December 14, 2022 • 13 mins
Like over a million of us in the UK, 38-year-old Clare had never met her father. She was told he was a British soldier stationed in Northern Ireland, during the troubles. She featured on series 2 of DNA Family Secrets, hoping to find out if this story her mother told her was true.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Today I am talking to the rather wonderful Clare who is one of our contributors on the second
series of DNA Family Secrets. So, for people who haven't seen the programme, why did you come to
DNA Family Secrets, what did you want to find out?I wanted to find out who my biological father is,
and just wanted to finally try and get some answers?
(00:22):
So, what did your mum tell you about your biological father?
So, my mum had always told me that it was a British soldier that she had met in Belfast,
back in 1982, and they had dated for a while. She told me what he looked like, she told me where she
thought he was from, and she gave me a name, but I tried to look myself for years and years
(00:43):
and didn't get anywhere, and sort of thought then maybe that wasn't the truth and gave up.
So, there was a little bit of doubt going on there?
Well, I didn't doubt it for a long time, but a few years ago I got some more information that it
might not be the truth and there could be somebody else, that was actually my biological father,
(01:05):
so there was a lot of doubt then and a lot of confusion. That's why I had to
try and get the answers that I needed.And presumably at this point your mum
had passed away, so it wasn't like you could go, mum I've heard this.
That's it, yeah, she died in 2012 and this new information came out, I think, in 2015.
(01:25):
So not too long after she had died but nobody else actually had met the guy that she told me
was my father, there was no one else to ask, and he started then to be to me a bit of a mythical
figure. I thought maybe she was telling me a story just to try and make me happy,
and yeah there was no one to ask, there was no one to go back to to check the facts that she told me.
(01:50):
So, what happens, somebody comes to you and says?Yeah, basically my sister was out with friends and
bumped into somebody she'd known years ago, that used to live along the road from us. And she'd
taken her aside and told her that she wanted to meet with me. Which my sister found strange
because I had no recollection of meeting most of them ever before. And that she had basically been
(02:17):
speaking with her family and they had all decided to talk about the fact that they thought I was
their sister. They believed that their father had had an affair with my mum, back in the early 80s
and that I was actually their sister. Which we did look alike, they had darker skin like myself, they
all had brown hair, brown eyes. So, it did seem very real. but again, I needed the facts. And the
(02:45):
man that they had said was my father had passed away, so I had no way of speaking to him either.
I still held on to the fact that what my mum told me could have been the truth,
because it was what my mum told me. She never ever mentioned this other family, never mentioned
the other man, and my mum could not keep a secret ever, so I sort of thought you know,
(03:09):
I think I was 30-31 when she died, she would have let something slip at some point but, you know,
it was never something that was mentioned.And the thing that kind of made you think,
oh maybe that is true, not only you've got these people saying this, but he was mixed race.
Yeah.And with your skin tone you started to wonder…
Yeah, whenever I was born, I looked so different to anybody else, I had so much black hair, darker
(03:33):
skin. Whereas my sister has blue eyes, and she had all this blonde curly hair when she was born,
and she looks just like my mum. I didn't like anybody in my family, kind of stuck out like
a sore thumb where I grew up in Belfast. Yet this other family looked so like me. In fact,
I do remember years and years ago people always saying that I look more like them than I did my
(03:56):
actual sister, just because of the skin tone and the hair colour and everything like that.
So, I suppose growing up you felt like you were that little bit different because your skin tone
is obviously different from the rest of them?So different, so different, it was never made
to make me feel like it was any sort of issue, I never worried about it but when
I moved to Leicester it was different, and I grew up in a place where everyone was from
(04:17):
different backgrounds and different ethnicities and things like that. So people started to ask
me where I was from, and was I mixed-raced and all of these things that I'd never even,
you know, I didn't know what it meant, and of course I was like no I'm just from Belfast,
you know, but everybody was convinced that I was from a mixed race relationship, but I was
just not aware of how to even deal with that at such a young age, it was so strange, you know,
(04:41):
but I was convinced I was myself, if I'm honest, because I was just so dark when I was younger.
And for me as a geneticist I'm very used to sort of saying to people, oh you see a real
range of pigmentation within families, but if you don't know that you would be wondering,
and particularly if you've got someone who comes and goes, actually we think you're related to us,
of course one of the first things you'd be starting to think of is, oh my goodness.
