What would you do if you rediscovered your siblings, and how would you navigate the journey to heal?

Reuniting Sisters and Healing Through Writing

In this heartwarming episode of Family Twist, Corey and Kendall Stulce welcome Barbara Lane, author of "Broken Water." Barbara shares her incredible story of being separated from her 12 siblings at a young age and her relentless search to reunite with them. Through her writing, Barbara explores the profound impact of family bonds, resilience, and the healing power of storytelling. Join us as we delve into Barbara's journey, her discoveries, and the emotional reunion that brought her family back together.

Key Benefits for Listeners:

• Emotional Resilience: Gain insight into how to cope with and heal from the trauma of family separation and loss.
• The Power of Persistence: Learn the importance of persistence in the search for lost family members and the unexpected ways they can be found.
• Healing Through Storytelling: Discover how sharing and writing about personal experiences can be a powerful tool for healing and connecting with others.

Dive into Barbara Lane's incredible journey of reunification and healing, and find inspiration in her story of resilience and the power of family bonds. Listen now!

Guest bio:

The Rev. Barbara Lane integrates her life experiences of being a foster child, sister, wife, mother, grandmother, entrepreneur, speaker, child advocate, educator, ministerial counselor, and author into her writing. By sharing her own personal journey, Barbara destigmatizes the fate of child abuse survivors, leading her to write "Broken Water." In addition to her 25-year service in private practice as a ministerial counselor, Barbara’s educational background in human development, social sciences, and family psychology with a focus on child abuse, inspires her to share her expertise on interrelated issues: the family, family separation, the foster care system, attachment and bonding, child maltreatment, relationship formation, the resilience of the human spirit, healing from trauma, and the power found in having faith in something greater than the self. When not writing, you will find Barbara enjoying nature, reading, swimming, playing sports, and people watching. She especially enjoys spending time with her grandchildren. Barbara lives in the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia with her husband, Jim, who remains her childhood sweetheart.

Guest links:

https://barbaralane.info/

Join the Family Twist family here!

Listen, Rate & Subscribe

Apple

Amazon

Google

Spotify

00:04

Hello and welcome to season three of Family Twist, a podcast about DNA surprises, found family, and amazing adoption stories. I'm Kendall Austin Stulce, and my partner is Corey Stulce. We've had fabulous guests during seasons one and two.

00:20

00:49

Thanks for joining us again on season three of Family Twist. Our guest today is Barbara Lane and Barbara has a brand new book called Broken Water. Welcome, Barbara. Thank you. Thank you for having me. I'm so excited to speak with the both of you. And I'm just amazed at what you're doing and I'm honored to be here. Oh, thank you. Well, we appreciate it. We're honored that you're with us as well. We love when people are able to come on and...

01:16

you know, tell their authentic stories, share their truths, maybe heal a little bit, you know, at the same time. So it's, yeah. That's what it's all about. For me, anyway, it's that healing part. And your story spans so many years. It's wonderful, yeah. It sure does.

01:35

Now don't you give away how old I am. No, no, no. I said, it's so many without a number. Thanks. It's okay. Somehow she's still 29, but she did this surgery. Right. That's what I'm trying to tell myself anyway. Right. So how many siblings do you have? Okay, so I thought I was nine of 10.

02:03

Um, when my family fell apart, um, when I was three, uh, later I was to find out I was nine of 11 girls. And then later I was to find out there's two more out there somewhere that we can't find and one of them's a boy. What we wouldn't do. Right. So, um, but, but my writing involves interviews with, um,

02:32

11 sisters, myself included. My story's in there, obviously I didn't interview myself. Well, I could have used your help in that. Yeah, yeah. But you know, I spent 15 years gathering their stories because they were hard to tell and we were just patient. You know, they came out when they could and to their credit, all my sisters came out and told the truth of their stories, which, wow.

03:01

all your sisters are you're all from the same mother? Yes. Okay. How many are you all from the same father? No. So the way this story goes, you know, it took form over those many years because each sister's story was a little different. You know how memories are, you know, you.

