Inspire to Read: Finding Sisters: How One Adoptee Used DNA Testing and Determination to Uncover Family Secrets and Find Her Birth Family by Rebecca Daniels

Review

I received an ARC copy from the touring host for an honest review.

Finding your roots can be a tricky subject, but for the author, Rebecca Daniels, it became a life mission of finding her roots amid so many anomalies. Anomalies that could have derailed her at any time. It was only her tenacity that helped her, and she can be very proud of her accomplishments.

The first person she encountered was Thomas, a relative living in Norway who helped her in her search. He took the time to teach her the ropes of Ancestral DNA and how to fine tune her search to be more successful. A search that took her from the US to Sweden and back to finally find a reliable trace, not only of her birth mother but her birth father as well. Long hours of correspondence with people who had no reason to trust her followed. But each time, when a different lifeline was thrown to her, she follows it just to learn more about her extended family. Some were happy to meet her, other skeptical and others simply didn't respond. But this never discouraged her, and she could truly find a place of contentment.

Her entire journey is neatly documented, giving others who have the same desire to follow through on their journey. Every detail blends well with her story, which gave me a genuine appreciation of her experiences.

Definitely a must read for people with the desire to find their own roots.

Excerpt from Chapter Four: In Person

When I pulled into the driveway of a small ranch house with a fenced yard on one side and open landscaping on the other, the garage door opened almost immediately, and an energetic woman a few years younger than I, wearing jeans, a loose colorful top, short curly hair, and a big smile came bustling out to greet me. April enveloped me in a warm hug as soon as I got out of the car, and it felt good to know this welcoming person was my half-sister. We had arranged to meet early, so we could talk and get used to each other a bit before Glenna woke up. As we entered the house through the double garage, April showed me all the boxes she had arranged to have carried up from the basement to folding tables in the empty bay, so I could go through their contents while I was visiting. We were hoping to find a little more about both my birth father and perhaps more about Glenna’s background as well, but she spent most of her time during the day caring for Glenna’s needs and rarely had the energy for sleuthing in the basement in the evenings, so the job of going through those boxes would be mine. April thought her grandmother, Flora, had kept journals, but she hadn’t had a chance to go through the memorabilia that had been in storage since coming to Glenna after Flora’s death. Seeing those boxes for the first time gave me a jolt of visceral excitement. Perhaps my story would be somewhere in their contents!

As it had been on the phone, the conversation was easy between us, and April and I continued to share more details about our lives over coffee in the living room of this cozy little house, with many family photos, gingham curtains, and charming country-style knick-knacks all around, including a porcelain shepherdess and some animal figurines. A friendly small white dog and a tri-color cat completed the picture of domestic coziness and tranquility. As we talked, April shared more details about Glenna’s medical situation. In addition to dementia, she suffered from Sundowner’s syndrome, which meant that she often got upset and agitated in the late afternoon for no obvious reason and was much more herself in the morning hours. April told me that Glenna was both excited and nervous about meeting me and that she was very glad I had discovered her after all these years. I confessed to feeling the same. After about an hour of comfortable conversation, it was time for April to get Glenna up for the day. This was it; the moment I had been waiting for. I had seen several photos and heard lots of anecdotes about my birth mother, but now I was going to find out who she was in person. Though my insides were still tense, I felt a strange calm come over me as I waited in the kitchen and family room area of the house. I could hear the murmur of April’s voice as she helped Glenna get up and dressed for the day, which seemed soothing for both of us. Soon, a frail elderly woman wearing a purple-flowered housedress and a shy smile pushed her walker into the room. She stopped when she saw me, and April, who was right behind her, introduced us. Glenna didn’t speak but kept on smiling and nodding as April reminded her who I was. With my heart pounding and an answering smile on my face, I moved closer and took her hand, telling her I was so very glad to meet her. She held on tight and just kept smiling; she was looking at me like she was trying to memorize every detail of my face. April told Glenna that she needed to get seated in her recliner, so we could all talk and get to know each other, and thus the reunion with my birth mother began.

