A 66-year-old man recently found out that he’s a father to a now-adult woman, and chose to legally adopt her.
Many adopted children feel a desire to find their birth parents. Wanting to know more about the people who made you who you are is understandable, but it’s not always easy.
Jennifer Skiles, now a 46-year-old mother of three, faced many obstacles in her journey to discover who her biological parents were. She chronicled her decades-long search and all of the highs and lows that came with it in her book “Vault of Treasures.” Although the experience was painful at times, she now has a loving father and extended family she can count on.
Skiles found her biological father through a DNA test and connected with him even though he didn’t know she existed.
According to the Washington Post, Skiles lived with her birth mother, Cheryl Brown, until she was 3. Her father’s name was not on her birth certificate, and she had no idea who he was. Skiles was then adopted, and life was good until her teen years. That’s when her family life became toxic, her adoptive parents died, and some of her siblings chose to cut her off.
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Skiles said she felt like she “had lost everybody all at one time,” so she searched for a sense of belonging in her past. She was able to reconnect with Brown through information on her birth certificate. They had a close relationship for 12 years before Brown passed away.
Brown didn’t hide anything from her daughter, and she told her what her father’s name was before her death. Unfortunately, his name alone wasn’t enough to find him, so Skiles took a DNA test and used the results to do some online sleuthing. That’s how she found herself on the phone with Paul Lonardo in 2022, having a conversation that “felt like home.”
Skiles and Lonardo felt an instant bond, but spent time getting to know each other.
Lonardo explained that he and Brown had a brief relationship when they both served in the military in the 1970s. Brown never told Lonardo that she had a baby afterward, but it might have changed everything if she had. He insisted, “If I had known, she would never have been up for adoption.”
The father and daughter promised to talk every day, and a paternity test confirmed what they already knew a few months later. They met in person shortly after and began a years-long journey of what Lonardo called “making up for lost time.”
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There was really no question about how important they were to each other. Skiles shared that she started calling Lonardo “Dad” after their first phone call, and her children refer to him as “Grandpa.” When they got the results of the paternity test, she said, “I knew I loved him.” Still, Lonardo felt like there was one more important step for them to take.
Recently, at the age of 66, he asked the daughter he didn’t know he had, “How about we make it right? Would you mind if I adopt you?” Their families joined each other in a courtroom in January for the emotional legal proceedings. “I was very happy,” Lonardo said. “I hope that others have the same luck I had.”
Skiles and Lonardo’s situation is unique, but that doesn’t mean it can’t have a positive impact.
There are 155,000 children awaiting adoption in the U.S. alone. Obviously, most of those kids are not going to have an almost miraculous experience where they find biological family members who want nothing more than to take them in and have a relationship with them.
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Skiles and Lonardo’s connection still shows how powerful a strong parent-child bond can be, though. Skiles had some positive authority figures in her life, but their influence was pretty inconsistent. There are a lot of benefits to having a dad who’s involved in your life when you’re a kid, of course, but those benefits continue into adulthood.
Skiles now gets to reap the benefits of having a father she loves and who loves her in return. Her story is a reminder that anyone can step in to play an important role in another person’s life at any age, whether they’re related by blood or not.
Mary-Faith Martinez is a writer with a bachelor’s degree in English and Journalism who covers news, psychology, lifestyle, and human interest topics.
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