At nearly 70 years old, Longmont resident Sharon Adams found her birth father by using a home DNA kit. The information came in time to save her life when an unexpected surgery loomed.
Adams was raised by her grandparents in Rochester, New York, because her mother struggled with mental illness. Neither her mother or her grandparents knew who her father was. While living in a loving home, Adams didn’t quite feel like she fit in with her Sicilian immigrant family as they all had dark features compared to her fair hair and skin.
As the years passed, Adams grew more concerned about possible family medical conditions that might contribute to illness in her older years and decided to take a DNA test from 23andMe, a service that helps individuals discover potential health risks through DNA testing.
“I’ve got a couple of health issues, as most people near 70, and I just wanted to see what was in my history,” Adams said.
The results of the 23andme test and a data search connected Adams with several distant cousins. Adams learned about a similar service on Ancestry.com and tried there, too.
The genealogy website states that customers can “combine what you learn from your DNA with over 100 million family trees and billions of records for more insight into your genealogy and origins.”
Little did Adams know her half-sister, Beth Mamo, a librarian at a local hospital in Rochester, had submitted her family’s DNA to the Ancestry.com database.
Mamo became interested in her family’s genealogy and tested her and her parents’ DNA, “not thinking anything would come of it,” she said.
Early one morning, Adams received notification that her information had been matched with a man the site believed to be her father, Joseph Mamo.
““I wasn’t looking to find a family or find my father … I will never forget the moment,” she said. “I just stared at the screen through the grog of waking up and the shock of the news … That’s what started the exciting journey to find this lively, lovely family that I had no idea existed.”
It was through the Ancestry.com website that Adams was connected to her half-sisters, Mamo and Kathy Reddy, and her father. She learned her father is 94 and is fighting cancer.
Coincidently, Adams was already scheduled to fly to Rochester in the days following the introduction to visit family from her mother’s side and asked to meet her newly discovered half-sisters to “learn more about their shared ancestry,” she said.
Mamo, too, was surprised early in the morning with an email from her newly discovered half-sister.
“I was shocked … It’s crazy because you hear these stories all the time but you never think it's going to be you,” Mamo said. Knowing without question that they wanted to meet Adams, Mamo and Reddy agreed to get together.
“I was overwhelmed with acceptance,” Adams said.
Adams learned the family has a long history of hereditary thrombophilia. “Thrombophilia is a condition in which there’s an imbalance in naturally occurring blood-clotting proteins, or clotting factors,” according to healthline.com.
The timing of receiving that information could not have been better.
Six weeks after visiting her sisters and father, Adams went in for her annual mammogram and learned she needed to have a double mastectomy. The news about the family’s blood disorder changed the medications prescribed to Adams, which helped her make a full recovery.
Learning about her family’s medical history “came into play immediately,” Adams said.
Getting to know her father and half-sisters has been a challenge since the pandemic has set in. They text, email, Zoom and call each other with regularity and Adams has plans to visit again this summer, “assuming that COVID calms down,” she said.
The experience, regardless of the constraints of the pandemic, has been positive for Adams. Not only have her half-sisters welcomed her in, but her extended family has as well by sending “surprises and gifts,” she said.
Mamo and Reddy had another sister, Peg Chittenden, who passed away suddenly at the age of 39.
“That was horrific for our family,” Mamo said. “Then to fast forward all these years and find out we actually have another sister was just unbelievable. … We immediately knew we wanted to meet her and get to know her. That was never a question. Our family and our extended family has always been very, very close. … Where Sharon was not expecting that (acceptance), that’s the norm (for our family).”
Half-sisters Kathy Reddy, Sharon Adams and Beth Mamo visit Rocky Mountain National Park just before the onset of the coronavirus pandemic. By Photo courtesy of Sharon Adams“Our father was always this emotional, enthusiastic, loving, demonstrative man and he sort of flatlined that way. … We have often said to Sharon, it is a little hard for us sometimes because we wish that she had met the dad that we knew before all the cancer and the cognitive decline happened. We know he would have embraced her and adored her and really made her feel special,” Mamo said.
Joseph Mamo’s illness and the pandemic has limited his interactions with Adams, however, the two have met, had a “nice long chat,” and talk on the phone occasionally, Adams said.
“There is definitely more to family than DNA. I’ve always said that because people make family with just people they love around them, but there is something to be said for DNA. That’s what struck me … this family really was my family and it was a surprise for me,” Adams said.