03:23

think you remember something and you swear it's cute. The older ones would argue with each other. It was not that way. The other one would say, well, you weren't there. And I mean, but you know, their memories to them were their truth. So what I went after was the truth of their memories. And then somehow over the years, I kind of was able to thread it together to what I think is the truth of what occurred to our family, you know? So.

03:52

Wow, what is the age range? So my eldest sister was born in 34 Okay, my youngest sister was born in 61 Yeah, the ones I know of no she would still be the youngest She was the youngest that we know of Mm-hmm. Well, let's talk about your mother a little bit How does how does one end up having? 11 kids or maybe 13

04:22

I wish I knew. I assumed that she must have been Catholic and that birth control wasn't allowed. So Catholics had a lot of kids back then, not just Catholics, a lot of people back then had a lot of kids. But she wasn't. She was pretty much non-religious. But she kept having babies. This is my conclusion. My kind of guess after.

04:51

all the years of learning about her from my sisters, because I have no memories of her at all, that there was this need in her. You know, when you have a baby, it's like all totally dependent upon you, right? It fulfills you and then all of a sudden, it goes through that two-year-old stage where it's no and don't pick me up and I'm getting independent. And a lot of women then have a need to have another baby.

05:21

to recapture that. And I can say from what I've learned about her, that probably fit her. That probably fit her to a T. Yeah. You have no memories of her, but you were three years old when you were taken out of the family home. At that point, how many people were living in the house? So there were 10 of us, no, yes, 10 of us at that point. Two were married and out of the home.

05:51

You know, you married young back then, like 16, and women in that era, you know, in the 50s didn't have a car, they didn't drive. So when they were out of the home, they were out of the home, except for maybe holidays, you know, when we could all get together. So they didn't know what was going on in the home, and our mother didn't tell them either. But she had kicked our father out, and she was dating a lot of men.

06:21

06:49

I'm sorry, seven of us in the apartment took off with the boyfriend and took the newest baby that was seven months old with her. She just she just left. So we were there for three days, no water, no food, no heat, nothing until a neighbor in the in the building. And we lived in the projects in downtown St. Louis, because we were pretty poor. A neighbor realized we were in there and called one of the eldest sisters and said, you know, your sisters are alone in there.

07:20

My eldest sister called Catholic Charities, and they came in and got us. We ended up in a Catholic orphanage for a while. This was the bigger trauma. You would think all that's a trauma. It wasn't. Being separated from my sisters and placed in foster care and losing connection with them was something I could not heal. I simply could not get over it. And I think, guys, they...

07:49

They were so loving when I was an infant and the sister I was placed in foster care with was young. Maybe they thought we were dollies, you know, and played with us like dollies, but it was enough that we bonded to them so deeply that when we lost them...

08:09

there aren't any words and I'm supposed to write, right? I'm supposed to be able to put words on it. I tried my best, but I still don't think I could define it that hurt, because I knew them, you know? So anyway, yeah. And I remember watching them leave the orphanage. They have a little suitcases and they'd be getting into cars of people I didn't know and then they were just gone.

08:37

I didn't understand foster care. I didn't know where they were going. It was just really traumatic. And you know, this happens today. It just keeps happening. So anyway, so that was the beginning of probably another night, well, for sure another nightmare. Eventually, myself and my sister Kay, who was 18 months older than I, were placed in foster home together.

09:06

It was the home of a mafia grunt.

09:10

I mean, you know, I had red hair, I still have green eyes, and you know, they were very Sicilian and we looked nothing like them, right? But they tried to pass us off as from Northern Italy. So, you know, but it was a horribly abusive home, just in every way you can think of.

09:33

I don't understand why Mafia Grunt would want to have foster kids in his house. Hmm. Yeah, he had plans for children. That's why. And, you know, back then they didn't screen very well. And today the screening needs help still. It's better, but it's still, I mean, as a journalist, I'm sure you stay on top of the many stories out there, especially the Florida.

