I Found My Biological Mom, Did I Find My Dad, Too? | KARAMO

So please tell me what happened with the man that you thought was your biological father.

Oh, well, first of all, I found out when he came to my son's graduation. My son graduated in 2016 and he showed up at the house, drove 7.5 hours to the house. Wow. And the party was over, but I still invited him in. My husband came up to me and he said, "Um, I just took your bio dad to Walgreens and he bought a DNA test." And I said, "Oh, okay." So we took a DNA test and I found out that he wasn't the father.

Wow.

So then how did you initially find that man?

Um, through my birth mom.

Through your birth mom?

Yes, yes.

So your birth mom said this could be your father?

Yes, yes.

Got it.

Yes.

How long had you been building a relationship with him?

For 4 years.

4 years?

Yeah.

Wow, wow.

And during that time, why didn't you ever think to do a DNA test?

Well, he just openly accepted me. Got it. Right? And so the only reason why he decided to do a DNA and drive 7.5 hours is because his wife at the time and his children kept on telling him to get a DNA test.

Got it.

So he wholeheartedly just accepted me. Yeah. So we were building a family.

And especially if your mother had said something, you're like, okay, he accepts me, my mother said something, so why not just believe it?

Yeah.

What did your biological mother say about him being your dad?

She really thought he was my dad. She cried when I called her, 'cause I did call her and say he did come out not to be my dad. And she was crying and she said she didn't really mean to hurt me. She didn't wanna hurt me, but she really thought that he was my dad.

Tell me, what was it like growing up?

I actually grew up in a multiracial family. So I'm adopted. I'm one of 9 children adopted. And I grew up with white parents. My father has since passed about 5 years ago. But yeah, I grew up in a multiracial family. Racial family.

Oh, that's beautiful. Have you and your birth mom become close?

Yeah, yeah, I don't, we do talk regularly, you know. I actually called her before I came on the show just to show respect that I'm gonna go tell my story and my truth.

Yeah.

Right? So we do have a relationship since I've found her.

So tell me about Ben.

Okay, so because my supposed birth father father did not come out to be my father. I got, me and my daughter did ancestry.com together. And when we got our results, you know, the other closest person besides my daughter was a Benjamin Wade, who, where it said we were cousins.

Cousins, okay.

Yes, yes.

Okay, got it. And how did you find out that Ben could be your potential brother if it said cousin?

I had been, you know, messaging Ben on Ancestry. And he never really got back to me. He never got back to me. And we said we were gonna connect but never connected. But I check yearly. And so when I checked this past, just this past April, I noticed that the DNA changed. So instead of cousin, it said sibling nephew. So—

Oh.

Yes. So yeah, so I was like, oh. And so I got on Facebook and I, he happened to be on. I had already stalked him from before looking for him, right? And so I messaged him, messaged him on Facebook.

And what did your mother say when you asked if she knew Ben's father Bernard?

The first time she got real quiet and got off the phone real quick. And that's not naturally what she does. Usually you're just—

Listening, you're like, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. So the fact that she got quiet led you to believe there could be something more going on?

Yes, yes. I just didn't know. I just didn't know.

So why is this DNA test important to you?

Being adopted, again, as I shared before, out of 9 of us, we've all found some sort of our birth families. And for me, being adopted in the multiracial family with white parents is really close to my identity as a Black woman. And so knowing those pieces of me and my family history, now I have my birth mom's side, I would like to know my birth dad's side.

On that side. Well, I think it's time for Joy to meet her potential brother Ben for the first time. So everyone, please welcome Ben to the show.

Nice to meet you for the first time. I'm so excited.

It's amazing. Can't believe it.

Hello, everybody.

Hi, how are you?

Thank you for being here.

I'm good, man. So how's it meeting your potential sister for the first time?

It's a miracle, to be honest. I didn't think it would ever happen, you know?

So how did you first find out that you may have a sibling?

Well, to be honest, it was like a normal average day, and I went my whole life being an only child, and I didn't think I'd ever have any siblings.

Oh, wow.

And then I think my father maybe had a little bit too much to drink that day, possibly, and he just, oh, you might have a brother out there, just so you know. And I'm like, casually tell me that? Yeah, that's another twist to the situation, 'cause I thought I was looking for a brother. So I kinda went through Facebook and went online, tried to search and do what I could to possibly figure out if I could find the person. Didn't really get much, didn't have much to go on. All I had was that the mother's name could be, which ended up being really weird because that—

Oh, wow.

Right?

Is that your mother's name?

Yes.

Okay then, wow, okay.

Yeah, so that was the weirdest. That's all I could find was her on Facebook, but I couldn't really even find her or contact her. It was difficult, like a needle in a haystack, you know? And then one day my ex-wife just happened to like, as a present, be like, "Oh, well I'll get you the ancestry.com, maybe you can find something that way." And you know, I wasn't thinking anything of it. A lot of people do that, that you have a million cousins. That's why I didn't message you at first.

So no offense.

I'm the first cousin that said first.

Yes, yes. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to offend you by doing that. I just assumed I had like 38 cousins, so how could I keep up with you?

