Even more family...

So, moving forward. Would it have been better to have left the past where it belonged? Why put myself through the emotional wringer unnecessarily? I can’t honestly say that I’d like to relive the searching experience but I don’t regret it for one moment. I have discovered a fairly minor – but hereditary – health issue and satisfied myself about the maternal side of my medical history. Of course, the very best bit has to be the lovely relationship I have with James, and that my relationship with Mum and Dad hasn’t suffered in any way at all. In fact, Mum and Dad have totally accepted James as my brother and as one of the family; because they love me, they love him in a way because he’s a part of me. Before I started searching, I didn’t feel that my life was incomplete in any way, but now that the search is more or less over, I do feel a huge sense of relief and satisfaction that everything has fallen into place. Added to which, there were several more amazing coincidences to come …

The experiences of the last years provoked an interest in genealogy and on joining a website for family history, I was contacted by a lady who thought we had a name in common on our family trees. The name she quoted was that of my (birth) maternal grandmother, and she asked in what way I was related to this person. I contacted her and explained the adoption situation and she came back with a totally unexpected response - my grandmother was her great aunt, making her my third cousin. My original birth certificate gave my place of birth as a private dwelling and I’d so far been unable to make any connection with the occupants and my birth mother. I asked my cousin if she happened to recognise the names of the people living at that address when I was born and she did – they were her grandparents! She then emailed me a photograph of their house and it was lovely after 40 years to see a picture of my actual place of birth.