If it turned out you’d been switched at birth, would you want to know?

[AlternativePerspective]

This week’s long lost family was about two women who had been switched at birth.

One had always suspected because of something her family had said when she was growing up, but the other one had no idea.

So the one who suspected wanted to know the details, so did DNA tests etc, and it turned out she was right.

However, the other one had no idea and her life and that of her family was essentially destroyed when she was approached and told that the family she thought she had weren’t actually her family at all and her brother for e.g. was told his sister wasn’t his sister etc.

Personally I think that the makers of the show were morally wrong for telling her, and all the other woman should have been told was that yes her family were not her biological family. But at that point she IMO lost the right to invade the lives of her biological family who hadn’t asked to be put in the situation and were completely unaware.

If I were told out of the blue that I had been switched at birth and my family weren’t my family, I would want nothing to do with those who were my biological family.

And if I were told that my sister had been switched at birth I would outright reject the biological sister I was given in her place. Because my family are my family and I wouldn’t want anything to do with anyone else wanting to be family.

So, would you want to know?

'What if they’d said no'

'She wouldn’t have met them and there wouldn’t have been a TV programme.'

Perhaps Jacky/Jackie felt under pressure by her DB's enthusiasm? The fact she didn't then go on to meet her biological family tells us all we need to know about how much she was obviously struggling with the situation.

Perhaps Jacky/Jackie felt under pressure by her DB's enthusiasm? The fact she didn't then go on to meet her biological family tells us all we need to know about how much she was obviously struggling with the situation. or the emotional blackmail that was likely heaped on her by the programme makers.

I don’t imagine for a second that having unearthed this gem they would have wanted to let it slip through their fingers. This was potentially TV gold.

I felt really uncomfortable watching this programme because of this story. I understood the original woman’s desire to know if she had been swapped, she kind of knew anyway and had her to whole life to decide if she wanted to find out the truth.
However to then use that knowledge to destroy another woman’s life didn’t sit right with me at all, Jacky was clearly deeply upset by this(not surprising) and I felt it was unnecessary and unethical. I doubt Jacky will ever get over it and her relationship with her brother who she was very close too will never be the same again.

All she needed to know was that her family weren’t her family. She didn’t know her biological family. Had she not overheard her mother she would never have known her actual family weren’t her biological family.
In your opinion.
She felt she needed to know more about where she cane from and IMO had that right.
We'll agree to disagree we're coming from a different place on this taking our own experience into it.
I don't think she should have put up and shut up never finding answers to her lifelong questions.

I'd want to know. No one has the right to withhold such information from another person as it impacts medical matters.
I'd be curious about my biological family, but can't imagine suddenly thinking differently about the family I grew up in. But I'm not a subscriber to the importance of blood ties. Relationships are grown between people, shared genes are neither here nor there.
It would however be interesting if the life circumstances of your blood family were very different, say millionaire versus deprived upbringing, or great parents versus neglectful ones. I imagine that might feel conflicting if you thought you had badly missed out.

I agree with you OP
Jacky's life will never be the same and despite all good intentions I doubt her relationship with her brother will be the same.
She found out that her whole life was a lie - even her date of birth wasn't hers.
Poor woman, my heart broke for her.

It irked me during the programme when she kept saying it was ‘her right’ to find out if she was swopped at birth. She did that - the dna proved she wasn’t biologically linked to her family. She didn’t have to go any further and I guess that She was fortunate in that the dna found her biological family. However, Jackie was the victim in all this, her world has been shattered. I guess if you were approached by researchers from Long Lost Family, you’d assume that a new relative had been found. Instead, they dropped a bombshell, one which there was no going back on.

I hope there are complaints to the watchdog over this programme. They ought never to have touched this case - they've thrown a grenade into Jacky's life, purely for entertainment.
I think the woman was wrong to tell her biological family. No good can come if it now.

Im thinking that surely the only reason they were able to track down the biological relatives was because Richard, or perhaps more likely one of his extended family, must have already done a dna profiling thing & registered it somewhere. In which case the link could have been made quite easily without the shows involvement, and would have inferred that -due to their close birthdates- the two ladies were either twins seperated at birth or that they couldnt both be Richards sister Although it was uncomfortable to watch at times, at least with the shows involvement they are likely to have had access to professional support & lots of their questions answered.

