A woman from Chicago who wanted to learn more about her origins about her origins had no idea that a long -amended family secret would be discovered.
The Bombshell: The man who raised her was in fact not her father.
Cherise Irving grew up on the south side of the city.
Her parents divorced when she was born, but she continued to have a solid relationship with her father.
“My father was Reginald Irving,” she said. “He was my father until the end to the end, until he passed,” said Cherise. “I get emotional because I loved him so much.”
A few years ago, Cherise started working on her family tree. That included an account Ancestry.com.
She hadn’t been working on it for a while.
Then her daughter logged in on March 14 and made a shocking discovery.
“I started clicking around. Then I saw a match, and it was a face of a man and a name I had never seen before. And the photo, the face I saw looked like my mother. I had something like that, maybe something went wrong,” said Cherise’s daughter, Barbie Chapman. “And yes, after, after, really to that photo, I saw a face that looked like my mother. It took the wind out of me. It felt like a movie. I called my mother, and I have something like:” Mom, do you sit? “
It was news that Cherise never expected.
“She discovered that I was a match with a father. And that was, that was really difficult to find out that information. I just couldn’t believe it,” she said. “Learning your father is not your father.
Cherise’s mother died in 2017 and never told her anything about her biological father: Eerw. William Chicago Higgins.
‘I sent him a message Ancestry.com. Maybe about two weeks later, and I was with Starbucks when I got a phone call, and he was the first thing he said to me is: “God has a plan. Let’s unpack this, “she said. “So we had done the paternity test later and discovered that, yes, we are a match. So now, after that day he was something like that, you can call me dad. He was born and raised here. He moved to Arizona in 2000 and he is still there. “
Cherise and her father now talk on the phone every day. Higgins will fly to Chicago on July 24 next week. He will meet his daughter and grandchildren for the first time.
“We are both very happy,” said Cherise. “It’s like a miracle. Really. And especially I am 63 and he is 89.”
“I feel so happy to know my grandfather and to have a relationship with him,” said Zachary Watson, the son of Cherise. “He is a very nice man, and I am just happy that my grandfather spoke with my mother and they have a relationship.”
“I have a new grandfather, which I am enthusiastic about because the origins also reach that far back. So it was really exciting to see the pieces coming together,” said Barbie.
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