I knew that mornings were Glenna’s best, most lucid times, but I didn’t want to push too hard for information, especially on that first day. So, I started by telling her a bit about my adoptive parents and what a good life I’d had with them and thanking her for giving me to such a good family. It felt like cliché after cliché coming out of my mouth, but Glenna seemed to appreciate knowing that her oldest child had been well cared for, so I didn’t worry about trying to find more original ways to describe my life to her. April had told me Glenna’s eating habits were erratic, so I was happy to discover that my presence didn’t affect her appetite, at least not on that first day. We shared a modest meal together, and I was happy to notice that Glenna was able to feed herself with no trouble. The stroke had not taken that ability away, even though it had claimed much of her memory.

When I returned to my hotel room in the evening to try to process the experience and to make notes about any and all information about my family background, this was how I wrote about our first day together:

What a day! I don’t feel particularly articulate at the moment, but there are a few words I can use to describe what happened today. It was sweet (we were all nervous but very accepting of each other right away), rather sad (I wish I’d found her before dementia did…but I did see flashes of what she must have been like when younger), and generally quite wonderful to start building relationships with new family members. I know these kinds of reunions can be tricky, but here’s hoping tomorrow and Friday go as well as today did.

And they did. What I wrote on the second evening revealed just how well they were going:

We had another remarkable day today. Though her dementia still presents us with some challenges, more of the story emerged today. Glenna seemed more at ease with me, and April and I continue to get more and more comfortable with each other. Things I’ve learned in the past couple of days from a combination of old journals and current conversations: 1) Glenna went to South Dakota State, where there were lots of WWII veterans in her classes, but my birth father was not among them. She met him at a local dance. She said he was a pilot, though she didn’t know what kind because she “never went up with him,” and that he ended up marrying a girl who looked just like her, about which she seemed quite proud. 2) She went to Bremerton, WA (where I was born) to live with her Aunt Rachel, and while she was there she took classes at the Bremerton Business College (whether before or after she had me and gave me up is not clear). And though there’s a clear family resemblance between me and April, it seems I resemble my deceased half-sister, Penny, most of all, right down to our looks, gestures, and even our interests. It’s all pretty amazing!

These conversations with Glenna exist in my memory in a kind of a jumble. Each of the three days I was in Omaha, we spent the mornings talking about our shared history and connections. They were rather disjointed conversations, with April trying to fill in some details she and Glenna had discussed in earlier years about the baby girl who had been given away. Each time April tried to bring up my birth father, Glenna would burst into tears, so we stopped talking about it. It wasn’t evident whether she was crying because she forgot his name, whether he wasn’t very nice to her, or for some other unknown reason. It’s possible he never even knew she was pregnant since she was sent immediately after that discovery to her aunt’s house in Washington State.

Finding Sisters: How One Adoptee Used DNA Testing and Determination to Uncover Family Secrets and Find Her Birth Family by Rebecca Daniels

Publisher: Sunbury Press (September 14, 2021)

Category: Non Fiction, Memoir, Genetic Genealogy, Adoption, Family Reunion, Extended Families Tour dates: January-February, 2022 ISBN: 978-1620065587 Available in Print and ebook, 125 pages

Description Finding Sisters by Rebecca Daniels

Where does she come from? Who are her genetic parents? Who is she? Does she even want to know? With almost no information of her genetic heritage, adoptee Rebecca Daniels follows limited clues and uses DNA testing, genealogical research, thoughtful letter writing, and a willingness to make awkward phone calls with strangers to finally find her birth parents. But along the way, she finds much more. Two half-sisters. A slew of cousins on both sides. A family waiting to be discovered. With the assistance of a distant cousin in Sweden and several other DNA angels on the internet, Daniels finally comes face to face with her birth mother just months before her passing. Join in on this author’s discovery of family and self in ‘Finding Sisters: How One Adoptee Used DNA Testing and Determination to Uncover Family Secrets and Find Her Birth Family.’

