‘DNA don’t lie’: Longview woman who was adopted finds long lost family members

LONGVIEW, Texas (KLTV) - As we move into the holiday season, family becomes priority with East Texans. For one East Texas woman, family has taken on a new meaning, because it’s family she never knew she had.

Family lineage and generation history is something that Longview dance teacher Tempe Kirby never paid much attention to growing up. She was adopted.

“People would ask me all the time if I would try to find my family, and I’d say, ‘Oh my God, no. I have a happy life,’” she says.

That all changed about five years ago when her sister, who was diagnosed with breast cancer, got a DNA test kit for her.

“She sent me an ancestry kit, told me to spit in it,” Tempe says.

A match came back, and suddenly all that she was unconcerned about for over 50 years was about to change.

It started with a phone call to a woman she’d never met.

“Panic. I said, ‘There’s something I want to tell you. I think I’m your sister.’ She goes ‘Well, sister! DNA don’t lie. I’m going to call my Aunt Weezer,” Kirby said.

Her biological family had been only 60 miles away.

“My new family is from Atlanta, Texas,” Kirby said.

That includes a brother, a sister and extended family.

“Within the next week my brother actually drove here and surprised me at the office,” she said.

The newfound family has opened a new chapter for new memories.

“Well, that gives Christmas a whole new meaning. We need more presents. Now I just have this huge one happy family and I realize that a lot of people don’t experience that. And I realize how lucky that I am,” Kirby said, her voice quivering with emotion.

Kirby says the families try to gather together as one when they are able to on holidays.

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