A pair of sisters who spent a lifetime not knowing each other have been reunited thanks to a DNA test. Jackie Murphy, 80 from Detroit just found her sister, Suzan Baekkelund, 76, who lives in Nashville, and didn't even know she ever had a sister, after relatives of each of theirs did DNA testing.
Jackie's cousin was doing an Ancestry test with her mother. At the same time, Suzan's daughter did the same thing. When Ancestry let them know that they had matches they were confused.
Suzan had been given up for adoption by their mother, who raised Jackie. But Suzan was never told she was adopted, so she never searched for her birth family.
Jackie was still skeptical that this could be her long-lost sister until she asked Suzan what her middle initial was, knowing her maiden name started with the letter T. When Suzan said her maiden name was Trotter, Jackie got her confirmation and so began a three-week marathon of tears and excitement.
"I love her and I don't even know her. But I loved her all my life because I knew she was there," Jackie said minutes before Suzan's plane from Nashville arrived. "We have a big family waiting for her."