure out the right way to 352 00:18:21,240 --> 00:18:23,480 like, interrupt and tell her I'm actually not black. 353 00:18:23,920 --> 00:18:27,440 And it was so awkward. And so it was like. 354 00:18:27,440 --> 00:18:30,000 That combination of things that had me male in the test. 355 00:18:30,000 --> 00:18:32,320 So like I ended up having to like send her a note like, you 356 00:18:32,320 --> 00:18:36,800 know, like I really appreciate it, but I'm not actually black. 357 00:18:37,160 --> 00:18:40,480 Like so like that's the thing. And it was just so awkward 358 00:18:40,480 --> 00:18:43,000 because people, it didn't even occur to people. 359 00:18:43,480 --> 00:18:45,520 Wow. And I think also people were 360 00:18:45,520 --> 00:18:48,880 offended because they were just like, is she like, does she 361 00:18:48,880 --> 00:18:51,000 just, like, not like herself or what? 362 00:18:51,000 --> 00:18:53,360 And then there's also like, a tension between the Afro Latino 363 00:18:53,360 --> 00:18:56,080 community and the African American community because not 364 00:18:56,080 --> 00:18:58,960 all Latinos embrace their African heritage. 365 00:18:59,640 --> 00:19:01,040 There's some of that, too, right? 366 00:19:01,400 --> 00:19:04,840 And like, I was sort of tripping into all of these different 367 00:19:04,840 --> 00:19:08,680 things inadvertently. White people just would assume I 368 00:19:08,680 --> 00:19:11,440 was black or, you know, something. 369 00:19:11,720 --> 00:19:15,840 And then black people always saw, like, the African American 370 00:19:15,840 --> 00:19:18,640 heritage in me, you know? Sure. 371 00:19:19,200 --> 00:19:24,760 OK, so take me to getting your results and opening them up. 372 00:19:25,600 --> 00:19:28,320 So I got my results. I sent in my test and it was 373 00:19:28,320 --> 00:19:32,120 like part of like the Christmas flood of tests, you know, that 374 00:19:32,560 --> 00:19:34,440 went in. So I mailed it out like, I don't 375 00:19:34,440 --> 00:19:38,000 know, sometime after the new year, like pretty early on a 376 00:19:38,000 --> 00:19:40,280 couple years ago, I guess this was about four years ago. 377 00:19:40,400 --> 00:19:43,280 And I was kind of stalking them. Like I put them in the mailbox. 378 00:19:43,280 --> 00:19:45,400 Like my parents live nearby. So I put them in like the 379 00:19:45,400 --> 00:19:47,600 mailbox, like when I knew my mom wasn't around. 380 00:19:47,600 --> 00:19:50,080 And then I literally watched the mailman take it out of my 381 00:19:50,080 --> 00:19:53,400 mailbox cuz I was worried that like, my mom was gonna see it. 382 00:19:53,400 --> 00:19:57,080 Cuz my cousins on my dad's side had done DNA testing and they 383 00:19:57,080 --> 00:19:58,800 were talking about it. And I was like, Oh my God, 384 00:19:58,800 --> 00:20:01,000 that's so cool. And then in the car on the way 385 00:20:01,000 --> 00:20:03,680 home, this was about like maybe six or seven years ago, like my 386 00:20:03,680 --> 00:20:06,640 mom, like flipped. She was like, don't you dare, 387 00:20:06,680 --> 00:20:09,160 like, promise me, promise me you're not going to do DNA 388 00:20:09,160 --> 00:20:11,440 testing. And like, obviously that was 389 00:20:11,440 --> 00:20:14,320 super suspicious. So at that point, I was like 390 00:20:14,320 --> 00:20:17,520 beginning to suspect that perhaps that's why my DNI test 391 00:20:17,520 --> 00:20:20,640 disappeared, Like, and I was starting to put two and two 392 00:20:20,640 --> 00:20:22,640 together. So finally, even though I didn't 393 00:20:22,640 --> 00:20:25,520 know what I was going to find, like by the time I sent my test, 394 00:20:25,520 --> 00:20:29,720 I had a pretty good idea that there must be like, my parents 395 00:20:29,720 --> 00:20:32,280 were hiding something. I didn't know what. 396 00:20:32,480 --> 00:20:34,680 I was like, maybe it was something like my grandmother 397 00:20:34,680 --> 00:20:36,960 did, although that didn't make any sense based on like my 398 00:20:37,160 --> 00:20:40,240 mother's appearance. But like, it's really scary to 399 00:20:40,240 --> 00:20:42,480 take the step to find out. Like it's one thing if you 400 00:20:42,560 --> 00:20:45,920 innocently send off a test and you don't really know what 401 00:20:45,920 --> 00:20:48,880 you're going to find, but I think it's another one, you 402 00:20:48,880 --> 00:20:53,800 know, that there's probably a greater than 50% chance that 403 00:20:53,800 --> 00:20:56,960 something is gonna be uncovered. I didn't know what. 404 00:20:57,040 --> 00:20:59,560 I had no idea cuz. Also, my mom is very 405 00:20:59,560 --> 00:21:02,720 conservative so I didn't think she'd had an affair. 406 00:21:02,720 --> 00:21:07,360 I was so confused I couldn't figure out an explanation. 407 00:21:07,360 --> 00:21:10,040 Like she was very into like that purity culture. 408 00:21:10,280 --> 00:21:12,800 I didn't know what to expect. So I sent it in. 409 00:21:12,800 --> 00:21:16,080 And then the day before the test results came back, I had eaten 410 00:21:16,080 --> 00:21:19,160 like a bad burrito. So I was up all night and like 411 00:21:19,160 --> 00:21:21,720 super sick with awful food poisoning. 412 00:21:21,720 --> 00:21:24,240 It was like miserable. So my mom stayed over because I 413 00:21:24,240 --> 00:21:28,240 was dehydrated. I had all my kids at home. 414 00:21:28,240 --> 00:21:32,680 Like it was just a nightmare at 7:30 in the morning, I woke up 415 00:21:32,680 --> 00:21:35,120 and it was March 7th. I checked my e-mail and I see 416 00:21:35,120 --> 00:21:38,080 that my results from Ancestry came in and I was like, oh, so 417 00:21:38,080 --> 00:21:40,000 like she was there. And then I was like, oh, can I 418 00:21:40,000 --> 00:21:42,520 have some tea? So I sent her down to make me 419 00:21:42,520 --> 00:21:44,920 tea. And I go quickly look on my 420 00:21:44,920 --> 00:21:49,120 phone and I click on, I ignore all the warnings and I look and 421 00:21:49,120 --> 00:21:52,160 right away, like you can see like the pie chart or whatever, 422 00:21:52,320 --> 00:21:55,880 it came out to exactly 50% Ashkenazi Jewish, which is what 423 00:21:55,880 --> 00:21:58,720 I, I expected Ashkenazi Jewish, but not 50%. 424 00:21:59,280 --> 00:22:02,240 And then there were a whole bunch of different other things. 425 00:22:02,240 --> 00:22:04,920 The second largest ethnicity was like Nigeria. 426 00:22:05,480 --> 00:22:07,920 And then it was just like a whole list of African countries. 427 00:22:07,920 --> 00:22:10,760 And when I did the math, it came out to about 40% African 428 00:22:10,760 --> 00:22:14,000 countries and 10% European countries. 429 00:22:14,160 --> 00:22:16,840 I haven't taken science since college, but I knew enough to 430 00:22:16,840 --> 00:22:20,840 know that in order to have 40% African DNA, that means that 431 00:22:20,840 --> 00:22:25,960 like my one of my parents has to have 80% African DNA and neither 432 00:22:25,960 --> 00:22:28,000 one of my parents have 80% African DNA. 433 00:22:29,120 --> 00:22:31,000 And I knew nothing about ancestry at that point. 434 00:22:31,000 --> 00:22:34,560 But I did see that I could Click to see matches and there's a 435 00:22:34,560 --> 00:22:36,600 warning there. And I was like ignore all that 436 00:22:36,600 --> 00:22:39,600 crap. And I went and I clicked it and 437 00:22:39,600 --> 00:22:44,880 I saw that my highest match was my mother's sister. 438 00:22:45,000 --> 00:22:48,120 I did some Googling and it was pretty clear that she was 100% 439 00:22:48,120 --> 00:22:52,040 like my first aunt. And then my second highest match 440 00:22:52,720 --> 00:22:57,840 was, I still remember 632 Santa Morgans and he was an African 441 00:22:57,840 --> 00:23:01,680 American man from the Bronx. And I looked through my list and 442 00:23:01,680 --> 00:23:04,480 there are tons of African American people that are 443 00:23:04,480 --> 00:23:06,680 connected to me genetically. So I thought to myself, I'm 444 00:23:06,680 --> 00:23:09,800 like, well that's weird. My DNA must have mixed with 445 00:23:09,800 --> 00:23:11,960 somebody else's, you know, like, and I'm like, no. 446 00:23:12,000 --> 00:23:14,480 That is the next logical thing, right? 447 00:23:14,480 --> 00:23:16,840 I think. This is super confusing and I'm 448 00:23:16,840 --> 00:23:19,240 like cuz there's no way cuz neither one of my parents are 449 00:23:19,240 --> 00:23:23,200 African and it was too high for it clearly wasn't my mother. 450 00:23:23,200 --> 00:23:25,440 So that threw out like the theory like the Latin American 451 00:23:25,440 --> 00:23:27,880 theory like that made no sense. And then I'm thinking about I'm 452 00:23:27,880 --> 00:23:31,920 like wait so if I match with my mom's sister my that means my 453 00:23:31,920 --> 00:23:35,920 mom must also be 100% Ashkenazi Jewish. 454 00:23:36,560 --> 00:23:40,280 And then I was like Oh my God. So I immediately went on Amazon 455 00:23:40,280 --> 00:23:44,360 and ordered a 23andMe kid and I waited for that to come. 456 00:23:44,960 --> 00:23:47,560 And 23 Me is a little easier to read, I think, because they 457 00:23:47,560 --> 00:23:50,200 break it down by continent a little bit more clearly. 458 00:23:50,200 --> 00:23:53,320 And that came a couple of weeks later and it came out again to 459 00:23:53,320 --> 00:24:00,160 the same 4041% African DNA and 10% European DNA, similar kind 460 00:24:00,160 --> 00:24:03,080 of list of countries, slight differences, but basically the 461 00:24:03,080 --> 00:24:06,000 same. And I didn't really have many 462 00:24:06,000 --> 00:24:08,760 matches on 23 Me. I had a lot of matches on 463 00:24:08,760 --> 00:24:10,640 Ancestry. I was mad. 464 00:24:11,240 --> 00:24:13,800 But yeah, I was gonna say, like, what was your first reaction? 