(05:03):
Yeah, I was like, oh my god, it all makes sense, this has to be the truth because it
can't just be a coincidence, they lived up the road, they're telling me this information and we
actually look like we should be related more than even my own family at home. So yeah, I
definitely thought that was going to be the truth.A lot of people, when they come on the programme,
they talk about it feels like part of them is missing.
(05:24):
Yeah, definitely, I didn't miss out on having a dad because I was so lucky that I had my stepdad.
So I didn't miss having that father figure, but I always knew that my actual father was out there
somewhere and I always had the questions of what does he look like, do we look alike, is this why
I look like I do, does he know about me, does he miss me, that was a big thing for me. I was quite
(05:48):
embarrassed to tell people that I didn't know who my biological father was, I just found it really
embarrassing. I know a lot of my husband's family never knew, a lot of friends never knew until the
programme came out, because I just thought, oh my gosh what are they going to think of me,
even though it's not my fault, it's nothing to do with me, I was not there at the time.
So was it nerve-wracking to kind of finally be chosen, I mean I know when you came to see me,
(06:14):
and we could kind of boil it down to two questions. So, one was you want to kind of
confirm the ancestry of your biological father and then ideally, hopefully find
out who your biological father was? So, it must be nerve-wracking when you come in and you say
well this is what I'm hoping to find out, but the really scary bit must be when you come back
and you know you're going to get some answers, and you don't know what those are going to be.
(06:37):
Oh my gosh, I was so nervous that day. I remember waiting outside the door before I had to walk in,
and I knew I was going to get some answers, but I had no idea which direction it was going to
be. Never ever thought I'd get as much information as I did. I thought maybe you'd identify sort of
my ethnicity and, you know, where I'm from and that alone would have given, me answers as to,
(07:00):
which one of these men was actually my dad.So it was fairly straightforward,
the bit about taking a DNA test and what we do is we look for where you're getting matches in
particular parts of the world, and yours was coming back as you know 100% British, Irish,
which completely fit with the whole idea that it wasn't this mixed race man who was
(07:26):
your biological father. So that was the first thing I was able to tell you, so how was that?
That was the biggest part because I remember when you started talking about where I'm from and
explaining the whole thing, I could feel myself starting to shake from the inside out, because
I knew that was going to give me an answer, and that was all I wanted, just that answer. And then
(07:47):
whenever you said Yorkshire, for me that was huge because my mum had always told me the soldier was
from Yorkshire. Now I did always doubt my mum in the fact that her geography was very poor,
but she was telling me this based on his accent, and that was your first words, Yorkshire. I'd
been waiting for, you know, you're from Northern Ireland and somewhere exotic, and it was Northern
(08:11):
Ireland and Yorkshire, and the minute you said that I just knew instantly that mum was right.
Yeah, we actually had a head start because your mum had given you a name and you had a few close
matches. And obviously what we're looking for in those matches is the surname Green,
and that's the sort of thing that we were finding. So we were able to narrow it down to a couple,
(08:36):
and that your biological father must be one of their sons, and we could see that one of them,
his name wasn't Jim on the birth certificate but we could see that one of them had a nickname Jim,
and that he had been in the Army, and so that all fit together. I mean I was able to
(08:56):
tell you this and that we found him, and your mum, everything that she told you was right.
I remember, and even watching it back, just sitting there with sort of a glaze over my eyes,
just thinking oh my goodness, she’s telling me everything that really I wanted to hear.
I couldn't have asked for more of a better outcome and I got so much more information
(09:20):
than I'd ever thought I was going to get. So not only was it, where he's from, but the name,
he had a different name, but he was always known as Jim, so mum had got that right, and yeah,
I just couldn't believe it. I couldn't have been happier, that was the main thing I wanted,
everything mum had ever told me about this man was completely right. And then Stacey told me that you
(09:42):
guys had all been in contact with Jim Green and that, you know, obviously he was alive and he was
talking to you guys and that she had a photograph of him and a letter, which by that point I was
shaking so much, I was thinking what is he going to say? I'd always thought if it was him, and if
I found him, he's not going to want any contact, but she gave me the photograph first and I almost
(10:08):
fell off my chair, because I could not believe how much we looked the same. We were so alike,
the colour of our skin, our hair, brown eyes, we just looked very similar. And then I could
see pieces of my son in it as well, which was really strange, just that you can actually
see a likeness between the three of us.And then I got the letter, which was just
(10:30):
so lovely, he was explaining that he'd had a lot of loss in his life and he had children
and things have been difficult for him, but he completely acknowledged both me and my mum,
which was amazing, and asked if I would get back in contact with him and see how things go.
