The Lie That Raised Me Part Three

Reunion is not always soft.

In Part Three of this powerful late discovery adoptee story, Alicia Sharon Denise Williams steps into the aftermath of truth.

After learning she was adopted, after uncovering sealed Michigan adoption records, after discovering both biological parents had passed away, she begins reaching out to siblings.

The first response is rejection.

A phone call to a biological half brother’s mother ends with harsh words and a door firmly shut. But that is not the end of the story. It is only the first chapter of reunion.

Soon, another connection appears. A name that had shown up repeatedly in her DNA research suddenly becomes a real voice. A nephew. A sister. A family that had known about her all along and never stopped searching.

Within hours, Alicia finds herself walking into a townhouse filled with siblings, nieces, nephews, a stepfather, and decades of stories about her. They knew her birthday. They celebrated her existence. They had promised their mother they would find her one day.

This episode explores:

• DNA sibling rejection and acceptance
• Discovering biological half siblings through AncestryDNA
• The emotional complexity of adoption reunion
• Faith, forgiveness, and generational secrecy
• Medical history revelations for late discovery adoptees
• What healing looks like after decades of silence

Alicia speaks openly about secrecy in adoptive families, the cost of silence, and the difference between adopting to give a child a life versus adopting to complete an image.

She also shares how her own late discovery changed the way she parents her adopted children today.

This is not just a DNA surprise story.

This is a story about identity being rebuilt. About faith being tested. About whether truth can redeem what was hidden.

And Alicia’s answer is yes.

About Alicia Sharon Denise Williams

Alicia is a NAAP Board Member, speaker, storyteller, and adoption truth advocate. As the founder of From Hidden to Healed, she shares her late-discovery adoptee journey marked by silence, spiritual awakening, DNA revelation, and the sacred work of untangling identity after truth emerges.

Her message is not about blame, but about belonging. Not about shame, but about healing. She reminds us that what was hidden can be healed and what was silenced can be spoken.

Hear Alicia Live at Untangling Our Roots

Alicia will be speaking at Untangling Our Roots, the national conference for adoptees, NPEs, donor-conceived individuals, and families navigating identity discovery.

After hearing this three-part series, experiencing her story in person will land differently.

Learn more at untanglingourroots.org.

This concludes the three-part Raised on a Lie series.

If Alicia’s story resonated with you, share it with someone navigating a DNA discovery, misattributed parentage, or adoption reunion.

Truth changes everything.

Transcript

When Discovery Turns Into a New Life

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Welcome back to Family Twist. This is Corey. Alright, here we go with part three of Alicia's story. This is the part where the story stops being a discovery and becomes a whole new life. Because yes, Alicia finds answers, but she also finds rejection. The kind that lands in your body, the kind that makes you question whether you should have looked at all. And then, just when she's exhausted enough to declare publicly, I'm finished, everything flips again. A simple Facebook post. A call from her pregnant daughter. A message from a young man claiming to be her nephew. A name she has seen in her research a hundred times, suddenly becoming a real voice on the phone. And within hours, she's back in Detroit, walking into a townhouse filled with people who already know her birthday, already know her story, and already have a place for her at the table. I can't oversell how unbelievable this sounds. You're just gonna have to hear it for yourself. So this is part three with Alicia, the collision of grief, truth, and the family who never stopped holding space for her.

“You Are Not Part of This Family”