465 00:24:13,800 --> 00:24:14,800 It was anger. Oh my. 466 00:24:14,800 --> 00:24:18,800 God I was so mad like and I didn't say anything to my mom. 467 00:24:18,920 --> 00:24:21,600 I'm like cuz she'll kill herself or something cuz she's very 468 00:24:21,600 --> 00:24:25,600 emotionally volatile and she threatened me that she would if 469 00:24:25,600 --> 00:24:28,360 she took it if I took adna test like years ago. 470 00:24:28,440 --> 00:24:30,080 Wow. And like she's just like that. 471 00:24:30,080 --> 00:24:31,920 Like I didn't know if she was going to do it or not, but I 472 00:24:31,920 --> 00:24:33,480 didn't want responsibility for that. 473 00:24:34,400 --> 00:24:39,720 But I was so mad. So at the same time I was like, 474 00:24:39,720 --> 00:24:43,280 I can't tell anyone so this is awkward but I wanted to know 475 00:24:43,280 --> 00:24:45,320 what was happening and I was trying to come up with all these 476 00:24:45,320 --> 00:24:49,960 different theories. And I was like, well it's 477 00:24:49,960 --> 00:24:53,040 possible she was depressed after she lost her baby and had an 478 00:24:53,040 --> 00:24:55,200 affair. It didn't sound like her, but 479 00:24:55,600 --> 00:25:00,800 maybe because again, my DNA matches were in the Bronx and at 480 00:25:00,800 --> 00:25:03,080 the time my parents lived in New York City. 481 00:25:03,240 --> 00:25:05,720 So I'm like, that's possible. They didn't live in the Bronx at 482 00:25:05,720 --> 00:25:07,960 the time, although my mom did live in the Bronx at one point. 483 00:25:07,960 --> 00:25:09,840 They did not live in the Bronx at that point, but you never 484 00:25:09,840 --> 00:25:11,640 know. Maybe they were in Manhattan 485 00:25:11,640 --> 00:25:14,200 because she worked in Manhattan and maybe like something 486 00:25:14,200 --> 00:25:17,440 happened. Maybe she was sexually 487 00:25:17,440 --> 00:25:19,240 assaulted. That's possible. 488 00:25:20,160 --> 00:25:22,120 I didn't have any sibling matches. 489 00:25:22,400 --> 00:25:26,680 Donor conception didn't really occur to me because I was like, 490 00:25:27,200 --> 00:25:30,440 why would they give an African American sperm donor to like a 491 00:25:30,640 --> 00:25:33,520 white couple? Right, usually they try to match 492 00:25:33,520 --> 00:25:37,480 the ethnicity of the parents and and you didn't have fifty 493 00:25:37,480 --> 00:25:38,440 siblings, right. And that's. 494 00:25:38,600 --> 00:25:41,960 What I was expecting, which now I realize for someone who was 495 00:25:41,960 --> 00:25:46,520 born in the 1970s, it's not unusual necessarily because I 496 00:25:46,520 --> 00:25:50,880 was born before frozen sperm was really a thing. 497 00:25:51,320 --> 00:25:53,280 Like they were just experimenting with that at the 498 00:25:53,280 --> 00:25:54,880 time. But I didn't know that. 499 00:25:55,680 --> 00:25:59,760 So I was pretty mad. I didn't know what to do with 500 00:25:59,760 --> 00:26:01,760 the information. I'm like, I can't tell anyone. 501 00:26:01,960 --> 00:26:04,960 But I did end up telling my 16 year old, which is probably not 502 00:26:04,960 --> 00:26:07,560 the smartest, but we were driving around and like I was 503 00:26:07,560 --> 00:26:10,680 super upset and she could tell immediately that something was 504 00:26:10,680 --> 00:26:12,680 wrong. And like she kept trying to ask 505 00:26:12,680 --> 00:26:14,000 me. And then I finally just handed 506 00:26:14,000 --> 00:26:16,800 her and she like realized rode away like what was wrong. 507 00:26:16,800 --> 00:26:18,920 And I called my brother. We were trying to figure it out 508 00:26:18,920 --> 00:26:21,120 together. Like this is so weird. 509 00:26:21,120 --> 00:26:24,560 So I got him to agree to take ADNA test because in my head I'm 510 00:26:24,560 --> 00:26:26,600 like, well, maybe he's half African American too. 511 00:26:26,600 --> 00:26:30,040 Even though like there like it would have to be like a genetic 512 00:26:30,040 --> 00:26:32,240 miracle for him. I mean, I guess anything is 513 00:26:32,240 --> 00:26:34,760 possible. Sure, sure. 514 00:26:35,200 --> 00:26:37,840 Yeah. You never know the way DNA 515 00:26:37,840 --> 00:26:40,720 works. OK, so he takes his test. 516 00:26:41,160 --> 00:26:42,880 Yeah, and he got his results a while later. 517 00:26:42,880 --> 00:26:46,160 It took him a while to send it. But in the meantime, you know, I 518 00:26:46,160 --> 00:26:50,680 joined like the Facebook pages and then I ended up pretty 519 00:26:50,680 --> 00:26:53,800 quickly getting involved with the DNA Angel. 520 00:26:53,800 --> 00:26:56,200 It was like an obsession. But I don't know anything about, 521 00:26:56,200 --> 00:26:59,000 like, actual genetic research. And I'm really busy and like, I 522 00:26:59,000 --> 00:27:02,200 didn't have time to learn about it and I wanted quicker results 523 00:27:02,440 --> 00:27:06,160 then I could possibly muster in my time because I don't know 524 00:27:06,160 --> 00:27:08,200 what I was doing. Like, I've never been interested 525 00:27:08,200 --> 00:27:12,320 in geology ever, but I did a lot of homework on it. 526 00:27:12,320 --> 00:27:15,920 And then I within a couple of weeks, I connected with Adna 527 00:27:15,920 --> 00:27:20,720 Search Angel and you know, they did a lot of work and there was 528 00:27:20,720 --> 00:27:24,320 a dead end that they hit because, spoiler alert, it turns 529 00:27:24,320 --> 00:27:27,520 out that my biological father was also an MPA. 530 00:27:27,800 --> 00:27:31,040 Oh wow, there was. Just some triangulation. 531 00:27:31,040 --> 00:27:35,720 So we knew last names because we figured out pretty quickly, like 532 00:27:35,880 --> 00:27:38,120 just based on the number of Santa Morgans with my closest 533 00:27:38,120 --> 00:27:40,360 match, like we knew it was a close relative. 534 00:27:40,480 --> 00:27:43,360 So it turned out that ended up being 1/2 uncle. 535 00:27:43,960 --> 00:27:47,120 There was one person that we were able to narrow it down to 536 00:27:47,200 --> 00:27:51,040 because it was a family of I think six children. 537 00:27:51,040 --> 00:27:54,560 I think one died like way younger than would have been 538 00:27:54,560 --> 00:27:57,720 able to donate. Two were girls. 539 00:27:57,960 --> 00:28:01,400 This guy was not my father, There were three girls I don't 540 00:28:01,400 --> 00:28:05,320 remember, and then there was this one brother who was not a 541 00:28:05,320 --> 00:28:07,600 young medical student or anything like that. 542 00:28:07,600 --> 00:28:10,240 But at that point I didn't know about the donation part but I 543 00:28:10,240 --> 00:28:12,640 was trying to figure it out. But anyway, he was around the 544 00:28:12,640 --> 00:28:16,680 same age as my parents, born around 19491950. 545 00:28:16,680 --> 00:28:20,400 So it fit and then we're like, this is who it might be. 546 00:28:20,400 --> 00:28:24,440 Also, his age triangulated with the NPE piece because we were 547 00:28:24,440 --> 00:28:28,680 able to trace his paternal line and we found some documents that 548 00:28:28,680 --> 00:28:32,400 show that his mother was married to the closest male ancestor on 549 00:28:32,400 --> 00:28:35,080 that line. Somebody that I was connected to 550 00:28:35,080 --> 00:28:37,720 biologically happened to have been a genealogist in that 551 00:28:37,720 --> 00:28:39,560 family. So started working with the NP 552 00:28:39,560 --> 00:28:44,000 Search Angels to help me like as like a distant cousin. 553 00:28:44,000 --> 00:28:47,000 So putting it all together, we had a pretty good idea that this 554 00:28:47,000 --> 00:28:50,960 guy was the father because we had found records that his 555 00:28:50,960 --> 00:28:52,760 mother had very previously been married. 556 00:28:52,960 --> 00:28:57,400 She had had twins that had died in infancy and then she had had 557 00:28:57,400 --> 00:28:59,680 a son. And then there was no record of 558 00:28:59,680 --> 00:29:02,680 what happened to her first husband. 559 00:29:02,680 --> 00:29:05,040 But then there's a later record of her remarrying. 560 00:29:05,240 --> 00:29:07,440 And it all kind of lined up. He would, they were in the 561 00:29:07,440 --> 00:29:09,280 Bronx. It just kind of all lined up but 562 00:29:09,280 --> 00:29:11,640 we weren't sure but had a pretty good idea. 563 00:29:12,000 --> 00:29:15,800 OK, so for people who maybe aren't as familiar with the 564 00:29:15,800 --> 00:29:19,160 genealogical piece and all the mapping, the half uncle that you 565 00:29:19,160 --> 00:29:23,600 matched with, did he know that he had a brother out there who 566 00:29:23,600 --> 00:29:29,400 was your father or was he raised with your genetic parent? 567 00:29:29,400 --> 00:29:31,320 I, I guess I should say, have you referred to her? 568 00:29:32,080 --> 00:29:33,160 Your genetic parent? Yeah. 569 00:29:33,200 --> 00:29:35,520 So your half uncle knew your genetic parent. 570 00:29:35,760 --> 00:29:38,120 He. Did he did not, you know? 571 00:29:38,120 --> 00:29:41,040 So then I kind of reached out to him on Ancestry. 572 00:29:41,040 --> 00:29:44,040 So I kind of was poking around and then I kind of asked some 573 00:29:44,040 --> 00:29:46,480 questions. And then he was like, hold on. 574 00:29:46,760 --> 00:29:50,200 And I think he went to talk to his sisters because I don't know 575 00:29:50,200 --> 00:29:53,600 if he was aware that his older brother was from a prior 576 00:29:53,600 --> 00:29:54,840 marriage. OK. 577 00:29:54,840 --> 00:29:59,880 So your genetic parent was the third born child to his. 578 00:29:59,960 --> 00:30:04,160 Marriage of the 1st. Marriage and then the older two 579 00:30:04,160 --> 00:30:07,520 died, he was born and then she remarried. 