“I define myself by my questions, not my answers. My answers come and go but my questions remain.” -Elie Weisel
At 41, I found out that the man who raised me was not my biological father. While I had always had a sense of being different, this revelation thrust me into an emotional turmoil about my identity. I had never felt such a sense of betrayal. Throughout the past year and a half, I have been writing and journaling to help sort out my feelings. After reading about so many others going through this experience, I thought I would share my story with the hope that it would make others feel less alone. There is a tremendous amount of shame about this experience, despite intellectually knowing that I did nothing wrong. However, that isn’t why I am writing anonymously and using pseudonyms. My story is still being written – while I have been in touch with my biological father, I do not have a relationship with him, so I am going to use initials as in the place of full names.