This with bells on! I don’t see why she wasn’t allowed to meet her biological family . Yes I feel for Jacky but in a sense that is her life. She is not biologically related to her family

I have complained to ofcom

Im thinking that surely the only reason they were able to track down the biological relatives was because Richard, or perhaps more likely one of his extended family, must have already done a dna profiling thing & registered it somewhere. In which case the link could have been made quite easily without the shows involvement, and would have inferred that -due to their close birthdates- the two ladies were either twins seperated at birth or that they couldnt both be Richards sister Although it was uncomfortable to watch at times, at least with the shows involvement they are likely to have had access to professional support & lots of their questions answered.

Nobody who sends their DNA to one of these sites does so in the belief they might not be their parents’ child though, unless they are e.g. adopted and do so for the purpose of finding biological relatives.

The show didn’t do this because they wanted to help them. They did it purely because it made good entertainment on prime time television. And I very much doubt that Jackie will get ongoing support. Or that her relationship with Richard will ever be the same after this. But hey it made good viewing.

personally I think these DNA sites are a scandal in the making, it’s only a matter of time before DNA ends up in the wrong hands and IMO it is a case of when and not if. Anyone who willingly hands over their DNA is mad.

I honestly don't know whether I'd want to be told but equally my family wouldn't stop being my family (warts and all) just because I wasn't genetically related to them.

You might feel like that but what if they don't?

@ancientgran then there clearly wasn't much of a relationship there in the first place!

TheWildRumpyPumpus. Speaking for myself I haven't lost any family. I had a wonderful upbringing, and no inclination at all to find my biological family. So don't project yor views onto me.

@AlternativePerspective you can identify anyone's parents now, pretty much, via AncestryDNA alone, even from very distant matches if you know what you're doing and do a lot of research. It's a matter of time. You don't need close matches to have tested or even relatively close matches.

I wouldn't want to know. The family that bought me up would be more important to me than some strangers who happened to share my DNA.

@Zwellers great to hear that you had a happy upbringing. I wasn’t projecting my experiences anymore than you are though. And if you don’t consider you’ve lost family then my comment wouldn’t have applied

to you anyway 🤷🏻‍♀️

I just watched this and felt so sorry for Jacky and it made for really uncomfortable viewing. To be honest I felt it was a bit selfish of Rosemary. Fair enough she wanted to know if she had been swapped and she clearly had but she had no right to ruin the life of the other woman.

I am a genealogist (professional, not just hobbyist) so know my way around DNA tests.

The difference with this swapped at birth story is that it affects two people's identities. If a child has been adopted, or grows up not knowing a parent and later on does a DNA to find them, that does not change the birth siblings identity. Somebody finds their half sister - OK, the half sister has to come to terms with the fact their mum had another child they didn't know about. A lot to deal with. But their mum is still their mum, their siblings are still their siblings - there's just an extra person genetically related to them.

In this case on the ITV show, one half of the pair had always suspected and the other person had no clue. The effect of doing the DNA test on the person who had suspected, and her sister, proved the swap beyond all doubt as she was not genetically related to the woman she considered her sister. Then the genealogy kicks in to find who her birth family was, and I think they tested the brother which confirmed the full sibling link.

The difference here is that Jacky and her brother had no inkling that they were not genetically related and it was very very clear that Jacky could not process this. She was devastated. She kept saying that her brother wasn't her brother.

You would hope there is a LOT of therapy and social work going on behind the scenes, but ITV don't have such a great track record for that, do they?

Is that for you to judge? The individual might value her relationship with her family very much and the DNA might not change that but she has no control of how the family will react, they might have had a strong relationship but the DNA might be more significant to them.

@Stroopwaffels very insightful post there.

I must admit that I do like Long Lost Family and it has helped a number of people.

However, I am uncomfortable with this episode. I feel that maybe it should not have been aired. Or perhaps not just yet anyway. The effect on poor Jacky was awful even though she did agree to appear (how much pressure was she put under when she was feeling so vulnerable?). It was one to have kept in reserve for a while and not shown until or unless the issues it caused could ever have been worked through.

Excellent post.

And yes, we’re talking about the channel which supported the Jeremy kyle show for years.

have absolutely 0 doubt that Jackie would have ben coerced into appearing on this show. By the time the link was made the implication that Rosemary deserved the truth would have been made incredibly clear.

Sorry but her need to know the truth did not trump others’ right not to have their lives destroyed.

If the makers of long lost family had any morals or ethics at all they would never have taken on this case, but the entertainment value was just too great for them.