580 00:30:07,880 --> 00:30:11,560 And then the person that she remarried raised the genetic 581 00:30:11,560 --> 00:30:14,560 parent as their own Childs. OK right. 582 00:30:14,680 --> 00:30:17,320 And then everyone else was younger than him, so they 583 00:30:17,360 --> 00:30:20,000 wouldn't have known necessarily. Exactly. 584 00:30:20,000 --> 00:30:23,760 And this was like late 40s, early 50s, and, you know, people 585 00:30:23,760 --> 00:30:25,800 were kind of cagey about all this stuff. 586 00:30:25,800 --> 00:30:29,120 So I don't know what was known and what wasn't known doesn't 587 00:30:29,120 --> 00:30:31,760 seem like it was something that was widely talked about. 588 00:30:32,440 --> 00:30:36,600 So, you know, I found all of this out, but I still had no 589 00:30:36,600 --> 00:30:40,800 understanding of how it all came to be at the same time. 590 00:30:40,800 --> 00:30:43,360 Like I was still researching all of the options. 591 00:30:43,960 --> 00:30:48,480 So I knew like just from research that he was not a 592 00:30:48,560 --> 00:30:50,680 doctor. Like he dropped out of high 593 00:30:50,680 --> 00:30:53,000 school. He had his first child at 15 594 00:30:53,000 --> 00:30:56,560 years old and his second child also as a teenager. 595 00:30:56,920 --> 00:31:00,240 I knew from doing research that I also have a genetic half 596 00:31:00,240 --> 00:31:04,840 sister that was born about a week before me, and she was in 597 00:31:04,840 --> 00:31:07,040 and out of prison and died in her 30s. 598 00:31:08,240 --> 00:31:11,920 So I knew just from all of the research that the family 599 00:31:11,920 --> 00:31:15,680 definitely was, you know, I think more troubled from like 600 00:31:15,680 --> 00:31:18,640 just family research and all that, which didn't fit the 601 00:31:18,640 --> 00:31:22,280 perception that I had of who a donor would be. 602 00:31:22,440 --> 00:31:24,960 Because there was another branch of the family that we had zeroed 603 00:31:24,960 --> 00:31:31,200 in on initially on his biological father's family that 604 00:31:31,200 --> 00:31:34,920 had been more educated. And I thought maybe that was the 605 00:31:34,920 --> 00:31:37,040 side of the family that the relationship would come from. 606 00:31:37,040 --> 00:31:39,400 And the DNA search engine was like, no, it's not pointing that 607 00:31:39,400 --> 00:31:41,560 way. But in my head I'm like, but it 608 00:31:41,560 --> 00:31:44,960 makes more sense if it was the other family because like they 609 00:31:44,960 --> 00:31:48,120 were journalists and they were like professors and they were 610 00:31:48,120 --> 00:31:50,200 really educated. And that seemed to fit more with 611 00:31:50,400 --> 00:31:52,160 the type. Like at the time, like I was 612 00:31:52,160 --> 00:31:54,800 still going on, like I was going on different theories. 613 00:31:54,800 --> 00:31:57,720 I'm like, that's still kind of fit with like the, my mom like 614 00:31:57,720 --> 00:31:59,480 freaked out and had an affair theory. 615 00:31:59,560 --> 00:32:02,400 And also they were from Staten Island and my parents were from 616 00:32:02,400 --> 00:32:05,400 Staten Island. Yeah, because at this point you 617 00:32:05,400 --> 00:32:07,920 still did not know the origin story. 618 00:32:07,920 --> 00:32:10,400 You did not know. So you you were able to identify 619 00:32:10,400 --> 00:32:12,160 that as this person. But it makes sense. 620 00:32:12,160 --> 00:32:14,800 You're thinking, okay, what's the kind of person that my mom 621 00:32:14,800 --> 00:32:18,040 might have seen socially in some way? 622 00:32:18,400 --> 00:32:20,760 Right and they were from the same place and my grandparents 623 00:32:20,760 --> 00:32:23,240 lived in Staten Island. In my head, I had this whole 624 00:32:23,240 --> 00:32:24,720 story. I was like, well, my parents 625 00:32:24,720 --> 00:32:27,320 baby died. I knew that my mom and my dad 626 00:32:27,320 --> 00:32:29,800 had a hard time when the baby died and my parents were 627 00:32:29,800 --> 00:32:32,000 resentful. And I know that my mother stayed 628 00:32:32,000 --> 00:32:33,640 with my grandparents for a while. 629 00:32:33,800 --> 00:32:35,560 So I was like, well, these people are from Staten Island. 630 00:32:35,560 --> 00:32:38,680 Like maybe it all makes sense, but that was not what happened 631 00:32:39,080 --> 00:32:41,600 like at all. So finally my mom knew like she 632 00:32:41,600 --> 00:32:44,880 could sense that was hustle. And so she finally said 633 00:32:44,880 --> 00:32:47,680 something to me and I just like kind of was like, well, why am I 634 00:32:47,680 --> 00:32:49,040 black? Like what happened? 635 00:32:49,040 --> 00:32:52,440 Like I just kind of like finally head on like after all those 636 00:32:52,440 --> 00:32:54,000 months. And I think she was just trying 637 00:32:54,000 --> 00:32:56,880 to figure out like why I was so hostile to her for like months. 638 00:32:57,160 --> 00:33:00,120 I finally asked and then she said we have to talk. 639 00:33:00,120 --> 00:33:04,120 And then she took me to her house and they both told me that 640 00:33:04,120 --> 00:33:08,200 they couldn't conceive. And they used a donor. 641 00:33:08,240 --> 00:33:11,360 And their first baby died. And they thought like, maybe it 642 00:33:11,360 --> 00:33:13,480 was because of a donor. They didn't know. 643 00:33:14,000 --> 00:33:16,480 And then so they went like, they saved their money and they used 644 00:33:16,480 --> 00:33:18,440 a donor again a couple of months later. 645 00:33:18,440 --> 00:33:22,080 And my dad said that they mixed the sperm together because he 646 00:33:22,080 --> 00:33:24,880 was told that that would help, like, increase the motility of 647 00:33:24,880 --> 00:33:27,440 his sperm. And it was a medical student and 648 00:33:27,440 --> 00:33:29,640 all of that stuff. It was a doctor, and they were 649 00:33:29,640 --> 00:33:33,120 supposed to look like him. And so my mom's theory was maybe 650 00:33:33,120 --> 00:33:36,320 they like kind of decided to give her a different donor 651 00:33:36,320 --> 00:33:39,680 because they hurt her accent. My dad used to teach in New York 652 00:33:39,680 --> 00:33:41,960 City public schools in like very diverse classrooms. 653 00:33:41,960 --> 00:33:44,200 So he noticed that I looked like the little mixed and black 654 00:33:44,200 --> 00:33:47,520 babies in his class pretty early, but they just never spoke 655 00:33:47,520 --> 00:33:50,200 about it again. Like they just. 656 00:33:50,200 --> 00:33:52,400 Never talked about. Using a donor. 657 00:33:53,000 --> 00:33:55,440 Nope, they never talked about it. 658 00:33:56,200 --> 00:33:58,680 They just kind of pretended it didn't happen. 659 00:33:58,680 --> 00:34:01,080 They used the donor again to have my brother and I was like 660 00:34:01,080 --> 00:34:04,400 hey you really need to talk to him cuz he at that point had 661 00:34:04,400 --> 00:34:07,000 mailed in his DNA test and hadn't gotten the results. 662 00:34:07,360 --> 00:34:10,560 So I told him you may wanna say something to him because if you 663 00:34:10,560 --> 00:34:15,000 don't, I will because he's about to find out. 664 00:34:16,239 --> 00:34:18,480 But yeah, they never talked about it because at the time, 665 00:34:18,639 --> 00:34:20,600 like, they didn't even use, like, the same doctors. 666 00:34:20,600 --> 00:34:23,560 So like their doctor didn't know, like when the baby died, 667 00:34:23,560 --> 00:34:25,840 like they didn't sue the doctor because there was medical 668 00:34:25,840 --> 00:34:29,000 malpractice because they were worried that they would find out 669 00:34:29,000 --> 00:34:33,800 that they used a donor. Oh wow, so there's some like, 670 00:34:33,800 --> 00:34:38,280 deep shame. Yeah, very deep shame for them. 671 00:34:38,639 --> 00:34:41,600 And like, they were devastated that I found out. 672 00:34:41,600 --> 00:34:45,440 My dad was more understanding because I think he kind of knew 673 00:34:45,440 --> 00:34:47,600 over the years there were just certain things that would 674 00:34:47,600 --> 00:34:49,520 happen. And like, he just knew that 675 00:34:49,520 --> 00:34:51,960 people were perceiving me in a certain way. 676 00:34:51,960 --> 00:34:57,280 And I think he understood that it was probably like not the 677 00:34:57,280 --> 00:34:59,040 right thing. But then on the other hand, they 678 00:34:59,040 --> 00:35:01,840 were both so afraid of people finding out. 679 00:35:01,840 --> 00:35:04,480 Like at this point, like they still don't want people to know. 680 00:35:04,480 --> 00:35:08,600 Like they think nobody knows. Like, they don't seem to 681 00:35:08,600 --> 00:35:14,920 understand that like, people can tell and they form their own 682 00:35:15,360 --> 00:35:20,040 conclusions about it. Oh wow, that's that's heavy that 683 00:35:20,040 --> 00:35:22,240 they just never spoke about. Never. 684 00:35:22,280 --> 00:35:24,480 My dad was really apologetic. He's like, I'm so sorry. 685 00:35:24,480 --> 00:35:27,280 Like I knew your mom was doing all those things to try to cover 686 00:35:27,280 --> 00:35:31,240 it up with the hair and the sun and the nose and all this stuff. 