10:02

investigations they've been doing on abuse in foster homes. It's horrible. And I gotta say there's wonderful foster homes. I have to put that out there and really applaud the loving individuals that are trying everything they can, right, to take care of these kids. For sure. Yeah, we certainly don't want to disparage those that are doing good work. We've had several on the show. Oh, and they're wonderful. I mean, and we just need more of them. So

10:32

But back in my day, you know, that's where we landed. And.

10:40

They wouldn't allow us to see our sisters. They knew where they were, but they, you know, one of the things that abusive people do is isolate children. Soon, hemming won a tell, right? So they isolated us, kept us home, blah, blah, blah. And we stayed there until we married, frankly. So that was a long time. I mean, you get acclimated to how to be safe and you don't think...

11:09

there's any other way to live when you're in that. Were there any opportunities as you've gotten to be an older teenager to seek out your sisters? I mean, you had Kay, but you knew, you both knew that the others were out there. We were absolutely prohibited. And I remembered all their names in order of birth from when I was three years old. I remembered that. I used to pretend when I was little, I was having tea parties with them.

11:38

And I refused to let them escape my memory, you know. But when we were growing up in that home, if you mentioned it, you'd probably get smacked. So, you know, it was really prohibited. I think we had one visit with a few of the sisters, and I was pretty young. And it must have been the social worker that insisted. So we went. I do have that memory.

12:06

of seeing a few of my sisters when I was so young. And I remember we were playing in the backyard and there was a smell of honeysuckle and fresh cut grass. I mean, it was amazing, but the sun was getting ready to set. And I knew, you know, we'd be leaving them and that stays in there. And we did leave. So where do you go from there because of that point?

12:35

I imagine some of them moved around. Therapy. Of course. A lot of therapy. Yeah. Which is, I think I don't want to get off the subject, but to anyone's listening this that's gone through this, give yourself the gift of therapy, find a good therapist. This one's not good. Okay. Find another one. You deserve that gift, you know?

13:03

So anyway, that's my pitch for that. No, absolutely. I think we've talked about this on the show that I think more therapists are doing more training on dealing with folks who are having these discoveries later in life and these traumas resurface and that sort of thing, because there's more and more of you every day. Yes, yes, there sure are. And it's a gift. I mean, I was lucky to have, to find

13:33

some pretty phenomenal therapists and then a mentor that I trained with for over 20 some odd years and then eventually I entered that field myself, right? So you give back what you learned, hopefully, but you got to heal that first as best you can before you- Help others. Yeah. Right. How did you start your search for your sisters? When I was like six years old.

14:03

I was learning my letters. And back then there was something called a phone book. Ours was yellow. And I mean, I was learning how to find my last name, Lane. I remembered my last name for some reason in the phone book. And so when my foster mother was out of the house, I would get the old rotary dial and dial the number of any Lane in the book. I'd start going down and.

14:29

someone would answer and I would ask for a sister. Is Ruth there or is Ellen there? And they'd say, no, they're not here. So in my youth, I thought, well, they're just not home. And I really thought, I really thought, if I just call them, it's gonna be so easy to say, just come get me, just come get me. But all girls, you know.

14:53

No social security numbers through the years. No married last names. No internet, right? Pre-internet, I heard that. I tried that when I was young, which obviously didn't work. Then when I was an adult, I hired a detective. I got on all the registries you could think of, for missing family members. I wrote Oprah. But.

15:20

She ignored me. I'm sure she never saw the letter, but I thought, well, I'll try. Um, you know, I went to the, uh, same as library city library and thought, you know, if we were really abandoned, maybe the, you know, there'd have been an article on it, so I searched that way and I did find something pretty fascinating. I didn't find anything about the event that caused.

15:49

the family to fall apart, but I did find an article with my family. Here we were. It was like the first time I saw all of us together. Like this is actually real. There's my mother, there's my father, there's my sisters. And I'm holding the hand of my mother. I thought, I mean, it just shook me. Like, I can't even tell you, but what they had done is one contest for having the most girls in a row and they did an article on it, but that was such a treasure to me.

16:19

to see that, you know? So I had no luck finding my sisters. The detective did come up with an address of one of them my sisters that's a twin. And I sat down and wrote a letter to her, to a sister I was hoping was my sister. And I didn't know which twin it was. And I put it all in there and I thought, boy, if...

