It seems surreal to even say it. To see the words come out onto the page. As if it wasn’t ME. But it was me and my brain is still trying to grasp what happened last year and how it led me to where I am today.
In April of 2019, I finally decided to take a DNA Test through AncestryDNA. My main motivation at the time was to find out my heritage. I grew up knowing I was French (paternal & maternal) and Ukrainian (Maternal). But the thing was... I always thought there was MORE to that. I had a darker skin tone than the rest of the family and I was often mistaken for Indigenous or Hispanic growing up... AND... I never knew my birth father.
So, I would find out more about where I came from AND.. My secondary, SECRET wish was that somehow, someday... one of my relatives from that side would join and i would be able to find him and meet him once and for all.
Let me back up a bit. So, I can tell you the sordid details of my conception. Let me set the stage... it was 1980... my mom and bio dad did their thang. They decide to stop seeing each other and my mom heads to Winnipeg with a cousin of hers. 4 months later... she can’t understand why her pants dont fit and she is sick. She finds out about the bun in the oven that was ME!
By the time she gets back... Bio dad has moved and she is determined to raise me on her OWN. Shortly after I am born... my mom sends a pic of me with a friend of his and it had my name on the back of it. Tammi-Lynn Charuk.
Fast forward to 6 months old and my mom meets my daddy-o. They get married when I am 2 and he officially adopted me at 4. I was then on... Tammi Lynn Dagley.
These pictures were all I had for 38 years. No Leads, no ideas where he was and how i could possibly find him. His last name I found out.. was very common.
**BACK TO PRESENT DAY... JUNE 2019... THE DNA RESULTS ARE IN!!** ( it was my Maury moment!!)
I see the email and I am freaking out. I set myself up to open it and I have no idea what to expect. There are so many questions running through my head.
First screen... I see my lineage. This I find to be really anticlimactic because it basically told me that I was 81% French and 16% Ukrainian. Umm.... I knew that. No new information there.
So, I click to the next tab. SHARED DNA
AND I SEE THE NAME COTE...
AND WE SHARED A HIGH PERCENTAGE OF DNA.
So, I messaged him... "Hi. I was wondering if you knew a Gilles Cote. I believe he is my biological father and I would like to get in touch with him" ...... omg... that was the hardest message i had to ever make because i didnt know what i was going to get on the other end. Would he acknowledge me? Would he even care? I had no idea.
The next couple hours were so stressful as I waited for a response. A part of me worried that I may have opened a can of worms on his end that he didn’t want opened.
Finally, a message comes back and they acknowledged that Gilles was his brother and he said something about that he was looking for me and I had a sister.
So, I started looking on Facebook and I FOUND HIM.
We video chatted that night. We both were so happy to find one another. It was a beautiful thing. I found out that I have a younger sister named Tammy-Line (yes... he named her after me... his baby girl in the west he always called me) and i also got another Brother named Jonathan.
(I love the smiles we have. This was our first conversation)
Not to mention... i come to find out that Gilles is one of 13 brothers and sisters. So, its a huge family!
He came out to my city for my birthday last year to meet me as he lives out of Province. Let me tell you. It was one of the most amazing experiences I have ever had. We laughed... we cried... we
talked... we connected... we forgave and we made up for lost time.
Its been a year since then and as we continue to grow our relationships.. I reflect of my life up until last year... i never thought that void would ever be filled and it has been. The peace that I have reached is something I never thought possible. I feel like I fit in somewhere else. My mom, dad and brother love me dearly and I love them... but there have always been differences between us and I didn’t understand why.
NOW I SEE WHY. It was the other half of my DNA. The side I didn’t know. How him and I laugh the same way, crinkle our eyes the same way, how we both tan so easily and we are both short! Suddenly things made sense. Things that haven’t made sense in 38 years.
I am so so grateful. So, I want to tell anyone that is looking for a loved one. Don’t wait until its too late. Its better to KNOW instead of WONDERING. Even though you think you are saving yourself from pain and hurt. But what you don’t realize is that you also may be holding yourself back from so much healing and love.
I am so grateful for this journey.
I have created a GoFundMe to raise the funds to meet the rest of my family. If you are able to donate.. I would be ever so grateful.
https://www.gofundme.com/f/i-found-my-bio-dad-now-i-want-to-meet-my-family?utm_source=customer&utm_medium=copy_link&utm_campaign=p_cf+share-flow-1
Comments