Surprise!

In my search for my paternal siblings on social media, I noticed that the youngest brother--John--had his Facebook profile settings so that you could "follow" his posts without actually sending him a friend request.  I looked to see how many "followers" he had, and since there were almost 200, I felt it was safe to follow along as well.  He would never notice. And for about a year, he didn't.  He would post things, and occasionally I would "like" it, especially if it had to do with his dad (visiting his grave or posting old photos).  I never gave it much thought and felt I had the best of both worlds by being able to keep up with him without ever having to reveal any information.  Slightly "stalkerish" I suppose, but its not like I was camping outside his house with binoculars.

Then one day, I got a message request from him.  I stared at it in horror.  I opened the message and read "Hi Crista--not trying to be awkward but I've noticed you liking a lot of my posts and we aren't friends on FB, How do we know each other?"

In a panic, I texted my friend Sherri who had been so instrumental in my birthfamily search.  "WHAT DO I DO, WHAT DO I DOOOOOO???"  As we discussed it, she asked if I thought I'd be okay emotionally if he either didn't believe what I told him or didn't want anything to do with me.  I thought I would be, but there was really only one way to know for sure.  We agreed that if I could go into it with no expectations, that I should go ahead and tell him the truth. 

And I did.  Waiting for him to respond afterwards was pure torture.

Once again, I found myself shocked by how easily I was accepted.  Not just by him, but one by one, as they all learned about me, the remaining 5.  Within 2 weeks, I had received friend requests from all six siblings, spoken with 3 of them on the phone, and all but one in text or email.  One of my favorite parts of all of this was finding out John originally reached out to me because he thought I was "interested" in him....I like to tease him that he almost tried to ask his sister out on a date.

How amazing that even though my birthfather tried to keep me a secret (and most likely would not have been open to knowing me if he were still alive), life had other plans.  His children are kind, loving, and completely open to accepting me into their tribe. 

I think I was as surprised as they were.