16:47

I got this letter, I probably, who's that? But anyway, it came back unopened, the address was a dead end. So then I went through something I know I heard you went through as well. I put all my notes in the closet and closed the door and said, I just can't do this for a while. It was so heartbreaking, right? To get so close and not find them. So.

17:16

Then, do you want to know how we all got together? Yeah. Okay, so there's two pieces to this story. One is very logical and of this earth, and the other is such a spiritual realm. You could do with it what you will. But when we moved from St. Louis to the East Coast, we fell in love with the ocean. And when my kids were young,

17:45

and off school, we would rent this old, dinky old town home right on the boardwalk in Bethany Beach, Delaware. And we'd stay the month of August. I mean, wow, right? So I was getting ready for that trip and packing everything I usually took with us for that month-long trip. And I had a premonition. It was like somebody hit me over the head with a frying pan. And there was

18:14

that after all these years of searching for my sisters, I knew they were gonna find me. I just knew. Maybe it's because we are some levels so close, even though we were apart, whatever you do with this. I mean, I still not quite sure what to do with it. But I also knew they were gonna find me in three days. I just knew. So I was trying to tell my husband and my kids this, and they're always like, oh, mom, you always think you're gonna find your sisters or this one looks just like you or, you know.

18:43

So I thought, okay, I'll just sit on it. We got to the beach on the third morning. I ran out to the beach. I knew it was gonna happen. My husband called me in and said, sit down. And I said, they found me, didn't they? And I mean the tears. He said, how did you know? I don't know. I think I just that close to them, even though we were apart. Now the logical side of how this all happened.

19:11

My second eldest sister, Ellen, was going to try to reunite the sisters. Some of them knew where the other ones were, but they just kind of drifted in the wind, you know, and she was determined that the ones she knew where they were, that she was going to get them together. And her son was there with his best friend. And she started crying, and they said, why are you crying? I said, well, because there's two out there, myself and my sister Kay.

19:40

We don't know where they are. And so he said, well, what do you know about them? And unbeknownst to me, she had clipped an article that was in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch back then. We, this is so ironic, we were featured in the newspaper as the model family for foster care, you know, in spite of all of the terrible stuff going on in their home that no one knew about. And she clipped that.

20:08

And she tried to call our foster parents who said, no, they aren't here. We don't know where they are, which was a lie. But anyway, this friend of her son took that, our name, the foster name was on there, to St. Louis and worked with some clerks there and somehow got the marriage license of my sister Kay with a phone number. So he found us, which is pretty cool. Pretty cool, right? Yeah. Just the realization that.

20:38

it's happening in three days. I knew it, like I know I'm speaking with you. You know, I've got my background in family psychology, human behavior, social sciences. Then I went on, became an ordained ministerial counselor because I felt like there's a little bit of soul involved in healing this kind of hurt. So it's not unusual, I think, when you're kind of trained in that or you're looking for it or it hits you. I could only tell you that's how it happened.

21:08

on my side. I knew it. I knew when it happened. And there we are. We all flew to St. Louis. Those of us that could, because we're kind of spread out all over the country, flew to St. Louis the next day so we could. And I mean, I just literally fell into my sister's arms like I was three years old again. And they caught me.

21:33

They looked at our noses, our ears, you are who you are, Barbie, you are. It was really emotional. Oh, boy. Can't imagine. Yeah. How many sisters were there at that reunion? The first one, there were eight of us. And then two weeks later, we all met in Kansas. We were all there. That's amazing. Yeah. It was like we were never apart. Just, yeah.

22:02

I'm actually on this, I'm in Alabama right now, and I live out in Virginia, because I came here for a niece's wedding. You see, I wouldn't have even known I had her, right? And I, you know, and here we are celebrating her wedding. I think I have over a hundred nieces and nephews, guys. So. Yeah. That's wild. Wow. What an incredible story.