687 00:35:31,240 --> 00:35:33,480 And he's like, and I didn't intervene because I didn't want 688 00:35:33,480 --> 00:35:36,040 anyone to know. So it was like they were kind of 689 00:35:36,040 --> 00:35:40,360 stuck in a secret and they were both like separately engaging in 690 00:35:40,360 --> 00:35:45,440 their own cover up and like they just became so invested in this 691 00:35:45,440 --> 00:35:48,240 secret that they didn't, I don't think know how to get out of it. 692 00:35:48,280 --> 00:35:50,520 I still, I think carry a lot of resentment about it. 693 00:35:50,720 --> 00:35:53,720 I think especially because of my mom, because my mom took more 694 00:35:53,720 --> 00:35:56,960 physical attempts to hide it. Whereas my dad, he was like a 695 00:35:56,960 --> 00:35:59,160 dad. So he just like acted like he 696 00:35:59,160 --> 00:36:02,400 didn't know what was going on and like, that's just what he 697 00:36:02,400 --> 00:36:04,360 did. And he would also try to help 698 00:36:04,360 --> 00:36:06,400 me. Like, for example, at one point 699 00:36:06,480 --> 00:36:09,160 I was getting my house appraised to refinance the mortgage. 700 00:36:09,360 --> 00:36:12,960 And when they did the comps, like I was there for it, But 701 00:36:12,960 --> 00:36:17,160 when I got the report, my house came in like well under $100,000 702 00:36:17,160 --> 00:36:19,600 below what the estimate should have been. 703 00:36:19,880 --> 00:36:21,800 And then I looked at the addresses and I emailed them 704 00:36:21,800 --> 00:36:24,160 back and like, why didn't you pull actual houses in my 705 00:36:24,160 --> 00:36:25,920 neighborhood? Like they were pulling comps 706 00:36:25,920 --> 00:36:28,400 from like a totally different neighborhood. 707 00:36:29,480 --> 00:36:33,560 And I knew right away what had happened, like, And so I and my 708 00:36:33,560 --> 00:36:34,760 dad did too. He saw it. 709 00:36:34,760 --> 00:36:36,680 And he's like, next time I'll be there. 710 00:36:36,680 --> 00:36:38,280 And you just pretend you don't live here. 711 00:36:40,120 --> 00:36:42,080 Wow, so. He knew that they were 712 00:36:42,080 --> 00:36:44,760 perceiving me, whereas if I asked my mom, she'd tell me it 713 00:36:44,760 --> 00:36:47,840 was all in my head. So that's yeah. 714 00:36:47,840 --> 00:36:55,040 So this topic of race, I guess my first question is, do you 715 00:36:55,040 --> 00:37:02,120 feel like any of your mom's actions were at all tied to 716 00:37:03,120 --> 00:37:08,800 racism that she may have had in like not that she's overt, 717 00:37:08,960 --> 00:37:14,400 overtly racist or or was it more just about hiding the truth? 718 00:37:14,960 --> 00:37:17,240 I think it's a combination of both to be honest. 719 00:37:17,280 --> 00:37:22,320 I don't think if my parents adopted or if they knew they 720 00:37:22,320 --> 00:37:25,040 were going to have a biracial child, I don't think my dad 721 00:37:25,040 --> 00:37:28,480 would have minded. There is no way my mother, like 722 00:37:28,480 --> 00:37:30,640 my mom wouldn't have accepted me like she would. 723 00:37:30,680 --> 00:37:33,000 My brother told me like when this whole thing came up, when 724 00:37:33,000 --> 00:37:35,320 the DNA results came out, he was like you didn't notice? 725 00:37:35,560 --> 00:37:38,360 He's like everyone would always ask me why my sister was black. 726 00:37:39,440 --> 00:37:43,560 And also he told me something interesting too when he was I 727 00:37:43,560 --> 00:37:46,160 guess about college age. She'd asked him at one point if 728 00:37:46,160 --> 00:37:49,920 he'd ever date someone like me. And then you know, when I met my 729 00:37:50,360 --> 00:37:54,240 now ex-husband, like I didn't want my parents to meet him at 730 00:37:54,240 --> 00:37:57,640 1st and it was mainly because my mom was so into me getting 731 00:37:57,640 --> 00:37:59,000 married. Like I just didn't, I don't 732 00:37:59,000 --> 00:38:00,040 know. I just didn't want them to meet 733 00:38:00,040 --> 00:38:02,800 him initially. And my mom thought the reason 734 00:38:02,800 --> 00:38:04,760 was because she kept asking me. She's like just tell me is his 735 00:38:04,760 --> 00:38:06,880 mother black? They would barely have accepted 736 00:38:06,880 --> 00:38:09,320 me marrying someone that wasn't Jewish, let alone someone that 737 00:38:09,320 --> 00:38:12,280 was a different race that would never have been acceptable. 738 00:38:12,520 --> 00:38:17,960 So I always was aware that like I didn't match and I always 739 00:38:17,960 --> 00:38:22,760 wondered if they could really love me because I wasn't what 740 00:38:22,760 --> 00:38:25,320 they wanted. So I, I was always a pleaser 741 00:38:25,480 --> 00:38:28,320 growing up, like I always wanted to be the best. 742 00:38:28,320 --> 00:38:29,880 And I felt this intense pressure. 743 00:38:29,880 --> 00:38:32,760 And I think some of it like now it kind of makes sense because 744 00:38:32,760 --> 00:38:35,200 if for a couple of reasons, I think they invested a lot of 745 00:38:35,200 --> 00:38:38,040 money to have children, they were also promised like that 746 00:38:38,040 --> 00:38:40,640 they were getting like the offspring of medical students 747 00:38:40,640 --> 00:38:42,560 that were going to be destined for greatness. 748 00:38:43,120 --> 00:38:45,600 So I think there was that expectation tied up and 749 00:38:45,600 --> 00:38:49,880 everything. And also I felt like my main 750 00:38:49,880 --> 00:38:52,680 value in life was to please my parents. 751 00:38:52,680 --> 00:38:55,480 So like I got married to please my parents. 752 00:38:55,480 --> 00:38:58,640 Like I chose the career I did to please my parents. 753 00:38:58,640 --> 00:39:01,680 Like mostly my mom. I think my dad didn't care as 754 00:39:01,680 --> 00:39:02,800 much. Like he would have been, I 755 00:39:02,800 --> 00:39:05,320 think, happy with me regardless of what he did. 756 00:39:05,320 --> 00:39:07,400 But my mom was the dominant person in my house. 757 00:39:07,400 --> 00:39:12,200 My dad was just there, like he paid the bills and like he's a 758 00:39:12,200 --> 00:39:14,840 better grandpa than he was. He's a good dad now, but he 759 00:39:14,840 --> 00:39:17,040 wasn't like a great dad for young kids. 760 00:39:17,040 --> 00:39:20,360 Like he was just kind of there. I'm curious. 761 00:39:20,400 --> 00:39:27,640 This is a totally selfish question about how you have 762 00:39:27,640 --> 00:39:32,960 navigated the fact that you were perceived as something for so 763 00:39:32,960 --> 00:39:34,840 long. You just said your brother was 764 00:39:34,880 --> 00:39:37,400 even like hello your sister's luck. 765 00:39:37,400 --> 00:39:41,640 Like, why is that? People have assumed you talked 766 00:39:41,640 --> 00:39:43,800 about at work, people were disappointed that you weren't 767 00:39:43,800 --> 00:39:46,360 acknowledged as like the first black woman to receive a 768 00:39:46,360 --> 00:39:49,600 promotion and and you kind of had to walk that back. 769 00:39:49,600 --> 00:39:53,960 And how have you been able to like or have you been able to 770 00:39:53,960 --> 00:39:59,080 reconcile that you had this experience where you went out 771 00:39:59,080 --> 00:40:02,480 into the world and people treated you like a Black woman 772 00:40:02,480 --> 00:40:08,000 or mixed race Black woman and you never accepted that about 773 00:40:08,000 --> 00:40:11,960 yourself? I mean, I'm curious to hear your 774 00:40:11,960 --> 00:40:16,640 thoughts on this too, because I still feel like I have this 775 00:40:16,640 --> 00:40:20,040 knowledge, but I don't feel that necessarily that I have the 776 00:40:20,040 --> 00:40:22,680 right to. Like I haven't figured out how 777 00:40:22,680 --> 00:40:25,640 to slap myself because I kind of feel like I fit nowhere. 778 00:40:25,640 --> 00:40:28,280 Like even before all of this, I knew I wasn't a white woman. 779 00:40:29,000 --> 00:40:33,400 Like I knew that because it just never, I knew I wasn't perceived 780 00:40:33,400 --> 00:40:34,880 as one. So, you know, that's why I was 781 00:40:34,880 --> 00:40:37,600 always trying to figure out how to explain myself because I knew 782 00:40:37,600 --> 00:40:39,360 I wasn't being perceived as a white woman. 783 00:40:39,520 --> 00:40:41,360 So I've never seen myself that way. 784 00:40:41,640 --> 00:40:45,000 But now like, even just like filling out forms, I'll click 785 00:40:45,000 --> 00:40:47,720 two or more racist because I feel like that's accurate from a 786 00:40:47,720 --> 00:40:51,120 racial perspective. But you know, race and culture 787 00:40:51,120 --> 00:40:54,680 are two different things, right? So I didn't grow up in the black 788 00:40:54,680 --> 00:40:59,400 community. So I don't know, like what's 789 00:40:59,400 --> 00:41:00,840 right? And it's something I struggle 790 00:41:00,840 --> 00:41:03,920 with to this day. And I think part of that also is 791 00:41:03,920 --> 00:41:07,080 because like I still have to kind of be on the down low about 792 00:41:07,080 --> 00:41:11,200 it because my parents are still like completely ashamed. 793 00:41:11,520 --> 00:41:14,200 And they also don't feel like it's my story to tell. 794 00:41:14,440 --> 00:41:16,320 So it's just like, again, like it's weird scenario. 795 00:41:16,320 --> 00:41:21,280 And my mom still is very racially insensitive and she was 796 00:41:21,280 --> 00:41:23,400 furious when she found out that my kids knew. 797 00:41:23,400 --> 00:41:27,520 I'm like, well, they were being asked at school. 798 00:41:27,520 --> 00:41:30,560 Like when I told my youngest, I told her about a year and a half 799 00:41:30,560 --> 00:41:35,360 ago and like she I would say she looks more Hispanic than black. 800 00:41:35,680 --> 00:41:38,440 But like when I told her she's like, well that makes sense. 801 00:41:39,320 --> 00:41:40,920 Like. That was her immediate initial 802 00:41:40,920 --> 00:41:43,000 reaction. She's a teenager. 803 00:41:43,000 --> 00:41:46,720 She's 14, and she's, like, talk talks to boys and like, she 804 00:41:46,720 --> 00:41:50,160 often talks to black boys, which sets my mom off. 805 00:41:50,520 --> 00:41:53,800 And I've had to pull her aside many times. 