Yeah, you're like, "I'm not even gonna say nothing on this one." But then once it switched, And you saw that it switched, that it said you could be a potential nephew or brother.

Yes.

That's when you said to yourself, oh, I gotta communicate back.

Oh yeah, for sure. Right away. I was just blown away. I had to honestly just sit down and take it in for a little while. And then I had to contact her immediately. And it was perfect because she was so joyed too once we actually— it was hard to believe, you know what I mean? Yeah. It's very hard to believe things like that.

We have those initial first messages from you two. Can I see them?

Oh.

Okay, it says, do you remember a Joy messaging? Yes, I do. That's me. We may be cousins or half brothers. Half siblings. Did your father or uncle live in Illinois area around Chicago back in the day? Yes, exactly. Wait, I've been looking for a half brother for about 10 years. That was the main reason I did ancestry. You would be on my biological father's side. My birth mother is blank. I'd be a sister. This is wild. I had faith, but I thought it was going to be damn near impossible. Wow.

Yeah.

I'm getting chills underneath my suit because the fact that you were looking for a brother, so you were searching yourself. 'Cause you're the only child, you said?

Yes, yes.

So you wanted a sibling, you wanted somebody that you could connect with.

Yeah, I always felt as if they were out there. You know what I mean? You just have that feeling that something's not right.

Yeah.

And there's somebody out there. You're missing a piece of yourself. Yeah, you're missing, exactly, perfect.

Have you ever spoken to Bernard, your father, about all this?

Yes, I have. But it was like, what, 56 years ago, I believe. So that's a long time for some, and times were different back then. Things were, so it was hard to kind of get a good like response out of it. I kind of had to keep pushing it and kind of was like, leave it alone. Then I just texted her on my own, you know.

I had to check in too.

Any luck?

Yeah.

So you tried to connect them?

Yes.

You tried to and there was no luck?

No, it was difficult. And then it just, I don't know, it just never worked out for some reason.

So why is this DNA test important to you?

The main reason, it just shows that like anything is possible in life and if you just try hard and try to figure something out, any mystery can be solved.

Amen.

Yeah, you know.

Thank you.

Be persistent.

So I wanna say that your father Bernard was available for this DNA test, which was really important. So that way that we could actually test Bernard versus doing a sibling test. So you get an actual confirmation if Bernard is your father or not. How does that make you feel knowing that it's not a sibling test and it is actually, you get to see if he is your father?

It will be, oh, my stomach is turning a little bit right now. It will give me answers, right? One way or the other. I don't know, I just feel a little bit, a little bit overwhelmed with it all, right?

Yeah, understandable.

But I've been pretty persistent at I've been looking for a very, very long time. Yeah, so.

Well, Joy, are you ready to find out the truth?

Yes.

Well, come with me. Joy, in this envelope is the DNA truth that you've waited 56 years for. 56 years. A beautiful 56 years, by the way.

Oh, thank you.

You wanted to know, though you've had your adoptive parents, You said as your identity as a Black woman, you need to know this. You want to know where you come from. So in this envelope is your DNA truth. It's not my truth to open, it's yours.

Oh my goodness. Oh, well Ben, no matter what this says, we're connected.

I still love you.

Right? We're connected.

For sure, for sure.

We're—

We at least know our DNA is a match somewhere, right?

Yeah, it's okay.

And so we can build that. Whatever we decide what our relationship looks like, I know that my children have already accepted you. I mean, okay, here we go. Bernard is your biological father.

Nice to meet you. Can you believe it?

Can you believe it?

From the first text message?

Joy, how do you feel?

I love you, sis.

Joy, I have a question for you. How do you feel?

I feel awesome. You know, even if I haven't met him, you know, I think just talking with my new brother.

Well, actually Joy, would you like to meet your father Bernard? What? Bernard, he's here.

You wanna come on down? Come on down, Bernard.

That's so good. I got it for you finally.

It took a little time, but it's good. It's outta joy, sir.

Good to meet you.

Yeah, go to your daughter.

Oh my God. Oh my God. I mean, how are you?

Okay, good, good.

Oh my gosh, oh my gosh. My son looks like him.

He does?

Favors.

You guys look alike, for sure.

Yeah, for sure. Definitely found somebody that it looks like. Come sit down, sit down, sit down. Oh my goodness.

You got your answers.

Yes.

You got a sister.

Oh yeah, I got a sister now for sure, 100%.

100%.

Yes.

Bernard, what do you feel like in this moment?

It's strange. I don't know what to say. It's been a long time. It's been a long time. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

It's been a long time.

And when you don't know somebody, when you don't know, I mean, 56 years later, right? This woman pops up, right? And he didn't know, they didn't know I was adopted out. So there's a lot of mystery, right?

Yeah.

Well, what I love about this is that—

I knew about you was adopted and stuff like that, but it was different. You young, you didn't, you know.

Yeah, different times.

Different times, different times.

I do understand that.

Yeah, and stuff like that.

Well, I will tell you this, what I do see here is a willingness and an openness for there to be growth and connection. And that's what it takes to make any family full of love. And so congratulations on getting your answers. We're very happy for you all. Congratulations on meeting your father and getting your sister, all right?

Everyone at home, stay with us. We'll be right back.