Family Twist: A Podcast Exploring DNA Surprises and Family Secrets
Corey and Kendall Stulce
200 episodes
6 days ago
Send us a text What happens after the truth comes out, when the search begins and there is no DNA test, no internet, and no clear roadmap? In part two of this two-part episode, we continue our conversation with Marylee MacDonald as she takes us into the long, painstaking search for her birth family. This was a time before commercial DNA testing, when finding answers meant microfilm machines, legal notices buried in newspapers, and carefully rehearsed phone calls that could change your life in...
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Send us a text What happens after the truth comes out, when the search begins and there is no DNA test, no internet, and no clear roadmap? In part two of this two-part episode, we continue our conversation with Marylee MacDonald as she takes us into the long, painstaking search for her birth family. This was a time before commercial DNA testing, when finding answers meant microfilm machines, legal notices buried in newspapers, and carefully rehearsed phone calls that could change your life in...
Send us a text What happens after the truth comes out, when the search begins and there is no DNA test, no internet, and no clear roadmap? In part two of this two-part episode, we continue our conversation with Marylee MacDonald as she takes us into the long, painstaking search for her birth family. This was a time before commercial DNA testing, when finding answers meant microfilm machines, legal notices buried in newspapers, and carefully rehearsed phone calls that could change your life in...
What happens when the story you were told about your adoption turns out to be a lie, and you find out at the moment you need support the most? In part one of this two-part episode, we talk with Marylee MacDonald, an adoptee who always knew she was adopted and believed she had a tragic but simple origin story. She was told her birth parents had been killed in a car accident. The door was closed. The past was settled. Until it wasn’t. At 15, when Marylee became pregnant, her adoptive mother rev...
What do you do when a DNA test proves that everything you believed about your race, your ancestry, and your family history is not true, and at the same time the world becomes more dangerous for the people you have just learned you belong to? That is the question at the center of Kara’s story. Kara grew up believing she was African-American, with a family history rooted in ancestors who had been enslaved in Texas. When she asked her father to take a DNA test so she could plan a "Finding Your R...
In Part One, Lisa shared her extraordinary adoption reunion story. A closed adoption, a lifetime of questions, a birth family who lived down the street, and the shocking discovery that she likely cared for her own biological grandfather in the ICU. It was a story about caregiving, identity, and the power of finally finding your roots. Part Two takes us into a very different kind of discovery. This episode explores the emotional fallout of her paternal DNA match. What begins with hopeful email...
With the Trump administration moving to reclassify nursing so it no longer counts as a professional degree for federal student aid, this episode couldn’t land at a more urgent moment. Nursing organizations warn that limiting access to funding threatens the very foundation of patient care, and in our household, where nurses are family, this news hits hard. Today’s guest, Lisa, is a nurse practitioner, an adoptee, and someone who has lived through more than one life-changing twist thanks to DNA...
What happens when you discover a whole set of siblings who grew up in the donor’s home, but you are not sure they even know you existIn part one, a simple birthday DNA kit rewrote everything Nick thought he knew about his identity. He learned he was donor conceived at thirty-six, discovered fourteen half siblings, and realized his parents had carried the truth for decades. But nothing prepared him for what came next. In this episode, Nick talks about the two siblings who were raised by the do...
What if a simple birthday gift revealed a secret your parents had been carrying for more than three decades? For his 36th birthday, Nick’s siblings gave him a 23andMe kit. It seemed like a fun way to learn more about his ancestry, until his parents sat him down with a truth that changed everything. Nick discovered that he was donor conceived, while his brother was not. In this first part of Nick’s story, he shares what it felt like to have the truth land without warning, why he chose compassi...
What happens when a single email from a stranger confirms the secret you have been living with your whole life? In this episode, Rich Boerner returns to Family Twist to share the second half of his extraordinary story. In Part One, Rich discovered the truth about his father after finding a Polaroid tucked inside his mother’s old address book. That discovery shattered the story he had grown up believing and opened the door to an entirely new family. In Part Two, Rich picks up the story a decad...
What if the father you spent your life wondering about turned out to be someone you already knew?As a kid growing up on Long Island in the 1970s, Rich Boerner learned not to ask too many questions. His mother had her version of the truth and repeated it word for word whenever he asked. His father was a man from Milwaukee who left when he found out she was pregnant. That was all she would say. It was a story that sounded just plausible enough to stop the conversation. For years, Rich focused o...
What happens when the podcast that’s helping you make sense of your DNA surprise starts to sound a little too familiar? For many listeners, Family Twist is more than a podcast, it’s a lifeline. That’s exactly how it felt for Jai, whose own DNA discovery journey unfolded side by side with the stories she was hearing from Corey and Kendall. As an adoptee navigating identity, belonging, and the shock of hidden truths, Jai found comfort and courage in Kendall’s openness about rejection, reconnect...