Claiming Her Birth Name Publicly

SPEAKER_02 1:10

I did know that a brother that was 11-year-old older than me. Right. I did know his name. To this day, I have not found him. I did find his mother, who would have been my father's first wife. I did contact her and call her. That was not pleasant. That was my first occasion of rejection because she literally cussed me out and told me, don't ever call them again. Don't make contact with my son. You are not part of this family. You are a bastard. You were the you still are now. My son does not need you in his life and don't ever contact us again. I respected her wishes. I told her I will never contact you again. I apologize. I'm sorry that this has brought up bad memories. And I did tell her, but if I'm 53, your son, who's 64, still has a right to make that decision for himself. And if I find the occasion to find him, I will still reach out to him. I respect your wishes and I will not contact you again. Well, that's my father's side. I put that box away. Through my uncle, I discovered that I did have many other siblings, and he did not know how many more, but he did know of one because that sibling of mine, her mother, and his wife were sisters. So the two brothers had children by two sisters. So they all knew each other and they were all raised together. And that sister, who knew of me and knew the story of me, and knew that her father had gone to prison because he had a baby with a very young girl, she knew the story of me. She readily accepted me, and we became clicked in clicked in locked-in sisters. Not only is she my big sis, her sisters are my sis, and just saw them two days ago. So she was the only sibling I had on my father's side. When I found out my mother's biological name, I went on Facebook and I made a grand declaration because I was exhausted by this time. This had been a year and a half of searching, a year and a half of drama, a year and a half of therapy, a year and a half of processing it, not knowing who I am today, who I want to be tomorrow. And I was tired. And this was my final declaration. And I went on all of my sites and I made a posting that basically said I finally am satisfied with who I am. I am Sharon Denise Atkinson, the daughter of Herman Felton and Alma Jean Atkinson. And I hit send and I closed up my Facebook and it was going to go off of social media for a while and just decompress. I had found enough people that I had my story. And so many of my family that was raised me were, you know, were just constantly tapping in and you know, are you okay? And we know, but we didn't want to tell you it wasn't our place, and we still love you, and you're part of our family. So it was just overwhelming. Families from every side, you know, every emotion. You all knew, but nobody told me. And here's this family that I'm trying to get to know. And really was feeling pulled apart. No, you're you're always going to be part of this family. You know, we're in the holiday season. We're we're Thanksgiving and Christmas coming up of 2019. No, you need to have dinner with us. And I was like, okay, I don't have dinner with anybody. I want to stay home and go back to bed. So I closed up that Facebook page. And I didn't want to know or meet anybody else. And I was telling people that publicly, I'm done. I'm exhausted. I'm hurt. I'm lost. I'm confused. I'm overwhelmed. And I just can't do anything else. Let me just process what I already know.

Kendall 5:11

Right.

SPEAKER_02 5:12

And that youngest daughter of mine that started this whole conversation with her pregnancy, started feverishly calling me one day. 911ing me. And her boyfriend.

Kendall 5:25

Oh boy.

The Nephew Message That Changed Everything

SPEAKER_02 5:26

Yeah. And her boyfriend got to me first. And I was like, what is going on? What does she want? We're both at work. And he didn't know. He said, I don't know, but she's been calling me because she wants me to bring her some lunch. Maybe she's trying to get you to bring her lunch. And she's the youngest. So lunch for her is a 911 call.

SPEAKER_01 5:44

So I'm now thinking she's 911ing, maybe because she just wants lunch.

SPEAKER_02 5:50

And so I really didn't answer, but I was in close proximity to her job. So I started driving down her street and I was just gonna stop. And I had Wendy's, and I was just gonna stop and give it to her. I pulled down her street and she's in the middle of the street, and she spots my car, and she's jumping up and down in the middle of the street, pointing at me. And she's like seven or eight months pregnant. And I'm like, What is this child doing? You know, what is this girl doing? And I think get closer. She's like, Mo, Mock, there's this boy on the phone. He says he's your nephew. He saw your Facebook post. I was like, Well, how'd he get a hold of you? He's like, Well, he contacted me on Messenger, and I look at the picture, cute, very handsome young man. And I'm like, you know, my daughter, he's a gorgeous girl. And I was like, he's using that posting to you. This is a scam, you know, because I'm I'm skeptical, of everybody now. Everybody in my life. I have a question mark above their forehead, and I didn't believe him. We didn't believe her. And she literally shoves the phone up to my ear. And I'm like, I'm not talking to this boy, this 21-year-old kid. No, I'm not talking to him. And I hear a female's voice in the background, and she's going, share it, share it. Through my months and months of paperwork and my months and months of connecting pieces, there were names that kept popping up that I knew were connected to my father and were connected to my birth mother because they were connecting to each other. And when I say I hired private detectives, I knew every car my father owned. I knew every mob, bell, telephone that was in his name. I knew every utility bill that wasn't in his name. I knew every house location address change. I went deep.

SPEAKER_00 7:42

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 7:43

We went deep. And so there were several names that kept connecting. And Jessica Jessica Pickett was one of the names that matched like all the time. And Alma Jean was another name that matched all the time. So when my daughter shoved this phone at my at me, and I hear someone yelling, Sharon, Sharon, the only name that came to mind when she says Sharon.