Praise Finding Sisters by Rebecca Daniels

“Finding Sisters is an excellent example of what it takes to solve a family mystery. Yet it’s also a captivating story of human relationships in the age of secrecy-revealing DNA databases. As Rebecca Daniels so skillfully illustrates, DNA tests are most effective when combined with conventional genealogical research, thoughtful letter writing, and a willingness to get on the phone for some awkward conversations with complete strangers. Like many of us, the author wasn’t even sure she wanted to attempt this search. Then—in making contact with newfound relatives—she experienced both acceptance and rejection. By sharing her thoughts and insights throughout this journey, Rebecca makes the story refreshingly honest and personal. Like no other DNA success story, Finding Sisters uses footnotes and family tree diagrams to show exactly how the search unfolds. This makes the book a clever hybrid of a memoir and a case study.”-Richard Hill, Author of "Finding Family: My Search for Roots and the Secrets in My DNA" “I would, hands down, recommend Finding Sisters to anyone who is contemplating going on this journey of discovery. Rebecca Daniels lays out quite beautifully what one can expect from a logistical standpoint, while acknowledging that the emotional ride might be different for everyone. I particularly liked at the end how she wrote about not having any huge “aha” releases. I find that to be true of therapy as well. There are breakthroughs and insights, and then we usually move slowly toward change. I think this book does great justice to the idea that it is the journey and not necessarily the destination. I think sometimes we think we are going to find the piece that makes everything else make sense, but that kind of shifting ground is reserved for the movies and near-death experiences. I think Finding Sisters reflects this reality well when it comes to change.”-Jay Sefton, Licensed Mental Health Counselor “In Finding Sisters, Rebecca Daniels becomes a detective taking the reader on an intriguing hero's journey to solve the mystery of her roots. The rollercoaster of complex emotions is evident as she navigates her way through today's popular DNA ancestry websites connecting surnames, diving down rabbit holes, hitting dead-ends and making break-through discoveries. Along the journey, Daniels receives significant virtual guidance from newly found distant relative Thomas, forming an enigmatic relationship that will prove both beautiful and haunting. The adopted person's journey is an important one to understand, and Daniels serves us well by bravely sharing her story.”-Brian Stanton, actor/writer of the film @ghostkingdom and solo play “BLANK,” both pieces about adoption, search and reunion “In Rebecca Daniels’ memoir Finding Sisters, she takes us on her personal journey for answers surrounding her adoption, birth family, and ancestral heritage and introduces us to genealogy research and the increasingly popular genealogy websites that make familial matches from DNA databases. Of all the encounters and relationships, she chronicles during her search, I found the most interesting and endearing to be the one formed with a genealogy expert she befriended online after entering into the intriguing world of DNA discovery. This book is not just ideal for those interested in genealogy research and ancestry websites, but also those wanting to uncover more of what makes them who they are. And isn’t that all of us to some degree?”-Maia Williamson, author of Where the Tree Frogs Took Me

About Rebecca Daniels

Rebecca Daniels (MFA, PhD) taught performance, writing, and speaking in liberal arts universities for over 25 years, including St. Lawrence University in Canton, NY, from 1992-2015. She was the founding producing director of Artists Repertory Theatre in Portland, OR, and directed with many professional Portland theatre companies in the 1980s. She is the author of the groundbreaking Women Stage Directors Speak: Exploring the Effects of Gender on Their Work (McFarland, 1996, 2000) and has been published in multiple professional theatre journals. After her retirement from teaching, she began her association with Sunbury Press with Keeping the Lights on for Ike: Daily Life of a Utilities Engineer at AFHQ in Europe During WWII; or, What to Say in Letters Home When You're Not Allowed to Write about the War (Sunbury Press, 2019), a book based on her father’s letters home from Europe during WWII. She had always known she was adopted, but it was only as retirement approached, and with a friend’s encouragement, that she began the search for her genetic heritage through DNA testing. Finding Sisters explores how DNA testing, combined with traditional genealogical research, helped her find her genetic parents, two half-sisters, and other relatives in spite of being given up for a closed adoption at birth. She is currently working on a new memoir about her late-in-life second marriage and sudden widowhood titled Adventures with the Bartender: Finding and Losing the Love of my Life in Six Short Years. Website: https://rebecca-daniels.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rebecca.daniels.9

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