806 00:41:53,800 --> 00:41:56,080 And she gets super mad, you know, when she gets called out 807 00:41:56,080 --> 00:41:59,560 on it. But like, she has a lot, I 808 00:41:59,560 --> 00:42:03,080 think, of internalized racism. And it's really tricky because 809 00:42:03,280 --> 00:42:06,560 even though I think she doesn't mean to, I think some of it has 810 00:42:06,560 --> 00:42:10,160 been directed at me. And I think also when she does 811 00:42:10,160 --> 00:42:14,200 that, it also reminds me that she would never accept me and 812 00:42:14,200 --> 00:42:15,920 that she wouldn't. She didn't get what she paid 813 00:42:15,920 --> 00:42:17,520 for. That's how I feel. 814 00:42:19,120 --> 00:42:23,160 And then adding to that too, is there were certain issues too, I 815 00:42:23,160 --> 00:42:26,000 think with the way I was conceived because I was 816 00:42:26,000 --> 00:42:28,920 conceived in late 70s with a fresh donation. 817 00:42:29,160 --> 00:42:33,600 I mentioned earlier that my biological parent father was, 818 00:42:33,680 --> 00:42:36,920 you know, not a Med student. He dropped out of high school, 819 00:42:36,920 --> 00:42:40,000 teenage father. I also found out later through 820 00:42:40,000 --> 00:42:44,200 DNA testing, I connected with two of his grandchildren via 821 00:42:44,200 --> 00:42:47,240 DNA, which really confirmed the biological connection. 822 00:42:47,240 --> 00:42:51,400 One of them it's like a 1200 centimorgan connection, which is 823 00:42:51,400 --> 00:42:54,080 really close. And another one, it's like in 824 00:42:54,080 --> 00:42:57,120 the like around 900 and 80 or something like that, like it's 825 00:42:57,120 --> 00:43:01,080 really high. So it's unequivocal that this is 826 00:43:01,080 --> 00:43:04,680 my biological father. So when that was proven, then I 827 00:43:04,680 --> 00:43:07,520 sent the, a person that I found on Facebook that I believe was 828 00:43:07,520 --> 00:43:10,360 my half to sister Adni test. And it seems that she gave it to 829 00:43:10,360 --> 00:43:12,160 her daughter. So that's how we found out. 830 00:43:12,840 --> 00:43:14,280 And then I asked her some questions. 831 00:43:14,280 --> 00:43:17,280 When the results came through, I'm like, it's confirmed And I 832 00:43:17,280 --> 00:43:20,920 found out. I knew he had died in 1997, but 833 00:43:20,920 --> 00:43:24,160 I didn't know why. I found out he was a drug user 834 00:43:24,200 --> 00:43:27,640 and he died of AIDS. And I think the AIDS epidemic, I 835 00:43:27,640 --> 00:43:30,040 was born a little bit before it, but my brother was born in the 836 00:43:30,040 --> 00:43:33,040 80s, early 80s. It was right at the beginning, 837 00:43:33,080 --> 00:43:35,000 before they were really testing sperm. 838 00:43:35,000 --> 00:43:38,120 People had contracted HIV through sperm donation in the 839 00:43:38,120 --> 00:43:40,160 early 1980s. And think about the fact that my 840 00:43:40,160 --> 00:43:44,280 mom was doing that and the clinic where she went, the 841 00:43:44,280 --> 00:43:46,880 doctor where she went, like they literally, I have no idea where 842 00:43:46,880 --> 00:43:49,000 they found him. Like no idea. 843 00:43:49,160 --> 00:43:51,840 And I also have connected with people whose parents use the 844 00:43:51,840 --> 00:43:53,960 same doctors. And there are some stories of 845 00:43:53,960 --> 00:43:56,760 him like pulling random boyfriends of people that work 846 00:43:56,760 --> 00:44:00,760 there. Like, I have no idea how like he 847 00:44:00,760 --> 00:44:05,160 ended up being in the donor base like or how they, I mean, it was 848 00:44:05,160 --> 00:44:08,280 almost like they pulled someone like off the sidewalk and was 849 00:44:08,280 --> 00:44:10,600 like, here, you want to make some money, like be a donor. 850 00:44:10,600 --> 00:44:12,400 We're in a bind and we need some sperm. 851 00:44:13,040 --> 00:44:14,680 Like, yeah, like, I can't understand. 852 00:44:14,680 --> 00:44:17,240 Like, cuz I was like, well, maybe there was like an African 853 00:44:17,240 --> 00:44:19,760 American family also trying to conceive at the same time, but 854 00:44:19,760 --> 00:44:21,960 then there I didn't connect with them, right? 855 00:44:21,960 --> 00:44:24,320 So there was nobody that I connected with genetically. 856 00:44:24,320 --> 00:44:26,960 And I feel like if there were another family that they were 857 00:44:26,960 --> 00:44:29,840 actually looking for an African American donor at that time, I 858 00:44:29,840 --> 00:44:32,080 would have connected with them. So I almost feel like my parents 859 00:44:32,080 --> 00:44:35,440 were coming in and they had like a sperm shortage and they just 860 00:44:35,440 --> 00:44:39,520 picked some random person from somewhere just so that they 861 00:44:39,520 --> 00:44:43,120 could inseminate my mom. And I don't know what they 862 00:44:43,120 --> 00:44:44,800 thought was gonna happen. Have you? 863 00:44:44,800 --> 00:44:46,480 Seen photos of him? Yes. 864 00:44:46,480 --> 00:44:49,200 I look a lot like him, especially before my house was 865 00:44:49,200 --> 00:44:53,120 fixed. I have half siblings, so I have 866 00:44:53,120 --> 00:44:59,080 1/2 sister and then there's AI think there's 1/2 brother and 867 00:44:59,080 --> 00:45:01,600 then I think there may be one or two other siblings. 868 00:45:01,600 --> 00:45:04,640 Like I said, one of them is exactly my age, like born in the 869 00:45:04,640 --> 00:45:08,040 same month, same year, but she struggled with addiction and 870 00:45:08,040 --> 00:45:09,800 prison and she died really young. 871 00:45:09,800 --> 00:45:13,440 So one of the people, the nephews that I connected with 872 00:45:13,440 --> 00:45:16,240 was actually her son. And then the other, like I said, 873 00:45:16,240 --> 00:45:19,840 was the daughter of my half sister who was born when he was 874 00:45:19,840 --> 00:45:21,400 like 15 or 16. Do you? 875 00:45:21,400 --> 00:45:23,640 Have any relationship with those people? 876 00:45:24,360 --> 00:45:26,240 Not really. I mean, I've messaged with them 877 00:45:26,240 --> 00:45:32,040 a few times, but like, I, you know, it's awkward. 878 00:45:32,040 --> 00:45:36,200 I think number one, I still feel like I'm supposed to be keeping 879 00:45:36,200 --> 00:45:39,840 it a secret. Number two, I was not supposed 880 00:45:39,840 --> 00:45:44,200 to be here, you know, and I think it's upsetting to them. 881 00:45:44,720 --> 00:45:47,000 Like, I don't think they're dying to meet me. 882 00:45:47,840 --> 00:45:50,640 And they live in New York. I do go to New York, but I've 883 00:45:50,640 --> 00:45:54,600 never really tried to connect with them when I'm in the city. 884 00:45:54,600 --> 00:45:56,960 Like when I'm in the city, I'm like either there for work or 885 00:45:56,960 --> 00:46:01,160 I'm with my kids or my family. And it's just like, I've haven't 886 00:46:01,160 --> 00:46:04,320 been in the headspace. And also, it sounds like, you 887 00:46:04,320 --> 00:46:06,360 know, we've had pretty different lives, you know? 888 00:46:07,120 --> 00:46:09,640 Yeah. It's hard to kind of go back and 889 00:46:09,760 --> 00:46:12,880 try to make sense of that especially I think probably the 890 00:46:12,880 --> 00:46:16,680 donor conceived part, right, because it's not even like if it 891 00:46:16,680 --> 00:46:19,160 had been the other family that you thought it might have been 892 00:46:19,760 --> 00:46:21,640 where maybe they have some more like it if. 893 00:46:21,640 --> 00:46:24,160 It was more similar right? But I also think knowing what I 894 00:46:24,160 --> 00:46:28,520 know now from what my half sister has told me, like he 895 00:46:28,520 --> 00:46:31,920 probably was just using the money for drug money or 896 00:46:31,920 --> 00:46:34,760 something like that, which also isn't a great feeling. 897 00:46:35,240 --> 00:46:38,080 Yeah, I mean. She said he was a good man, but 898 00:46:38,080 --> 00:46:41,640 he struggled. And like, I find it really 899 00:46:41,640 --> 00:46:45,520 upsetting to think about. There are all of these people. 900 00:46:45,520 --> 00:46:48,320 I'm genetically connected to you and they've had really hard 901 00:46:48,320 --> 00:46:50,880 lives. I was hoping that the family 902 00:46:50,880 --> 00:46:53,320 would be more like the other side of the family. 903 00:46:54,360 --> 00:46:58,640 Yeah, yeah. Have you wow, kind of keeping 904 00:46:58,640 --> 00:47:01,760 this on the down low as you said, come to find any 905 00:47:01,760 --> 00:47:04,920 connection with that black part of yourself? 906 00:47:06,880 --> 00:47:10,920 I mean, I think I've tried in different ways. 907 00:47:10,920 --> 00:47:14,400 It feels though, like sometimes I feel like I'm trying things on 908 00:47:14,400 --> 00:47:17,360 for size, which I don't know, feels respectful or not because 909 00:47:17,360 --> 00:47:21,120 I'm trying to figure it all out in the most respectful way that 910 00:47:21,120 --> 00:47:24,800 I can. So I do kind of think about like 911 00:47:24,800 --> 00:47:27,240 where I've come from, I'm always looking, you know, at the 912 00:47:27,240 --> 00:47:29,800 genetic updates. Like, I did a lot of poking 913 00:47:29,800 --> 00:47:33,320 around, try to figure out what I can about the ancestry on that 914 00:47:33,320 --> 00:47:36,040 side. About a couple of months ago, my 915 00:47:36,040 --> 00:47:38,680 brother and his family were visiting, so we went down to 916 00:47:38,680 --> 00:47:42,160 Mount Vernon, which is George Washington's estate, which isn't 917 00:47:42,160 --> 00:47:43,880 far from here. It's about half hour, 40 918 00:47:43,880 --> 00:47:46,240 minutes. I made sure to go to the slave 919 00:47:46,240 --> 00:47:48,720 cemetery and to pay my respects there. 