22:30

And so at what point did you decide you should be the one to chronicle everyone's story? Oh, so, you know, they put it on me. What can I say? We spent the first eight years together doing nothing but regressing to our childhoods. I mean, we got together every chance we could. Every single one of us. We played hand clapping. Miss Lucy had a baby. You know, we recaptured our youth.

23:00

in ways, you know, jumping ropes, skipping, being silly, makeup, sleepovers, the whole nine yards. But we never, ever spoke of our past. We just, it was too hard. And we were together maybe about eight years and one of my sisters, Laverne, I couldn't say it as a child that came up, Bernie, and the name stuck. She said to me,

23:28

will you write our stories down? Because we're getting older, you know? And I said, why me? You know, because you can. I guess she had confidence in me. And I never saw myself as a writer, you know? But okay. So that began a process of one-on-one interviews with each sister. I would spend a week alone with each one of them, which was such treasured time. You know, one-on-one, I mean.

23:57

And again, I had to follow my intuition as to who to see first. So this was October of that year, and I decided to go visit one of the twin sisters in Detroit. It was already sleeting. Well, I have sisters that live south. My husband would say to me, what are you doing? Go south where it's warm. And, but it was one of those, I just know that this is the sister I need to visit first.

24:26

gathered her story, spent a week with her, we had a wonderful time in Frankenmuth, I don't know, kind of a German, yeah, we had so much fun. And she was the first to pass. And if I hadn't listened to that intuition, I'd have missed it. So the whole 15 years of gathering their stories went just like that. Like, where should I go next? I don't know.

24:57

follow your heart. Amazing. Oh my goodness. I mean, what a beautiful ending to your story. Has anyone been able to find out what happened to your parents? Sure. Again, it depends on which sister you hear, because memories are pretty fluid. Is that the right word to use? Like, you know, they're.

25:24

that can be impacted easily by something someone says, especially when you're little. But the best I've been able to piece this together is that my mother and father didn't get along. He became ill. Some of it's kind of really trigger warning to speak about, so I won't. You know, I wouldn't wanna trigger anyone listening to this.

25:53

But so suffice it to say that she kicked my father out and she had many boyfriends. And then left, as I said, with one. And then we all went into the orphanage. One sister, Annie, I believed her story the most because she ran away from the orphanage twice, found out where her mother lived. And this was like at the age of 12 and 13. She did this.

26:24

But then she ended up living with her. So she knew more of the true story of what she was like and why she did what she did. And I think she just went into a field of making money that wasn't the best for children to be around.

26:53

Youngest sister, right? Yeah. She left with the youngest. Good catch, because the youngest got taken away from her as well. And then after that youngest, there were two more born with another man that were taken away from her. Then after that, there was my youngest sister, whom I know now, that was taken away from her. So she lost 13 children. A lot of alcoholism and a lot of.

27:23

neglect, hunger, you know, and inappropriate treatment by boyfriends. So, you know, the thing that's so sad about this and the thing I hope is seen over the sadness is that we all bounced, every one of us. We all bounced. We had kids, we raised them well. My youngest sister who probably was just

27:51

kind of in the worst environment with our mother, became a kindergarten teacher. I mean, and one of the best. I mean, so there's hope, there's resilience, there's healing, there's, you know, reunions. If you pursue it, and there's lessons to be learned from it all. For me personally, I can say, people say, you know, how'd you heal from all that trauma?

28:21

It's a long road. You find the right people that have faith in you and see that you are not what happened to you, that happened to you, but you're something else totally. And you follow that path, and then I think what I've learned from it, I don't think I'd give that up. So I'm not gonna say, oh, I'm so glad all this happened. No, but I'm not gonna give up what I learned from it ever. So does that make sense?

28:50

It totally does. And I hope that listeners take, you know, that from most of the stories that we've heard is that I feel really fortunate to hear the fortitude that people have, you know, and to your to use your word resilience. I mean, it's it's amazing to hear what people have overcome. Yes, and they do.

29:20

You know, and I think there's so many in my career, however many years, 20, I don't want to count how many, I've helped, you know, not only children, but I'm better at helping adults who are dealing with coming to terms. I mean, I'm good with kids, don't get me wrong. Ask my grandkids. I mean, you know, but when someone has been hurt as a child, my training helps.

