Lucy Greenwell
๐ค SpeakerAppearances Over Time
Podcast Appearances
Her story is remarkably similar to Jess's and I've been wondering if any of this gets easier.
Whether there's a point when a foundling makes peace with what's happened to them.
So I suggest the two of them speak.
Jess is a bit wary at first.
I'm not sure she wants to see herself reflected back, but she goes along with it.
Like Jess, Janet was a teenager when her adoptive parents decided it was time to tell her the full story, that she was found in California in 1981.
When she learns the details, she's angry at her mother, says she feels she's been tossed aside.
Then she has kids, and just like for Jess, it gets even harder.
She's thinking, why didn't my mother love me like I love my kids?
For years, she presumes she'll just never know.
But like Jess, at a certain point, she can no longer live with the blanks.
In 2013, when Janet's 32, she tries to find the person who spotted her and who called the police.
A woman who'd now be in her late 50s or early 60s.
Janet holds her sign up in front of the camera and she posts the photo on Facebook.
Within days, Janet's meeting Joanne Hauser.
A friend videos their meeting.
It's emotional.
Janet's so grateful for the fragments Joanne remembers about that day.
But Joanne's got no idea about who Janet's mother might be.
A year later, Janet does what Jess did, a DNA test.