A heartbreaking story of two women who found out that they were switched at birth in a US hospital has been revealed after 55 years.
Tina Ennis and Jill Lopez, now 57, first opened up about the shocking revelation last month, when they filed suit against Duncan Regional Hospital for a 1964 mixup — which they only discovered in 2019 thanks to an Ancestry.com DNA test.
“My heart just sank because I was just like, ‘This is for real,'” Ennis said of the moment she and Lopez, confirmed what they feared to be the truth about their parentage.
“I mean it was just like, all I could think about was how I was going to tell my mom,” an emotional Ennis shared. “I just thought she’s not going to be able to handle it. That’s what I thought about.”
Kathryn Jones, the woman who raised Ennis but gave birth to Lopez, told Snow that she was “totally devastated” when she learned what happened. Jones said it was as if “somebody took a hatchet” to her heart.
“She was afraid she was going to lose me,” Ennis explained. “And she wasn’t going to. I wasn’t going to leave her.”
To add to her pain, Ennis also learned that her own biological parents, Joyce and John Brister, had died years earlier before she had a chance to meet them. Although Lopez has regaled her with memories and photographs of the couple, Ennis admitted she was now somewhat jealous of her.
“Jill got to be with my real parents, and now she gets to be with my parents I grew up with,” Ennis told the outlet. “I didn’t know what to think about it at first, but the more I think about it, it makes me really sad.”
Tina was the one who made the discovery in 2019 – when she did an Ancestry.com DNA test to learn more about her granddad.
The results came back with a list of names Tina did not recognize, including the names of those who she would later discover were her biological parents – Joyce and John Brister.
Tina’s mum, Kathryn Jones, took the same test, and sure enough, their results did not match.
That was when Tina’s daughter, 26, suggested her mum may have been switched with someone else at birth.
Ever since Ennis knew that she looked different from her siblings. But she chalked up the differences to her estranged father — Jones’ ex-husband who left when she was just 2. Besides that, she never had reason to believe her family wasn’t related to her.
“I never felt like I didn’t belong,” Ennis insisted.
They filed a lawsuit against the hospital but since it has been years since the facility existed anyone involved with their care at the time is long gone and there’s no knowing exactly what happened that led to the mix-up. The hospital is now known as Duncan Regional Hospital.
Watch it here: Today/Youtube
The hospital released a statement about the lawsuit that the three women filled.
Cyndi Crook, community relations director at Duncan Regional Hospital said “It is the practice of Duncan Regional Hospital to not comment publicly on pending litigation.”
She added “However, in this particular matter, please note that Duncan Regional Hospital is a not-for-profit corporation that did not come into existence until 1976.”
Sources: The Western Journal, Today, New York Post, Metro, People, Daily Mail