29:49

me, I don't intervene. I mean, the client does all the healing. You just kind of are observing. And maybe there's some guidance, but not too much in the methodology that I use. They find their own inner child and how to rescue it. And to watch that happen over and over. But there are individuals who just

30:17

Society thinks if you were an abused child, you're broken. You're gonna be, you know, broke. What do they say? Well, ruined for life. No.

30:29

don't believe that. And I think, you know, the societal expectation that that's what you're going to be too many people listen to and then there they are. It's sad to me because, no, you got your whole life. Right. Right. Absolutely. I mean, some people do fall into like the cycle, you know, of abuse and things like that, but there's so many people that don't. Right. So how do you break?

30:54

that cycle is you don't listen to what society says unless they're telling you something that sounds true to your soul, that your soul can't, it's indestructible. You know, you can move beyond this. If you hear that message, I would say listen. Yeah. Well, I've got to ask about, you know, since we have the St. Louis connection, you know, I was born there, spent the first 33 years.

31:22

years there. That's where Kendall and I met before we moved to California. What is your opinion on St. Louis style pizza? Oh gosh. It's my hometown. Oh, St. Louis pizza? Yes. You can't beat it anywhere. Nor toasted ravioli. I knew you were going to say that. What part of St. Louis are you from? I'm from one of the suburban counties.

31:52

grew up in Florissant. Hello neighbor. Berkeley. Oh yeah. Wow. That's right there. Yeah. Wow. Listeners are going to have to pull out a map. I'm sorry. I said listeners are going to have to pull out a map. They're going to have to. They were neighbors. My husband grew up in Florissant. I grew up in Berkeley. And we met on a, uh, in a bike accident when we were 14.

32:18

And we still argue over who was at fault, but you know it was his fault, right? Sure, of course. If we took a vote, we would know he was just. Where did your husband go to high school? Of course I gotta ask the St. Louis question. Where did you go to high school? St. Thomas Aquinas. Oh yeah, I know a bunch of people from there, yeah. Yeah, yeah, we were raised Catholic. And I bet I tell you a funny story about how we became Catholic. Cause there is a lot of funny stuff in our stories. It's just not all.

32:48

You know, sad horrors. My eldest sister, we were being raised Southern Baptist. And I know I heard, I know I heard you, you can't, you couldn't dance, right? No. So my eldest sister was 16, I think at the time, and she had a friend that was Catholic that went to the CYC dances and she's like, Oh, I want to go there.

33:09

She had all of us baptized on the same day. Wow. So that we could all be Catholic and she could go dance. You got to have a plan. That's great. You got to have, she did. She still does. She's 86 and she still is like funky. I love it. Yeah. That's wonderful. Yeah. Just what a heartwarming story of the reunion. And I'm so happy that you got the chance to reconnect with all of your sisters, you know, before.

33:38

any of them passed. Right, right. We were all alive, we were all healthy, and we just had so much fun. We were there for each other. Yeah. I don't know. We were really blessed, really blessed. Interesting. It's not lost on me that it was just last night that Cory and I got to spend some time with my local family, my...

34:07

One of my nephews graduated from high school this week and my sister hosted his, it's his mother, hosted his graduation party. So, you know, got to hang out with them and my brother and his wife and just, you know, why we're here. Yeah. You knew you were adopted all along because I've been listening. I can't, I'm having a hard time not continuing listening. It's really well done. You know, oh.

34:35

It's fascinating. But you didn't know any of your biological family. But that longing was still there.

34:51

Uh-uh. Yep, I kind of equated to what you said about you could never let go of the thought of finding your sisters. I always, you know, in your mind you think, well, I can't just be alone out here. You know what I mean? Like there have to be others, right? And, but you know, to your point, I did put it on the shelf for a while because it did become disheartened and.

35:19

It's tiring, it's physically and emotionally draining to keep that search going. And I mean, well, I was gonna say the magic of DNA, I think it was just the gift for us, for sure, for finding each other, because I don't know how else we ever would have, honestly.

