Philadelphia, PA - I knew it was something missing, I’ve always known. Growing up with my stepdad, I wondered why our last name was different. I had no clue. I had grown so close to him and his side of the family that it never clicked in my head that I had a totally different family that I didn’t know.
When I was in the 9th grade, I finally started thinking more and more about why our names were different, and it finally clicked.
My dad was somewhere, but I didn’t know where, and maybe other siblings I had never met. I wondered how I could try to find them, but I had no clue. So I left it alone, and the thoughts faded away, and I was back to the state of mind I was in before.
About 2 years later, I found out my father's name and searched for it on different platforms. I found a Facebook page, but it didn’t have many posts, so I assumed it wasn’t active.
I saw a picture of him standing beside a girl who looked very similar to him and me. So I assumed it was my sister.
She had to be older than me because she was in graduation attire. I looked around to see if I can find her name or her account, no luck.
There was a picture of her and her mom, and she was tagged in it. I clicked on the profile and saw that it was active. I sent her a message stating that I think we may be related, but after about a week, there was no response.
Maybe she saw it and ignored it, I thought, so I tried again. I found a friend of her mother's and decided to send her a message.
She told my sister about the message I sent her, and it turns out that she didn’t ignore it; she just didn’t have Facebook messenger downloaded.
So my sister ( Alexia ) responded to the message and wanted to call. I was nervous at first but finally went through with it. We talked on the phone for about an hour that night, and I also talked to my grandma and aunts.
It turns out that my sister had planned on visiting the following weekend, so I told my mom about it, and I got the chance to meet her and some family members for the first time.
It was super exciting, knowing that I had a 3rd family out there and meeting them for the first time in my life.
So my father came along with my sister about a week ago and we all spent time with each other for about 5 days. It was a fun experience and definitely opened my eyes to myself more.
I have no regrets about how my life is; I love it exactly the way it is, every inch of it.
