You can read the earlier posts in this series here:

• Being Adopted, Introduction: The Primal Wound
• Being Adopted, Part I: An Incomplete Self
• Being Adopted, Part II: Finding the Missing Pieces

I was 27 when I first looked at a person who shared my DNA. On a gray day in late November, I opened the door of a diner and saw my then-12-year old niece, who gave a small smile and pointed to her mother standing at the counter. My sister.

It’s been nearly five months since I alluded to this post, and I’ve procrastinated on writing it. It’s a difficult one for me to write. This meeting happened almost eight years ago now, and I wish I had journaled about it at the time. My memories of my feelings have no doubt been affected by experiences in the intervening years and the soul-searching I’ve done since then. I’m also uncomfortable writing about other people, but I’ll do my best to recount things as honestly as I can.

I was flustered when I arrived at the diner. I had gotten stuck in traffic and was very late. I had no way of contacting my sister to let her know I was running behind, and I feared she may have left. Upon seeing her, I apologized profusely, but she was very gracious and excited to see me.

At first glance, my sister didn’t look much like me. She had dark, curly hair and skin that was darker than mine. Her race was ambiguous and her cheeks were covered in freckles. She was slim, with a huge grin that lit up her face and revealed a gap in her teeth. She was 35 then, but looked young for her age. I searched for similarities in our appearances and noted a few, but no one would have confused me with her. I think I was slightly disappointed by that, as a part of me had hoped that meeting my sister would be like looking in a mirror.

I thought her children looked more like me. Her daughter was blonde and her face shape and features struck me as reminiscent of my own. Her son, who was 14 and still boy-like, had brown hair and the same square jaw that I have.

When I’d envisioned meeting my biological family, I’d wondered if I would feel an instant magnetic connection to them. I’d thought perhaps it would feel as though the puzzle were complete, and I’d think, “These are my people!” I had consciously tried not to develop expectations or put pressure on these moments, but the anticipation had built anyway. When I saw them, though, I didn’t feel the kind of immediate bond I had thought I might feel.

Despite our shared DNA, the people sitting across from me were strangers. My sister and I did our best to fill each other in on the last 27 years, but how do you sum up a whole life and family history in a few minutes? She told me about our mother and brothers, about her upbringing, about aunts and other family members who wanted to meet me. She welcomed me with open arms as though I was clearly part of the family and had never really left. Later, other family members would treat me in the same way, and I appreciated that. It felt a little strange, though, almost as if I were a movie character with amnesia being told about her life that she can’t remember. For decades, this family, this whole other world, had proceeded without me. Was I really a part of it? I momentarily had a jarring feeling of being in two realities at once, like parallel universes.

My sister and I had lived drastically different lives. She and her kids had walked to the diner that day from the domestic violence shelter where they were staying. From the time the kids were babies, they’d been in and out of shelters and homes of families and friends, interspersed with periods of time living with both parents. They’d never had a stable home for an extended length of time. Their father was incarcerated when we met, and he and my sister were no longer romantically involved. He’d physically abused her. For a while, when she did not have custody of her kids, my sister had lived in the woods because she’d had nowhere else to go. She suffered from mental and physical disabilities that made it difficult for her to find and maintain employment. Having no transportation compounded the problem. She received disability benefits, but they were inadequate to cover her needs, and her kids’ father was not a reliable source of child support, particularly when he was in jail. Over the years, I would learn how my sister’s situation made her incredibly vulnerable. Her life had been much harder than mine, a life marked by constant struggle and virtually no peace.

After learning about my sister’s life, I felt a heavy survivor’s guilt. Why was I the one who was given a stable home and a loving family? Why did I deserve this life in which I’d never had to worry about having enough food to eat or a safe place to sleep? Of my biological mother’s four children, why was I the only one who was given a chance at a different life, when my siblings were raised in a dysfunctional home with limited resources?

I would later meet my brothers, and eventually my mother as well. My younger brothers fared better than our older sister. My birth mother married her now-husband a couple years after I was born and had two sons with him. They are still married today. My brothers’ father has had a steady income and, as far as I know, was able to provide for the family reliably when my brothers were growing up. My mother was a homemaker, and from what I can tell, they lived modestly, but they had more stability and their needs were met. The older of my two brothers has obtained a bachelor’s degree in accounting and secured solid employment. The last I heard from my younger brother, he, too, was supporting himself and making his way in the world. Neither of them has children. Like our sister and mother, they’ve both struggled with depression. Though we’ve kept in touch somewhat over the years, I haven’t talked to them in a while now. I’ve lost touch with my sister, too, over the past year or so. She used to call me frequently, but the last voicemail I left her went unanswered.

Even though I don’t have a close relationship with my biological siblings, I’m glad I met them. My family of origin and the circumstances of my entry into this world may not be the stuff of fantasies, but knowing about them has helped me to feel more grounded. I think I understand myself better than I did before I had this knowledge, although it’s taken me a long time to process. I can see the influence of genetic characteristics on myself, and I’ve noticed personality traits that I share with my siblings and other relatives. My connection to my biological family is unique. I don’t feel like part of their family in the way one would feel about the family in which they were raised, but I do feel a link to them. It’s a link that’s difficult to define, but I think it’s important, and it’s one I’m sure I’ll continue to explore for many years.

If you enjoyed this post, please share, and keep an eye out for future posts in this series.