35:46

You know, I wonder because as I told you, I have two more out there. They were adopted as you were very young. So they may not even know anything about us. And so we sisters have, you know, thought how can we find them? We know their first names, Robert and Roberta. Now, that could have been changed as your name was, right? But you know, we wonder.

36:13

if they didn't know anything about us or the history of our mother and what she became and our father, how traumatized would they be to find that out? You know, but are they longing, even though they don't know, are they longing for this connection like you have been? So my hope is, let me backtrack if I may just a bit.

36:41

All of us sisters got together and got brave enough to tell these stories, you know, at great personal expense for some of us, great personal expense with family or what have you. But to know that this truth put out there could help other men and women who have had the same histories find some hope or some like, you know, inspiration that they could do this.

37:09

But it also is a little bit of hope that as the book, it's been received really well, which, you know, I'm like, wow, you know, maybe it will flush them out. I don't know. You know, while some of us are still here and hopefully they are too. So I don't know, it's that great unknown thing, right? That you long for. And even though this is all inclusive, this book, there's still that longing. I have a brother out there.

37:39

Somewhere right a brother So we shall see Have you taken a DNA test? I have and I'm on ancestry.com, but nothing has shown up yet That would be I guess Help me. I think it's first first cousin right would be our half sibling, right?

38:01

Yeah, so nothing yet, except the ones I know that I'm already sisters with, which we don't give a hoot if we're half our whole. It just doesn't matter. Yeah, I mean, it's right. Exactly. Yeah, no, to Kendall's point, I mean, it was, you know, we've become like, um, old recluses, you know, and I like to just stay home on the weekends. We were kind of begrudgingly going because it was a nighttime thing. And so, but I'm so.

38:29

I'm so glad that we went because while he was hanging out with his siblings, I was talking a lot with his, which would have been Kendall's former stepmother, but his father's ex-wife and two of her sisters who have just, from day one, have just treated us like family. Yep. That's so wonderful. That's wonderful. You wonder that.

38:57

We sisters reunited. I wondered what extended families would be like. And I especially wondered what extended family would say once they read this book, because the truth just out there. And what I really got from most of my nieces and nephews is a thank you. And I didn't expect that because what they said was, I really understand my mom now because I didn't.

39:26

No, all this secrecy stuff that, you know, especially in my era, you just didn't talk about things, that they didn't know their own mother that raised them. So, you know, this story, they're like, thank you, because I get my mom. So, hopefully, you know, I didn't expect that level of healing, but I'm so glad that that's occurring. So, you never know, right?

39:55

Absolutely. Well, we will definitely be putting the link for your book in the show notes for this episode and encouraging everybody to check it out. Broken Water, you get the title, right? That's clever. Yeah, I think it's memorable and I think that's wise. Very cool. Well, thank you for doing the hard work.

40:21

because as you said, 15 years, I'm sure it was just like reliving trauma after trauma and emphasizing with your sister's situations, it had to be tough. It resurrected some of mine too, but then that was okay because I felt like, well, it put a light on something I still needed to heal. And so, you know, crazy as I might be.

40:50

seem, I just jump right in there and say, okay, just torture my heart and let me get over it. Let me do the hard work and then I know it gets better because I know you eventually laugh. Maybe not about that, but you're free to laugh about joyous things. Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, thank you so much, Barbara. This has been a true pleasure. It's been a pleasure for me. I'd love to just applaud you guys for

41:18

for all you're doing. I mean, this is touching a lot of hearts and I love how you share. I mean, I can hear you guys get teary in your podcast. I mean, it's so real and I just love it. So thank you so much for having me. Well, you're welcome. Yeah, it's been an absolute pleasure for us to do this. And yeah, we really enjoy it. And it's been, I think it's been just more rewarding.

41:48

than we thought it was going to be. For sure.

41:55

Thank you so much for listening to Family Twist. We feature original music by Cosmic Afterthoughts and Family Twist is presented by Savoir Faire Marketing Communications. Check out our website at FamilyTwistPodcast.com for blog posts and all of our episodes.