SPEAKER_00 8:10

And I go, Jessica? And she says, Sharon.

“We Found Her”: Meeting the Family Who Never Stopped Searching

SPEAKER_02 8:18

I've never spoken to this person. It was just that name, that that dangling participle over there that I kept circling because I had to figure out how she connected. And when I called her name, and she's saying, You just said you're the daughter of Alma Jean. You just said that your father is Herman Felton. Isn't your birthday February 4th? Aren't you this? Aren't you that? And I'm like, yeah, yeah. And then she starts screaming, I'm your sister. I'm Alma Gene's youngest daughter. And I'm like, and she's going, Mom, Mom, I can't believe it. Thank God, Mom, we found her, we found her. And then I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, hold up. My mother's dead. My mother's passed away. Because in my mind, I'm thinking she's talking to her mother. No, she's talking to her heavenly mom. And what she's saying is, Mom, we promised you that we would never stop looking for her. And we found her. And I'm going, Who's we? And she's like, I'm coming to you right now. Where do you live? Now, mind you, I need to stop everything. And I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, no. I don't need you in my space. I can't, I'm I'm not ready for that. And I said, I'll come to you. Give me your address. And she's like, no, you need to come now. And within two hours, that daughter of mine clocked out. I've been in my car. I swung by and picked up my husband. And we were back in Detroit at my sister's townhouse. And my sister and my brother and my stepfather and my nieces and my nephews and my mother's best friends and my stepmother, who had remarried my stepfather, who was also a friend of my mother's, and my mother's pastor. They just all started flooding into this townhouse. All say, Auntie Sharon, Auntie Sharon, because they all were raised celebrating my birthday, knowing all about me, knowing my father. Because there were times and years that my father and my mother were together on my birthday. My father would come over to the house and my mother would make a meal and set a plate because she said one day I was going to come back. This whole set of siblings all were raised with my image in their head, my concept of who I was in their head. My birthday in their head, my celebrations, my you know, and they're telling me all the things that mom had imagined for me. Did you graduate college? Mom said she was sure that you graduated college. Ma was sure that you'd be a teacher or a lawyer or something. And I'm like, Yeah, I went to Michigan State. Yeah. I wasn't, no, I wasn't a teacher. I was actually a principal. No, I am, you know, and then looking at the picture of my mother, and for the first time seeing me, first seeing me that, oh, I look more like her than y'all look like her.

Kendall 11:54

Exactly. That's so cool.

SPEAKER_02 11:56

I went from the two siblings that I knew about on my father's side to having two brothers and another sister, and I can't even count all the nieces and nephews. And I went to my stepfather's house, and I'm thinking, why would you take me to my stepfather's house? Because my mother got married at 16, and he knew all about me.

SPEAKER_01 12:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:21

And he was the one that bought my mom her first computer, and they searched for together, trying to find me, trying to get me back. And they're telling me stories how they went to the agencies and wanted me back, and how the agencies wouldn't let them because it's a you know, because they were giving them the story how it's best not to uproot me. I'm in a stable home, I'm I will have everything I want because these people have so much more money, and these people have moved her to this, and they were encouraged to stop looking and to stop seeking, and and then also the revelation that entire time that my biological grandmother always knew where I was. And then knowing that the mother who raised me and the biological grandmother stayed in connection multiple times. Wow, this all could have been an honest interaction with families. It could have just been an honest interaction. And I love my life. I love the parents that raised me. I and God knows I wouldn't want to trade it because I totally was spoiled. But to have had the opportunity to have been and raised and loved on my siblings, the way my brother, who was raised in the house and I didn't get to, to have had honesty, and honesty should have definitely came when I got married. Honesty should have definitely been revealed when I had children that needed to know their biological history.

SPEAKER_00 14:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 14:09

Honesty was long overdue when I had multiple medical procedures, diagnoses, and misdiagnosed conditions based on family history that wasn't mine. Honesty was long overdue when my parents paid for years of counseling from anxiety issues that I had, or night terrors that I had, or separation anxiety issues that I had, where they paid for those counseling sessions and allowed clinicians to make me feel like I was the one that wasn't equipped to deal with life when those issues were valid, were real. I earned them.

