Have A Cup Of Joe With Joe: An Interesting 70 Year Search To Find A Birth Family Finally Is Solved

Thankful For The Answer To “Who’s Your Daddy?”

By Joe McParland

This late August picture in front of the historic Assumption Church — the home parish of the McParlands and Martels — depicts from left: Fred (last name withheld, Joe’s friend); Janice Forsyth (Joe’s neighbour and recently discovered first cousin once removed on the maternal side); Joe McParland (formerly Gary Michael Bensette); Don Martel (Joe’s new brother) and Christopher Martel (Don’s son and Joe’s new nephew). Photo by Rod Denis.

On March 31, 1954, the trajectory of my life was forever changed when Judge Joseph Antoine Legris, in the County of Essex, signed my adoption decree officially naming me Joseph Edward McParland, the infant son of my Adoptive Father (AF), Joseph James McParland and my Adoptive Mother (AM), Elizabeth Catherine McParland.

I wish to make it very clear that my adoptive parents, Elizabeth and Joseph, are, and always will be, MY mom and dad — the amazing couple who specifically chose me as THEIR son, loved me, cared for me, and raised me as their own. I love them deeply and miss them each day they have been gone.

I was born on December 11, 1952 to Margaret Anne Bensette, my Birth Mother, (BM), an unmarried 19 year-old girl. I was 10 years old when my AM explained to me that I was adopted.

A few years later I was snooping through her “private drawer” and found part of my adoption record and learned I was born Gary Michael Bensette.

No other information was provided.

Fast forward 40 years to June 2009, Ontario opened adoption records for adoptees and natural parents. An adopted person could now obtain his or her original Statement of Birth with the names and addresses of the birth parents.

I applied in September 2009 for my records. I received them and the Statement of Birth confirmed my birth name, and supplied my BM’s name, age, occupation, and address. It turns out that my BM lived two streets directly east of where I grew up on Partington Avenue.

However, missing from the Statement of Birth was data about the paternal side of my birth; it was blank. This showed that no one knew who my Birth Father (BF) was.

Over the past decade, through social media and library research, I’ve contacted relatives of my BM who passed away in 1989 from cancer. I received some maternal medical family history and family photos from some of them.

However, according to my Family Doctor Frank DeMarco: “It’s paternal medical history that is much more important to have.”

But how to obtain it, since my BF is unknown?

My friend Fred (last name withheld) is a retired librarian and I shared with him that I was adopted as an infant.

He suggested that I take an AncestryDNA test (Ancestry.ca), which he offered to interpret for me. I honestly wasn’t interested. I didn’t think that a DNA test could ever find my Birth Father.

However, Fred kept subtly suggesting AncestryDNA and I eventually agreed to it.

I ordered the kit, spat in a tube, and sent it off to the lab in Ireland. Weeks later, my results