I remember one of the things you said was that you wondered what it'd be like to hear his voice so,
(10:55):
Yes.When did that happen?
Oh, my goodness, very quickly after I wrote a letter with my phone number in it and it was a
Friday night and I was at home and Johnny was out, and my phone started ringing,
and then looked at it. And I just had this strange feeling, this is going to be him.
And I answered the phone, and he had the most Yorkshire accent you could have ever heard. And
(11:19):
it was just so strange talking to somebody that I've never spoken to before and thinking that is
actually my dad, this is the first conversation I've ever had with him. And I think that night
we were on the phone for about an hour and a half. Something that I never thought I was going
to get and within literally two weeks of the show ending for me, we were on the phone to each other.
So, what would you like to have happen next?I would love to meet him. I think it's got
(11:44):
this far I couldn't not meet him now, so that's the best outcome for me. He hasn't mentioned it
yet so I want to let him decide when he's ready to do that, but I would love for the children
to know about him at some point, because they don't at the minute, they're so young, as far
as they’re aware, you know, their grandparents died a long time before they were born. So it
(12:06):
would be a big thing for them to have a grandpa, but we need to work on a relationship a bit more
and meet before that could ever happen, but from what I gather he would be happy enough to be part
of their lives as well, you know, they're part of him too, so that's why I would love to happen. So
hopefully at some point we can go that far.I think that's the thing, people always
(12:27):
say in these situations, just take it slowly because it's how you build that relationship.
Although it's been a year now since we've been talking to each other, there was 39 years missed,
so there's a lot to learn about each other before we take the next step. I'm ready I think,
but it'll be just whenever he's ready.So, when you came to the programme you
(12:49):
had a couple of questions and we were able to provide the answers for those,
so does it make you feel whole, because a lot of people when they come, they say look I feel like
I've got something missing. Now you've had the questions answered has it filled that for you?
Definitely, for me it wasn't missing the father figure as such, but it was just missing something,
(13:13):
but I didn't know what it was and because I got so much more than I could have ever asked for,
and now I have a dad again, which is amazing. So yeah, I think I do feel whole, I feel happier,
I feel like my relationship with my mum is now, even though she's not here,
it's still as strong as it always was. I completely trust everything that she ever
(13:34):
told me and maybe that's the gap that was missing for so long, but it's definitely been filled.
Clare it's been such a pleasure catching up with you, thank you so much for talking to me.
Today I am talking to the rather wonderful Clare who is one of our contributors on the second
series of DNA Family Secrets. So, for people who haven't seen the programme, why did you come to
DNA Family Secrets, what did you want to find out?I wanted to find out who my biological father is,
and just wanted to finally try and get some answers?
(00:22):
So, what did your mum tell you about your biological father?
So, my mum had always told me that it was a British soldier that she had met in Belfast,
back in 1982, and they had dated for a while. She told me what he looked like, she told me where she
thought he was from, and she gave me a name, but I tried to look myself for years and years
(00:43):
and didn't get anywhere, and sort of thought then maybe that wasn't the truth and gave up.
So, there was a little bit of doubt going on there?
Well, I didn't doubt it for a long time, but a few years ago I got some more information that it
might not be the truth and there could be somebody else, that was actually my biological father,
(01:05):
so there was a lot of doubt then and a lot of confusion. That's why I had to
try and get the answers that I needed.And presumably at this point your mum
had passed away, so it wasn't like you could go, mum I've heard this.
That's it, yeah, she died in 2012 and this new information came out, I think, in 2015.
(01:25):
So not too long after she had died but nobody else actually had met the guy that she told me
was my father, there was no one else to ask, and he started then to be to me a bit of a mythical
figure. I thought maybe she was telling me a story just to try and make me happy,
and yeah there was no one to ask, there was no one to go back to to check the facts that she told me.
(01:50):
So, what happens, somebody comes to you and says?Yeah, basically my sister was out with friends and
bumped into somebody she'd known years ago, that used to live along the road from us. And she'd
taken her aside and told her that she wanted to meet with me. Which my sister found strange
because I had no recollection of meeting most of them ever before. And that she had basically been
(02:17):
speaking with her family and they had all decided to talk about the fact that they thought I was
their sister. They believed that their father had had an affair with my mum, back in the early 80s
and that I was actually their sister. Which we did look alike, they had darker skin like myself, they
all had brown hair, brown eyes. So, it did seem very real. but again, I needed the facts. And the
(02:45):
man that they had said was my father had passed away, so I had no way of speaking to him either.