920 00:47:48,720 --> 00:47:51,680 I mean, I always was interested in it, but I think it feels a 921 00:47:51,680 --> 00:47:55,400 little bit different because I also know that my biological 922 00:47:55,400 --> 00:47:57,920 family, like part of it were held as slaves in Virginia. 923 00:47:57,920 --> 00:48:02,720 And also, I think another thing that really resonated was when I 924 00:48:02,720 --> 00:48:05,760 was doing that research and kind of learning about my family, I 925 00:48:05,760 --> 00:48:10,680 found out that, so I'm biracial and then my kids are about 1/4 926 00:48:10,680 --> 00:48:12,800 African American, something along those lines. 927 00:48:12,800 --> 00:48:16,560 And around the time my oldest was applying to college, she 928 00:48:16,760 --> 00:48:18,880 loves theater. And we talk about the founding 929 00:48:18,880 --> 00:48:21,520 fathers. And like, Sally Hemings was 1/4 930 00:48:21,520 --> 00:48:24,120 black. And that particular fact really 931 00:48:24,120 --> 00:48:27,400 sat with her because one of my kids like looks totally white, 932 00:48:27,400 --> 00:48:30,360 but the other two look like there's some sort of mix going 933 00:48:30,360 --> 00:48:31,720 on. And then also for her in 934 00:48:31,720 --> 00:48:35,840 particular, like a lot of people assume that she's mixed. 935 00:48:35,840 --> 00:48:39,280 You know, I never thought I had real ties to American history or 936 00:48:39,280 --> 00:48:41,680 anything like that. And finding out that I have 937 00:48:41,680 --> 00:48:45,680 like, this deep tie to American history, not to Sally Hemings, I 938 00:48:45,680 --> 00:48:48,760 mean, just the fact that I have ancestors, right? 939 00:48:48,840 --> 00:48:52,400 Here in. Some ways since the 1600s, you 940 00:48:52,400 --> 00:48:54,440 know. Right, because they're very 941 00:48:54,440 --> 00:48:57,200 different from like the Ashkenazi Jewish history. 942 00:48:57,600 --> 00:48:59,000 Right. Or my mother that came through 943 00:48:59,000 --> 00:49:01,440 Kennedy Airport in 1960 something. 944 00:49:01,440 --> 00:49:05,360 And my dad that was born in Brooklyn, but his grandparents 945 00:49:05,360 --> 00:49:08,040 came from Russia around the turn of the century. 946 00:49:08,240 --> 00:49:11,280 It's just a very different history, you know, like that 947 00:49:11,280 --> 00:49:13,720 history, you know, like when we went to the Tenement Museum a 948 00:49:13,720 --> 00:49:16,600 couple of months ago in New York City, that's that history. 949 00:49:17,000 --> 00:49:18,120 And that's the history I grew up with. 950 00:49:18,120 --> 00:49:20,480 And almost everyone I grew up with had a history like that, 951 00:49:20,480 --> 00:49:22,600 whether they were Jewish or Italian. 952 00:49:22,800 --> 00:49:26,520 It was a very similar story of like they came in at that time. 953 00:49:26,520 --> 00:49:29,000 And then my mom is, again, a recent and more recent 954 00:49:29,000 --> 00:49:31,160 immigrant. But still, I never thought of 955 00:49:31,160 --> 00:49:34,200 myself as having these deep American ties. 956 00:49:34,440 --> 00:49:37,680 Like, I thought we were just like 20th century Americans, you 957 00:49:37,680 --> 00:49:38,560 know. Yeah. 958 00:49:38,560 --> 00:49:42,080 So in that level, I've really connected with that because 959 00:49:42,120 --> 00:49:47,160 looking at how my biological father's maternal family came 960 00:49:47,160 --> 00:49:51,200 from slaves in North Carolina and Virginia, his father's 961 00:49:51,200 --> 00:49:53,760 family actually came from Bahamas, from the Caribbean. 962 00:49:54,760 --> 00:49:57,720 And so they came to the United States more recently from the 963 00:49:57,720 --> 00:50:01,040 Caribbean, which is a bit of a different history as well. 964 00:50:01,120 --> 00:50:04,680 So there's all these pieces like, and I don't know them, but 965 00:50:05,120 --> 00:50:07,240 I do feel like a connection to that. 966 00:50:07,240 --> 00:50:11,280 And I think because they're just unexpected roots and I'm 967 00:50:11,280 --> 00:50:14,680 interested in them, but I don't know how to express them. 968 00:50:14,680 --> 00:50:17,480 And I don't know what feels right and what feels right to 969 00:50:17,480 --> 00:50:20,560 claim. Because wherever, whatever I do, 970 00:50:20,560 --> 00:50:23,360 I feel like an imposter. Like whether it's my Jewish 971 00:50:23,360 --> 00:50:25,880 side, because I know that I'm not 100% Jewish. 972 00:50:25,880 --> 00:50:28,480 Whether it's, you know, the Latin American side because I 973 00:50:28,480 --> 00:50:30,280 know. OK, so my mom is from Latin 974 00:50:30,280 --> 00:50:32,400 American. I grew up visiting her country, 975 00:50:32,400 --> 00:50:35,320 and I have cousins that still live in her country and they 976 00:50:35,320 --> 00:50:37,440 have children. So I have all this family and I 977 00:50:37,760 --> 00:50:40,600 do speak the language and I do eat the foods and all that 978 00:50:40,600 --> 00:50:42,760 cultural stuff, but it's still not exactly the same. 979 00:50:42,760 --> 00:50:46,040 It's a subset of culture. And then this African American 980 00:50:46,040 --> 00:50:47,240 piece that I didn't know anything about. 981 00:50:47,240 --> 00:50:49,480 And I don't know what I have rights to, especially since I 982 00:50:49,480 --> 00:50:53,560 wasn't created on purpose. You've said that a few times, 983 00:50:53,560 --> 00:50:55,040 like I'm not supposed to be here. 984 00:50:55,040 --> 00:50:59,840 I wasn't created on purpose. Why do you think that that comes 985 00:50:59,840 --> 00:51:00,840 up so strong? Because I. 986 00:51:00,880 --> 00:51:05,080 Wasn't because nobody would have chosen this, right? 987 00:51:05,120 --> 00:51:08,800 Like if somebody maybe had an affair or one night stand or 988 00:51:08,800 --> 00:51:11,720 something, even if you were inadvertent, there were 989 00:51:11,720 --> 00:51:15,520 decisions that were made that kind of makes sense, right? 990 00:51:15,920 --> 00:51:22,040 Or but like for this, there was nothing about my existence that 991 00:51:22,040 --> 00:51:23,840 anybody would have done on purpose. 992 00:51:24,200 --> 00:51:27,640 No doctor in his right mind would have accidentally created 993 00:51:27,640 --> 00:51:31,640 a biracial baby for white parents and my parents knowing 994 00:51:31,640 --> 00:51:36,000 who they are, especially my mom, she would have adopted like a 995 00:51:36,160 --> 00:51:39,800 Hispanic baby because she's from Latin America and like she but 996 00:51:39,800 --> 00:51:43,720 she would never have wanted a biracial baby. 997 00:51:46,160 --> 00:51:48,560 So it's just hard because my brother was exactly what they 998 00:51:48,560 --> 00:51:52,000 wanted. He came out 100% Ashkenazi 999 00:51:52,000 --> 00:51:57,240 Jewish, and I always felt he was the favorite. 1000 00:51:57,520 --> 00:51:59,560 He was kind of like the golden child. 1001 00:51:59,560 --> 00:52:01,400 And I always felt like I didn't measure up. 1002 00:52:01,520 --> 00:52:04,640 And I feel like this is kind of part of it because like, they 1003 00:52:04,640 --> 00:52:07,000 just wanted a baby. So they were happy to have a 1004 00:52:07,000 --> 00:52:09,240 baby, but I wasn't what they wanted. 1005 00:52:10,400 --> 00:52:14,040 Where have you landed with your parents today? 1006 00:52:14,400 --> 00:52:18,480 We don't talk about it at all. Not really, no. 1007 00:52:19,200 --> 00:52:20,680 Has your. Relationship changed. 1008 00:52:21,360 --> 00:52:25,000 Yes, especially with my mother. I still am very hurt, I think 1009 00:52:25,000 --> 00:52:28,480 because she hasn't learned as much as I would have hoped. 1010 00:52:28,640 --> 00:52:31,680 You know, she's not really racially sensitive. 1011 00:52:31,680 --> 00:52:36,480 She's still doesn't understand and it's all about her. 1012 00:52:38,240 --> 00:52:41,760 Whereas my dad, I think he apologized right away. 1013 00:52:42,440 --> 00:52:45,800 His apologies were genuine and I think in a way I think he would 1014 00:52:45,800 --> 00:52:48,600 have told me earlier even though my mom blames him for the whole 1015 00:52:48,600 --> 00:52:50,680 thing. I think he would have told me 1016 00:52:50,680 --> 00:52:55,400 earlier because I think he just knew and it was weighing on him. 1017 00:52:55,400 --> 00:52:57,920 But I think they were both in this lie together. 1018 00:52:57,920 --> 00:53:00,680 And there was a part of my dad too I think that thought that I 1019 00:53:00,680 --> 00:53:04,840 wouldn't love him if I knew that we weren't related, which isn't 1020 00:53:04,840 --> 00:53:07,360 the case. Like the reason I'm out of my 1021 00:53:07,360 --> 00:53:12,520 mom and we are related is because I felt that she 1022 00:53:12,520 --> 00:53:18,160 knowingly inflicted pain and cause insecurities and didn't 1023 00:53:18,160 --> 00:53:21,360 care. Have you reached a place of of 1024 00:53:21,360 --> 00:53:25,760 self acceptance with your racial identity and some of those 1025 00:53:25,760 --> 00:53:27,480 insecurities that you grew up with? 1026 00:53:28,560 --> 00:53:30,240 Yeah. I mean, I don't know if you had 1027 00:53:30,240 --> 00:53:35,240 this experience, but I think finding out I think in a way 1028 00:53:35,240 --> 00:53:38,600 like led to more self acceptance because it made sense. 