Kendall 15:01

Yeah, you definitely did. And that's one thing that we always talk about on this podcast is just tell the truth. If you're a parent who has adopted and you haven't given your children the information they need, tell them. I mean, but I feel very fortunate that I always knew I was adopted, but it wasn't that helpful because I couldn't do anything with it, because it was a closed adoption. But still I'm glad that at least I didn't have like those doubts. I knew I wasn't biologically connected to my adopted parent, you know? And yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:42

One of the things that completely amazes me is that my mother was so supportive when my husband and I adopted two children. Now, mind you, I've been an adopted parent for over 20 years before I found out that I was adopted.

Kendall 15:57

Right.

SPEAKER_02 15:58

My kids have always known they were adopted. And I adopted my daughter at the same age I was. So I've had her since she was 18 months. It was supposed to be a closed adoption. Well, it just turned out that we ended up moving eight blocks away from their biological mother. And with my older son being 10 and having lived with his mom for multiple years, he knew how to find her. So my very closed adoption became very public and open because we couldn't avoid her. She could drive by my house anytime she wanted. And I had to be honest with my daughter, I had to be honest with my son, and I had to find a way to graciously accept her addictions, accept her gaslighting, accept her toxic influence in our life, and still open up the door that my kids could have a relationship one day with her because I couldn't avoid her. So everything that new adoptive parents are being taught now, I was forced to learn because she was in my face.

Kendall 17:10

Right.

SPEAKER_02 17:10

And my mother watched all of this and kept her own secret.

Kendall 17:17

I can't understand it. I know it was a different time. We all talk about that, you know, when you and I were born, it was not, you know, it wasn't cool. People just didn't talk about things the way they should.

SPEAKER_02 17:30

There's something that I've realized recently, and I and I don't know where you fall in this, but I believe that there are two types of parents that adopt. There are parents that adopt because they want to give a child a better life, and they want to give a child an opportunity. And there are parents that adopt because they want to give themselves a better life. They want to give a personality, a person, an appearance of wholeness, of that family that they couldn't create for themselves. And that was the parents that I got. We were showpieces. When we were in front of people, we were impeccable, we were well dressed, we were well groomed, and when we were back in privacy, we were put back on the shelf, and we were left alone, and we were ignored. I'm not gonna speak for my brother. He had a very different relationship with my mom, but I was. Wow. And my mother took that vanity to her grave. She was still up until her last three months, still clutching her pearls, saying she wished she didn't that she wishes that I didn't know. She hates that I know because I must think so badly of her.

Kendall 18:58

Oh my.

SPEAKER_02 18:59

Everyone now knows that she couldn't have children. It was all about her. And that's okay. I let her go with that. I let her keep believing that because at that age, when you've lived that lie for so long, it's your truth now.

Kendall 19:16

Well, my parents were very they bragged about me a lot, but they really did give me the attention that you would expect. For, you know, I was raised as an only child with them, and they were very loving and spoiled me, but they also gave me the love that went with that, you know, and discipline. I was joking with a colleague today about how I'm an HR guy and she wants more money. She wants a promotion just because she wants more money. And I joked and said, it kind of reminds me of myself when I was 10 years old, and I'd go to my dad and say, Dad, I I could really use some more allowance this week. And he's like, I bet you can. Here's your new list of chores. You know what I mean? Like he was funny about like he's like, I was gonna work it out, and but there was this respect that I had for I knew that eventually I was probably gonna get my way, but I needed that extra.

SPEAKER_02 20:07

I always equated the gifts, the gifts and the monetary offerings was my equation of love. That's how I thought it was supposed to be, and it wasn't until an adult and having my children that I realized that I personally had to incorporate the mother side of me into that. Yeah, now yeah, my kids are kind of spoiled, but they're not me. My allowance was an ungodly amount for a very young person, you know. I think my allowance started at$20 at eight. And when I said, Daddy, I want a pony, I got four of them.

SPEAKER_01 20:47

Like we four of them, because you can't just get one because the one's gonna get lonely, you know.

SPEAKER_02 20:52

I think the most thing I'm thankful now is I have an opportunity to correct the mistakes that I was making with my own adopted children, with the secrecy, the lack of honesty, the understanding their trauma and pretending that it didn't exist, pretending that we could love it away, pretending, pretending that their history and foundation could be washed away and replaced with ours. I've learned so many lessons with my own discovery that I will never do to my children. And I'm very thankful that they're young enough that I can still undo those things, but they're old enough to appreciate that they came up with that and have a better foundation and understanding of who I am as a mother and as a woman.