I still held on to the fact that what my mum told me could have been the truth,
because it was what my mum told me. She never ever mentioned this other family, never mentioned
the other man, and my mum could not keep a secret ever, so I sort of thought you know,
(03:09):
I think I was 30-31 when she died, she would have let something slip at some point but, you know,
it was never something that was mentioned.And the thing that kind of made you think,
oh maybe that is true, not only you've got these people saying this, but he was mixed race.
Yeah.And with your skin tone you started to wonder…
Yeah, whenever I was born, I looked so different to anybody else, I had so much black hair, darker
(03:33):
skin. Whereas my sister has blue eyes, and she had all this blonde curly hair when she was born,
and she looks just like my mum. I didn't like anybody in my family, kind of stuck out like
a sore thumb where I grew up in Belfast. Yet this other family looked so like me. In fact,
I do remember years and years ago people always saying that I look more like them than I did my
(03:56):
actual sister, just because of the skin tone and the hair colour and everything like that.
So, I suppose growing up you felt like you were that little bit different because your skin tone
is obviously different from the rest of them?So different, so different, it was never made
to make me feel like it was any sort of issue, I never worried about it but when
I moved to Leicester it was different, and I grew up in a place where everyone was from
(04:17):
different backgrounds and different ethnicities and things like that. So people started to ask
me where I was from, and was I mixed-raced and all of these things that I'd never even,
you know, I didn't know what it meant, and of course I was like no I'm just from Belfast,
you know, but everybody was convinced that I was from a mixed race relationship, but I was
just not aware of how to even deal with that at such a young age, it was so strange, you know,
(04:41):
but I was convinced I was myself, if I'm honest, because I was just so dark when I was younger.
And for me as a geneticist I'm very used to sort of saying to people, oh you see a real
range of pigmentation within families, but if you don't know that you would be wondering,
and particularly if you've got someone who comes and goes, actually we think you're related to us,
of course one of the first things you'd be starting to think of is, oh my goodness.
(05:03):
Yeah, I was like, oh my god, it all makes sense, this has to be the truth because it
can't just be a coincidence, they lived up the road, they're telling me this information and we
actually look like we should be related more than even my own family at home. So yeah, I
definitely thought that was going to be the truth.A lot of people, when they come on the programme,
they talk about it feels like part of them is missing.
(05:24):
Yeah, definitely, I didn't miss out on having a dad because I was so lucky that I had my stepdad.
So I didn't miss having that father figure, but I always knew that my actual father was out there
somewhere and I always had the questions of what does he look like, do we look alike, is this why
I look like I do, does he know about me, does he miss me, that was a big thing for me. I was quite
(05:48):
embarrassed to tell people that I didn't know who my biological father was, I just found it really
embarrassing. I know a lot of my husband's family never knew, a lot of friends never knew until the
programme came out, because I just thought, oh my gosh what are they going to think of me,
even though it's not my fault, it's nothing to do with me, I was not there at the time.
So was it nerve-wracking to kind of finally be chosen, I mean I know when you came to see me,
(06:14):
and we could kind of boil it down to two questions. So, one was you want to kind of
confirm the ancestry of your biological father and then ideally, hopefully find
out who your biological father was? So, it must be nerve-wracking when you come in and you say
well this is what I'm hoping to find out, but the really scary bit must be when you come back
and you know you're going to get some answers, and you don't know what those are going to be.
(06:37):
Oh my gosh, I was so nervous that day. I remember waiting outside the door before I had to walk in,
and I knew I was going to get some answers, but I had no idea which direction it was going to
be. Never ever thought I'd get as much information as I did. I thought maybe you'd identify sort of
my ethnicity and, you know, where I'm from and that alone would have given, me answers as to,
(07:00):
which one of these men was actually my dad.So it was fairly straightforward,
the bit about taking a DNA test and what we do is we look for where you're getting matches in
particular parts of the world, and yours was coming back as you know 100% British, Irish,
which completely fit with the whole idea that it wasn't this mixed race man who was
(07:26):
your biological father. So that was the first thing I was able to tell you, so how was that?
That was the biggest part because I remember when you started talking about where I'm from and
explaining the whole thing, I could feel myself starting to shake from the inside out, because
I knew that was going to give me an answer, and that was all I wanted, just that answer. And then
(07:47):
whenever you said Yorkshire, for me that was huge because my mum had always told me the soldier was
from Yorkshire. Now I did always doubt my mum in the fact that her geography was very poor,
but she was telling me this based on his accent, and that was your first words, Yorkshire. I'd
been waiting for, you know, you're from Northern Ireland and somewhere exotic, and it was Northern
(08:11):
Ireland and Yorkshire, and the minute you said that I just knew instantly that mum was right.