1029 00:53:38,600 --> 00:53:42,040 I think making sense kind of makes you like yourself more. 1030 00:53:42,120 --> 00:53:46,080 Where is constantly trying to explain away things I think 1031 00:53:46,080 --> 00:53:49,400 makes you feel more insecure. I think it felt really good. 1032 00:53:49,400 --> 00:53:53,720 Like I stopped relaxing my hair. I stopped like wearing so much. 1033 00:53:53,720 --> 00:53:56,040 I mean I don't go out in the sun that much anyway now cuz I don't 1034 00:53:56,040 --> 00:53:59,600 wanna get wrinkled and like it's hot but it's not the same as 1035 00:53:59,600 --> 00:54:04,480 when you're 7 right? But like, I think I felt more 1036 00:54:04,480 --> 00:54:08,400 like I made sense because it's really hard. 1037 00:54:08,400 --> 00:54:10,640 It was weighing on me to not make sense. 1038 00:54:10,680 --> 00:54:12,560 What do? You say now when people ask you. 1039 00:54:13,120 --> 00:54:18,480 Mix cuz I think that probably more captures reality. 1040 00:54:18,680 --> 00:54:19,640 You don't say I'm mixed. You know? 1041 00:54:19,640 --> 00:54:22,480 My mom is from Latin America so I have both of those cultures. 1042 00:54:22,840 --> 00:54:25,360 But I think saying I'm black doesn't feel right because I 1043 00:54:25,360 --> 00:54:28,040 didn't grow up in black culture and I feel like black is not a 1044 00:54:28,040 --> 00:54:32,200 race, it's an ethnicity. So like, that doesn't fit right. 1045 00:54:32,400 --> 00:54:35,160 But I think mixed fits because it's accurate. 1046 00:54:35,160 --> 00:54:39,040 Like I'm racially a mixed person and that is why I'm perceived 1047 00:54:39,040 --> 00:54:43,080 the way that I am culturally. I'm a combination of someone who 1048 00:54:43,080 --> 00:54:46,160 is of Jewish, Latin American culture in American, obviously. 1049 00:54:46,200 --> 00:54:48,800 But I think that kind of is where I've landed because that 1050 00:54:48,800 --> 00:54:51,880 feels the most authentic. I mentioned I had googled like 1051 00:54:51,880 --> 00:54:54,080 African American or Jewish people that look African 1052 00:54:54,080 --> 00:54:56,440 American and I'd found like Lisa Bonet and I'd found Lenny 1053 00:54:56,440 --> 00:54:58,720 Kravitz. Well, I saw an article in the 1054 00:54:58,720 --> 00:55:01,120 New York Times a couple of years ago, it must have been about 8 1055 00:55:01,120 --> 00:55:04,440 or 9 years ago about Lacey Schwartz and she had this 1056 00:55:04,440 --> 00:55:07,480 documentary called Little White Lie that was on. 1057 00:55:07,480 --> 00:55:11,640 I saw it on Amazon and I read the article and I forgot all 1058 00:55:11,640 --> 00:55:14,960 about this, but I immediately wrote to her and I didn't know 1059 00:55:14,960 --> 00:55:16,920 any of the story. This was before the DNA test 1060 00:55:16,920 --> 00:55:18,280 anything. And I wrote to her and I'm like, 1061 00:55:18,280 --> 00:55:20,280 Oh my God, like I'm not black, but this so much. 1062 00:55:20,520 --> 00:55:23,320 Your story resonates. And I've always wondered, but it 1063 00:55:23,320 --> 00:55:26,480 just kind of goes to show like I've been really trying for a 1064 00:55:26,480 --> 00:55:31,320 very long time to understand the story. 1065 00:55:31,320 --> 00:55:33,040 And that story resonated with me. 1066 00:55:33,040 --> 00:55:36,280 And it must have been almost 10 years ago at this point, like. 1067 00:55:36,600 --> 00:55:38,840 Well. Before any of this and I still 1068 00:55:39,120 --> 00:55:42,440 like when I found out like you know when I told you I had the 1069 00:55:42,720 --> 00:55:44,480 you know I knew that my mom was hiding something. 1070 00:55:44,480 --> 00:55:48,280 I tried test like I had bought a test and it disappeared like all 1071 00:55:48,280 --> 00:55:50,480 of the stuff. But then when I found out, like 1072 00:55:50,520 --> 00:55:53,560 I felt like the dumbest person alive, like so dumb. 1073 00:55:54,280 --> 00:55:55,880 And like people tell you you're dumb too. 1074 00:55:55,880 --> 00:55:58,240 I don't know if they do it to you, but they they tell me like, 1075 00:55:58,440 --> 00:56:00,360 are you dumb? Like, how did you not know? 1076 00:56:00,360 --> 00:56:03,320 And I'm like, I'm, I just didn't like I knew and I didn't like, I 1077 00:56:03,320 --> 00:56:04,960 think that's probably the most accurate answer. 1078 00:56:04,960 --> 00:56:08,400 Like it's not that I didn't know, it's that I didn't know, 1079 00:56:08,800 --> 00:56:09,480 you know? Like I knew. 1080 00:56:10,320 --> 00:56:11,880 Yeah, it's just what you said though. 1081 00:56:11,880 --> 00:56:13,480 You believe what your parents tell you. 1082 00:56:13,480 --> 00:56:16,280 I mean, I feel like I probably didn't get as much of the are 1083 00:56:16,280 --> 00:56:19,120 you dumb? Because my dad is Mexican and 1084 00:56:19,120 --> 00:56:22,640 he's dark. Why would you say no? 1085 00:56:22,640 --> 00:56:25,560 I, I don't believe you. Why would you confront your mom 1086 00:56:25,560 --> 00:56:27,280 and be like, did you have an affair? 1087 00:56:27,320 --> 00:56:30,080 Like, I mean, that's a bold thing to do, especially as a 1088 00:56:30,080 --> 00:56:31,600 child. Right. 1089 00:56:31,600 --> 00:56:35,000 And your origin story is fundamental to who you are. 1090 00:56:35,120 --> 00:56:38,680 And like, also when you're Jewish, like your ethnic 1091 00:56:38,680 --> 00:56:41,880 identity is such a huge part of who you are. 1092 00:56:41,880 --> 00:56:46,320 And also there's a huge part of being Jewish that really focuses 1093 00:56:46,320 --> 00:56:50,520 on like this, the line, the matrilineal line and like all of 1094 00:56:50,520 --> 00:56:51,920 that. And like these like the 1095 00:56:51,920 --> 00:56:54,000 fundamental thing, like you meet someone and the first thing as 1096 00:56:54,000 --> 00:56:55,680 you Jewish, like it's the first thing that they ask. 1097 00:56:55,680 --> 00:56:59,680 So it's so fundamental. So for me to like even question 1098 00:56:59,680 --> 00:57:01,960 that. And also my mom was very 1099 00:57:01,960 --> 00:57:05,240 conservative and like to question her integrity. 1100 00:57:05,560 --> 00:57:10,240 Like I, it took me like over 40 years to develop the guts to 1101 00:57:10,240 --> 00:57:15,480 even like mail in Adna test because I was so scared, like I 1102 00:57:15,480 --> 00:57:17,680 didn't know what I was gonna find by the time my mails in and 1103 00:57:17,680 --> 00:57:19,440 I knew there was something going on. 1104 00:57:19,440 --> 00:57:21,680 But even then, like there was still so much denial going on. 1105 00:57:21,880 --> 00:57:24,920 I literally ordered a 23andMe right after I was in acceptance. 1106 00:57:24,920 --> 00:57:27,920 A little bit before the 23andMe results came, I called my 1107 00:57:27,920 --> 00:57:31,360 brother and he was like, well, that's got to be correct, you 1108 00:57:31,360 --> 00:57:33,200 know. And by the way, my parents 1109 00:57:33,200 --> 00:57:35,080 didn't tell him he was donor conceived. 1110 00:57:35,160 --> 00:57:37,920 I didn't. They never told him didn't they 1111 00:57:37,920 --> 00:57:39,840 never discussed and. How did he take Well I. 1112 00:57:39,840 --> 00:57:43,400 Think by then he was staying up to date with the saga and then 1113 00:57:43,400 --> 00:57:45,720 he was just like, well, I was like, it's possible because 1114 00:57:45,720 --> 00:57:47,960 you're short and you kind of resemble them. 1115 00:57:47,960 --> 00:57:51,680 I'm like, it's possible that the sperm mixing micro magic, 1116 00:57:51,680 --> 00:57:53,240 whatever they told my parents worked. 1117 00:57:53,240 --> 00:57:54,840 I don't know. And it did not. 1118 00:57:54,840 --> 00:57:56,640 I know he found like 1/2 sibling. 1119 00:57:56,640 --> 00:57:58,160 We haven't really talked about it. 1120 00:57:58,400 --> 00:58:00,480 I think it affected me more deeply than it did him. 1121 00:58:00,480 --> 00:58:02,960 I think personally he's a guy and I think for whatever reason, 1122 00:58:02,960 --> 00:58:04,640 I think men don't react the same way. 1123 00:58:04,920 --> 00:58:06,840 And secondly, I think he looked the part. 1124 00:58:07,360 --> 00:58:10,480 So I don't think he had like a lifetime of unanswered questions 1125 00:58:10,480 --> 00:58:12,000 in the way that I did. I'm. 1126 00:58:12,000 --> 00:58:15,560 Interested in your perspective here because we had similar 1127 00:58:15,560 --> 00:58:17,600 discoveries but in different ways, right? 1128 00:58:17,600 --> 00:58:21,920 Did you have do you have any grief about the fact that you 1129 00:58:21,920 --> 00:58:26,840 didn't know earlier and therefore aren't really able to 1130 00:58:26,840 --> 00:58:30,080 connect with that half of? Yourself 100%. 1131 00:58:30,200 --> 00:58:31,960 I think my experience and yours too. 1132 00:58:31,960 --> 00:58:36,040 In a lot of ways, it's similar to the transracial adoptee 1133 00:58:36,040 --> 00:58:41,040 experience, right? Because they grow up. 1134 00:58:41,200 --> 00:58:43,160 They're brought here from the United States, and they grew up. 1135 00:58:43,160 --> 00:58:46,280 And like, when I was a kid, people didn't really bother to 1136 00:58:46,320 --> 00:58:49,240 teach them their culture. And I've heard a lot of stories 1137 00:58:49,240 --> 00:58:51,920 where people would say, you know, like, they outwardly look 1138 00:58:51,920 --> 00:58:55,080 to be like Asian or whatever the race is, but they don't know 1139 00:58:55,080 --> 00:58:57,120 anything and have any connection to that culture. 1140 00:58:57,600 --> 00:58:59,960 Like it was just kind of cut off because the parents never 1141 00:58:59,960 --> 00:59:03,840 bothered to teach them about it. And there's a family in our 1142 00:59:03,840 --> 00:59:05,600 neighborhood. Some of the kids went to school 1143 00:59:05,600 --> 00:59:07,280 with my kids. And both of the kids were 1144 00:59:07,280 --> 00:59:11,760 adopted from Ethiopia by like white and white South Asian 1145 00:59:11,760 --> 00:59:15,280 parents, so not African parents. And the parents, like had the 1146 00:59:15,280 --> 00:59:17,400 kids go to these Ethiopian groups. 