Kendall 21:50

That you lived through it, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:52

Yeah. And that I'm healing, and that's why my moniker now is hidden, you know, from hidden to heal. Because it's been a long, short six years. When I'm talking about having to go back to the beginning and rewrite my entire life in six years and then get back to where I'm moving forward and not just looking behind, you know, because I'm finally to the point where I feel like I'm going forward again because time stood still for a long time.

Kendall 22:26

I completely relate to that because my discovery came in 2017, and I feel like things are still unraveling. Okay. When it first when I first made the discovery, I wanted everything to be done this instant, right? Like I'm a control freak and I'm a problem solver. So I needed to fix everything right now. That's not the way life is. And you have to start giving your.

SPEAKER_02 22:52

Luckily, I had to write two majors because I was a criminal justice major first, and then I switched into communications with a background in juvenile psychology. So I worked with at-risk youth who were in that pipeline to prison. So I had that troubled youth embodiment around me. So diagnosing myself came easy once I knew what I needed to diagnose. Because before oh right, they were a total mask.

Kendall 23:26

Well, it's great for our listeners to hear, and we're gonna promote your appearance at the Untangling Our Roots conference.

From Hidden to Healed

SPEAKER_02 23:36

I am very thankful that I did find communities like this that were able to help me navigate through this and uh finding Untangling Our Roots and finding Adoption Network Cleveland and the DNA Search Angels and National Association of Adoptees and Parents, which I'm on the board of. I would not have been able to do this without people like you that have walked through it before me to at least hold my hand because I was doing everything. If it wasn't people saying, slow down and allow that to process, slow down and allow that to sink in, because I was showing up on people's doorsteps, knocking on doors, going boom, boom, boom, I'm your sister, let me in. I was stalking homes, I was outside of workplaces, I was going into HR departments trying to trick them into letting me know, you know, does my brother work here? Yeah, I had to slow my role. And it was people who came before me that really taught me to moderate this. And that's my goal. Wow, to help people understand that you will get to a point that you start to move forward again. And it's not all trying to unravel and untangling our roots, but you can start to really feel and move forward. So I thank you as well. You know, I'm knee-deep into listening to all of your podcasts and catching up with the stories and so many different angles. So I appreciate you.

Kendall 25:03

I mean, three of my six half siblings have been guests on the show, so that's been rewarding for me, but more than my story, just talk to people like you and hear other people's stories. I have very often said that I never knew that I needed this. I never knew that starting this podcast was gonna be the best therapy I think I'll ever get.

SPEAKER_02 25:28

Absolutely, absolutely. Yeah, my goal is to start my podcast this year. I want to have a platform that allows people to move forward and so we can start talking about our journeys and continuing to make the connections and not just about going backwards, because there's so many of you that are doing such a good job bringing the stories forward. But then where do we go after that?

SPEAKER_03 25:51

Absolutely. Okay, that's the heart of the story. Alicia's tale does not end with the discovery. It keeps moving through rejection and reunion, through anger and grace, through the long work of identity and the even longer work of healing. She said something in this episode that I cannot forget. Time stood still for a long time, and then slowly she found a way to move forward again. You also hear her connect the dots in a way that matters for a lot of people listening, especially adoptive parents. When secrecy sits inside a family, it does not stay quiet. It shows up in bodies, it shows up in anxiety, night terrors, misdiagnoses, and relationships that never quite click. It shows up in the questions no one will ever answer. And you hear what happens when community shows up. Adoption Network Cleveland, DNA Angels, NAAP, and yes, the Untimely Our Root Summit. Leash is going to be there, and if you've been listening along with this three-part series, you already know why hearing her in person is gonna hit you differently. If this story moved you, please share it with someone who needs to hear it, someone who's sitting on a secret, somebody who suspects the truth, someone who thinks they're not alone. And if that's you, we want to hear from you. The whole point of Family Twist is, well, as we'd like to say, family secrets are the ultimate plot twist. But the truth gives you a path forward. The Family Twist podcast is presented by Savoir Fair Marketing Communications and produced by Mosaic Multimedia.