Yeah, we actually had a head start because your mum had given you a name and you had a few close
matches. And obviously what we're looking for in those matches is the surname Green,
and that's the sort of thing that we were finding. So we were able to narrow it down to a couple,
(08:36):
and that your biological father must be one of their sons, and we could see that one of them,
his name wasn't Jim on the birth certificate but we could see that one of them had a nickname Jim,
and that he had been in the Army, and so that all fit together. I mean I was able to
(08:56):
tell you this and that we found him, and your mum, everything that she told you was right.
I remember, and even watching it back, just sitting there with sort of a glaze over my eyes,
just thinking oh my goodness, she’s telling me everything that really I wanted to hear.
I couldn't have asked for more of a better outcome and I got so much more information
(09:20):
than I'd ever thought I was going to get. So not only was it, where he's from, but the name,
he had a different name, but he was always known as Jim, so mum had got that right, and yeah,
I just couldn't believe it. I couldn't have been happier, that was the main thing I wanted,
everything mum had ever told me about this man was completely right. And then Stacey told me that you
(09:42):
guys had all been in contact with Jim Green and that, you know, obviously he was alive and he was
talking to you guys and that she had a photograph of him and a letter, which by that point I was
shaking so much, I was thinking what is he going to say? I'd always thought if it was him, and if
I found him, he's not going to want any contact, but she gave me the photograph first and I almost
(10:08):
fell off my chair, because I could not believe how much we looked the same. We were so alike,
the colour of our skin, our hair, brown eyes, we just looked very similar. And then I could
see pieces of my son in it as well, which was really strange, just that you can actually
see a likeness between the three of us.And then I got the letter, which was just
(10:30):
so lovely, he was explaining that he'd had a lot of loss in his life and he had children
and things have been difficult for him, but he completely acknowledged both me and my mum,
which was amazing, and asked if I would get back in contact with him and see how things go.
I remember one of the things you said was that you wondered what it'd be like to hear his voice so,
(10:55):
Yes.When did that happen?
Oh, my goodness, very quickly after I wrote a letter with my phone number in it and it was a
Friday night and I was at home and Johnny was out, and my phone started ringing,
and then looked at it. And I just had this strange feeling, this is going to be him.
And I answered the phone, and he had the most Yorkshire accent you could have ever heard. And
(11:19):
it was just so strange talking to somebody that I've never spoken to before and thinking that is
actually my dad, this is the first conversation I've ever had with him. And I think that night
we were on the phone for about an hour and a half. Something that I never thought I was going
to get and within literally two weeks of the show ending for me, we were on the phone to each other.
So, what would you like to have happen next?I would love to meet him. I think it's got
(11:44):
this far I couldn't not meet him now, so that's the best outcome for me. He hasn't mentioned it
yet so I want to let him decide when he's ready to do that, but I would love for the children
to know about him at some point, because they don't at the minute, they're so young, as far
as they’re aware, you know, their grandparents died a long time before they were born. So it
(12:06):
would be a big thing for them to have a grandpa, but we need to work on a relationship a bit more
and meet before that could ever happen, but from what I gather he would be happy enough to be part
of their lives as well, you know, they're part of him too, so that's why I would love to happen. So
hopefully at some point we can go that far.I think that's the thing, people always
(12:27):
say in these situations, just take it slowly because it's how you build that relationship.
Although it's been a year now since we've been talking to each other, there was 39 years missed,
so there's a lot to learn about each other before we take the next step. I'm ready I think,
but it'll be just whenever he's ready.So, when you came to the programme you
(12:49):
had a couple of questions and we were able to provide the answers for those,
so does it make you feel whole, because a lot of people when they come, they say look I feel like
I've got something missing. Now you've had the questions answered has it filled that for you?
Definitely, for me it wasn't missing the father figure as such, but it was just missing something,
(13:13):
but I didn't know what it was and because I got so much more than I could have ever asked for,
and now I have a dad again, which is amazing. So yeah, I think I do feel whole, I feel happier,
I feel like my relationship with my mum is now, even though she's not here,
it's still as strong as it always was. I completely trust everything that she ever
(13:34):
told me and maybe that's the gap that was missing for so long, but it's definitely been filled.
Clare it's been such a pleasure catching up with you, thank you so much for talking to me.
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