1147 00:59:17,400 --> 00:59:18,880 Like they fed them Ethiopian food. 1148 00:59:18,880 --> 00:59:21,840 And then they actually took the kids back to Ethiopia and 1149 00:59:21,840 --> 00:59:23,920 reconnected them with their biological family. 1150 00:59:24,080 --> 00:59:25,360 You know, I thought it was amazing. 1151 00:59:25,360 --> 00:59:27,200 But then also in a sense, it's like, wow. 1152 00:59:27,200 --> 00:59:30,400 Because they never, I mean, maybe they do in some level, but 1153 00:59:30,400 --> 00:59:33,720 on the other hand, they were raised to know who they were and 1154 00:59:33,720 --> 00:59:36,800 where they came from. And there wasn't this 1155 00:59:36,800 --> 00:59:42,720 expectation that their identity become subsumed by their parents 1156 00:59:42,720 --> 00:59:47,160 identity. Because when you're not the same 1157 00:59:47,240 --> 00:59:50,200 as your parents, like there's a whole half of your identity that 1158 00:59:50,200 --> 00:59:54,040 matters. And I feel that I lost the 1159 00:59:54,040 --> 00:59:58,320 ability to learn how to move and navigate in the African American 1160 00:59:58,320 --> 01:00:03,160 community in an authentic way. Because in a lot of ways, I was 1161 01:00:03,160 --> 01:00:06,280 just taught to navigate in a very different world. 1162 01:00:06,600 --> 01:00:09,560 And then there were times when, like, there was a mismatch, like 1163 01:00:09,560 --> 01:00:12,960 when it was really obvious that I wasn't being perceived, you 1164 01:00:12,960 --> 01:00:16,640 know, as a white person, when I'd have to try to figure it out 1165 01:00:16,640 --> 01:00:19,360 by myself. And I wish I had the chance to, 1166 01:00:19,360 --> 01:00:22,360 like, get to know more, like, eat African American foods and 1167 01:00:22,520 --> 01:00:26,280 understand black culture better and grow up among black people. 1168 01:00:26,280 --> 01:00:30,320 Like I grew up in a 100% white neighborhood, there was 1169 01:00:30,320 --> 01:00:34,440 literally nobody like me and I wish I had that because it's not 1170 01:00:34,440 --> 01:00:37,280 my fault. No, it's not your fault at all. 1171 01:00:37,520 --> 01:00:40,520 But you are left to navigate it right you. 1172 01:00:40,520 --> 01:00:43,760 Are and which is tricky because I think there's certain things 1173 01:00:43,760 --> 01:00:47,440 that, you know, parents had conversations that people have 1174 01:00:47,440 --> 01:00:50,360 with their kids like that are unique and specific to a 1175 01:00:50,360 --> 01:00:51,960 culture. And there's just so there's a 1176 01:00:51,960 --> 01:00:54,560 certain vocabulary or language or I don't know what the right 1177 01:00:54,560 --> 01:00:58,080 word is, but like a way of navigating the world that's tied 1178 01:00:58,080 --> 01:00:59,960 to a culture. And they're just certain things 1179 01:00:59,960 --> 01:01:02,120 that you intrinsically understand when you grow up in a 1180 01:01:02,120 --> 01:01:05,440 culture and when you didn't, it's harder because people think 1181 01:01:05,440 --> 01:01:07,400 you should know that language, but you don't. 1182 01:01:08,320 --> 01:01:10,760 Yeah, yeah. Thank you for sharing that. 1183 01:01:10,840 --> 01:01:15,240 What advice do you have for parents who are hiding adna 1184 01:01:15,240 --> 01:01:17,880 surprise from their child? Stop. 1185 01:01:18,440 --> 01:01:23,680 Like don't do it because it's not your information, it's your 1186 01:01:23,680 --> 01:01:29,600 child's information and your own personal fears and insecurities 1187 01:01:29,720 --> 01:01:34,040 are not your child's issue. I think especially in the donor 1188 01:01:34,040 --> 01:01:36,480 conceived world, and I know this happens, I think in general, but 1189 01:01:36,480 --> 01:01:40,080 I think at the time I was created, I can only really speak 1190 01:01:40,080 --> 01:01:42,120 to that because that's what I've learned from my parents. 1191 01:01:42,120 --> 01:01:46,240 I think there was so much deep shame in it and this idea that 1192 01:01:48,120 --> 01:01:53,680 nurture matters more than nature or you can kind of design a baby 1193 01:01:53,680 --> 01:01:57,120 to your image, but that's not the way humans are. 1194 01:01:57,120 --> 01:02:01,920 And I didn't sign up for that. Like I didn't agree to be 1195 01:02:01,920 --> 01:02:05,840 created by a donor. And just the fact that one of my 1196 01:02:05,840 --> 01:02:09,360 biological parents is a donor doesn't mean that that genetic 1197 01:02:09,360 --> 01:02:12,240 and identity is any less important than the genetic 1198 01:02:12,240 --> 01:02:13,800 identity of the parent who raised me. 1199 01:02:14,000 --> 01:02:16,880 So I think parents should think about that, because even if you 1200 01:02:16,880 --> 01:02:21,360 don't value it, your child does. What advice do you have for 1201 01:02:21,360 --> 01:02:24,440 someone who just uncovered Adna Surprise? 1202 01:02:24,560 --> 01:02:28,760 Maybe one similar to your own? Still working through it but 1203 01:02:28,760 --> 01:02:33,240 it's been 4 years. I think maybe Grace, like your 1204 01:02:33,240 --> 01:02:37,240 parents messed up and I think it's reasonable to be mad and 1205 01:02:37,240 --> 01:02:40,200 it's reasonable to be angry. But I think what helped me move 1206 01:02:40,200 --> 01:02:43,720 forward in a lot of ways was trying to understand like what 1207 01:02:43,720 --> 01:02:48,680 my parents mindset was at that time and why they acted the way 1208 01:02:48,680 --> 01:02:50,840 they did. Even if I think there are a 1209 01:02:50,840 --> 01:02:53,440 million things they should have done differently and I would 1210 01:02:53,440 --> 01:02:55,800 never have done, I like to think I would never have done what 1211 01:02:55,800 --> 01:02:59,120 they did. They were also operating within 1212 01:02:59,120 --> 01:03:01,600 a certain culture. They were told by their doctors 1213 01:03:01,600 --> 01:03:03,440 that it was. They didn't need to tell anyone. 1214 01:03:03,800 --> 01:03:07,480 They believed certain things about secrecy. 1215 01:03:07,520 --> 01:03:10,200 And there was a time when people didn't tell their kids they were 1216 01:03:10,200 --> 01:03:13,040 adopted either. And that was considered OK. 1217 01:03:13,040 --> 01:03:15,680 And it's wrong. And we know that now. 1218 01:03:15,680 --> 01:03:18,720 And I think sometimes you have to be compassionate. 1219 01:03:18,720 --> 01:03:22,040 But at the same time, I think it's also fair to expect an 1220 01:03:22,040 --> 01:03:25,880 apology and to expect them to learn. 1221 01:03:25,880 --> 01:03:28,840 And if they don't figure out a way to navigate it. 1222 01:03:28,840 --> 01:03:32,400 Ultimately it's up to you. Like for me, I can't. 1223 01:03:32,400 --> 01:03:35,200 I'm not the type of person that could ever go no contact with my 1224 01:03:35,200 --> 01:03:37,960 mom, even though she hasn't done what I would have liked her to 1225 01:03:37,960 --> 01:03:39,800 do or responded the way I would have liked her to do. 1226 01:03:39,800 --> 01:03:42,840 I just know that's who she is. And even though she didn't 1227 01:03:43,280 --> 01:03:47,200 accept me in in the ways I would have hoped, I just decided, at 1228 01:03:47,200 --> 01:03:51,080 least for me, that I can have a relationship with her on my 1229 01:03:51,080 --> 01:03:56,280 terms because I value that and she knows I'm still hurt. 1230 01:03:56,840 --> 01:04:00,160 But that doesn't make it OK. Just don't feel that there's one 1231 01:04:00,160 --> 01:04:03,480 particular way to handle it or one particular response you have 1232 01:04:03,480 --> 01:04:05,840 to have. It's perfectly OK for your 1233 01:04:05,840 --> 01:04:09,840 parents to disappoint you and to also decide not to go no contact 1234 01:04:10,240 --> 01:04:14,640 if that's what works for you. But it's really individual how 1235 01:04:14,640 --> 01:04:18,400 you want to handle your parents. Lori, thank you so much for 1236 01:04:18,400 --> 01:04:21,480 coming on the podcast and sharing your story. 1237 01:04:21,760 --> 01:04:24,680 I know it resonated deeply for me, and I'm sure it's going to 1238 01:04:24,680 --> 01:04:26,840 resonate deeply for others who are listening. 1239 01:04:27,240 --> 01:04:31,880 And I just wish you the best as you kind of figure all of this 1240 01:04:31,880 --> 01:04:33,120 out. Thanks. 1241 01:04:33,200 --> 01:04:37,520 So much thanks for having me. Thanks again to Lori for sharing 1242 01:04:37,520 --> 01:04:40,840 her story, and thank you to all of the guests who trusted me 1243 01:04:40,840 --> 01:04:44,680 with your stories this season. If you have a DNA Surprise that 1244 01:04:44,680 --> 01:04:47,360 you'd like to share, please submit your story at 1245 01:04:47,360 --> 01:04:50,880 dnasurprises.com. If you'd like to support the 1246 01:04:50,880 --> 01:04:54,800 show, please rate and review the podcast on Apple and Spotify. 1247 01:04:55,120 --> 01:04:58,320 It really helps. You can also join me over on 1248 01:04:58,320 --> 01:05:01,520 Patreon for early ad free access to episodes. 1249 01:05:02,480 --> 01:05:05,680 We're taking a short break for the summer, but we'll be back 1250 01:05:05,680 --> 01:05:08,040 soon with new DNA Surprise stories. 1251 01:05:08,480 --> 01:05:10,960 Thank you for listening. Until next time. 1252 01:05:12,640 --> 01:05:17,480 This episode of DNA Surprises was hosted, produced and edited 1253 01:05:17,680 --> 01:05:22,000 by me, Alexis Oursalt. It was mixed and mastered by 1254 01:05:22,000 --> 01:05:25,240 Josh Oursalt of Siren Recording Studios.