This episode feels like the heart of Family Twist. It’s about what happens when we stop hiding, start talking, and realize we’re all part of a much bigger family than we thought. Right to Know: Healing in Real TimeCorey shares the mic with other board members from Right to Know, the organization making sure everyone has access to their own origin story. These conversations aren’t polished or easy, but they’re full of heart, honesty, and hope. Debbie Olson talks about the strange beauty of fin...
This episode nearly vanished. Literally. When Corey bumped into fellow podcaster Jeremy Bryant at a New England podcast event, he recognized his voice before placing his face. Then it hit him, they had already recorded an episode of Family Twist with Jeremy, but somehow, that recording got lost. So here it is. Jeremy’s story is about learning he was donor-conceived, discovering a growing list of half-siblings, and reconciling that truth after the father who raised him had already passed. It’s...
What if the first clue to your DNA surprise was hidden in your parents’ wedding video — and years later, the search pointed to identical twins? Episode OverviewIn this episode of the Family Twist podcast, Corey and Kendall talk with Emily, a fellow New England podcaster who uncovered her DNA surprise in an unforgettable way. As a child, she noticed she was in her parents’ wedding video, and that observation launched decades of questions about her identity. Emily’s journey stretched from child...
Can we ever truly feel safe if we don’t know where we came from? Episode Summary:In this deeply emotional episode of Family Twist, we welcome Bryan Post, world-renowned therapist, author, and adoptee, for a conversation that feels more like a healing session than an interview. Bryan speaks directly to the heart of what many adoptees feel but struggle to articulate: the hidden trauma, the nervous system overload, the sense of disconnection that lingers, even in the midst of reunion. For co-hos...
What happens when a DNA test flips your world upside down and you decide to make a comedy about it? Actor, writer, and producer Lisa Brenner joins Corey and Kendall to talk about her new film One Big Happy Family, opening in AMC Theatres on October 3, 2025. Inspired by her own discovery at age 40 that the dad who raised her wasn’t her biological father, Lisa transformed a life-altering revelation into a heartfelt comedy. In this episode, she shares how she worked through shock and grief, why ...
This is the rescued first conversation with author Shirley Muñoz Newsom, whose memoir The Little Dark One: A True Story of Switched at Birth chronicles discovering—at age 43—that she was switched at birth. She grew up in Gillette, Wyoming, knowing she didn’t fit, searching through library microfiche long before Google, and navigating an emotionally unavailable home where affection and belonging were withheld. In this raw, intimate talk, Shirley shares how a National Enquirer ambush multiplied...
In this episode of Family Twist, Corey and Kendall sit down with Mary, adoptive mom to previous guest Chris Martin. If you haven’t already, we recommend listening to Chris’ two episodes first — his story as an adoptee lays the groundwork for the conversation you’re about to hear with his mom. Mary opens up about the unexpected beginnings of Chris’ adoption and how what started as a plan for a closed adoption blossomed into a fully open one. She shares candidly about the joys, challenges, and ...
In this episode of Family Twist, Corey and Kendall sit down with storyteller and comedian Becca Rothman to talk about her remarkable DNA discovery and her upcoming live solo show, Gifted: Nature, Nurture, and an Unexpected Present. Becca shares the journey from long-held suspicions about her conception, to finally taking a DNA test, to discovering her biological father—a pediatrician—and two half-sisters she instantly connected with. She walks us through the clues, the moment of opening that ...
In this episode of Family Twist, Corey and Kendall get raw, real, and a little ranty. It’s part group therapy, part comedy roast, and all about the phrases adoptees hear over and over again that range from paper-cut stings to sledgehammer blows. From “You’re so lucky your parents chose you” to “Do you know your real parents?”—they unpack why these comments miss the mark, how they flatten adoptee stories, and what people could say instead. With equal parts humor and honesty, Corey and Kendall ...
In this candid conversation, Corey and Kendall tackle one of the most painful realities in the adoptee and DNA surprise world — reaching out to a biological parent and getting… nothing in return. Ghosting the Ghost ParentKendall opens up about his own experience with his birth mother: the initial reply that offered hope, the “I need time to process” that turned into months of silence, and the slow realization that this wasn’t a pause — it was a soft no. Together, Corey and Kendall unpack what...
Family Twist: A Podcast Exploring DNA Surprises and Family Secrets
Send us a text What happens after the truth comes out, when the search begins and there is no DNA test, no internet, and no clear roadmap? In part two of this two-part episode, we continue our conversation with Marylee MacDonald as she takes us into the long, painstaking search for her birth family. This was a time before commercial DNA testing, when finding answers meant microfilm machines, legal notices buried in newspapers, and carefully rehearsed phone calls that could change your life in...
