15 Years after Baby's Birth, Strange Girl Showed up on Couple's Doorstep Claiming She Is Their Daughter

A girl's biggest fears came true when a child service worker contacted her parents to inform them about their biological daughter.

All her life, people had mocked the girl for not resembling her parents and not performing well at school like her siblings. They'd call her "the ugly duckling" of the family.

Everything started making sense when she heard the child service worker talk about her parents' biological daughter, Sofia.

The child service worker told her parents that Sofia was recently orphaned and had genetic ties to their family. OP's (Original Poster's) parents investigated the case, which led them to a shocking truth.

After Sofia's parents died in a car accident, child services planned to place her into foster care. Just then, she decided to buy a DNA test kit to see if she had any distant relatives who'd be willing to take care of her.

She was stunned when she saw the results and learned she had parents and siblings out there somewhere. She immediately told the child service workers about it.

They took the test results and confirmed that Sofia was the biological daughter of OP's parents. Upon further investigation, they concluded that the hospital management mistakenly swapped Sofia with OP at the time of their birth.

She even got bullied at school, which made things worse for everyone

OP's parents happily agreed to take care of Sofia and welcomed her into their family. On the other hand, OP's anxiety kicked in watching her parents welcome their real daughter into their home. She felt terrible seeing her family members happy to reunite with Sofia.

Drenched in self-pity, OP didn't realize Sofia was going through much worse, but she explained:

"I never really fit in with my family and have always been very self conscious about it."

People called her "ugly duckling" because she looked nothing like her parents when she was little. She also noticed that unlike her, her siblings and parents were naturally-gifted athletes and performed well in school. Her siblings were also among the popular kids, while she struggled to interact with new people. She even got bullied at school, which made things worse for everyone.

When she saw Sofia for the first time, she noticed how her skin and hair color matched her parents and siblings. "She's so obviously a better fit in the family, even my cousins commented on it," she said.

When Sofia joined OP's school, she noticed how everyone, including the teachers, liked her. She compared herself to Sofia and felt worthless.

A month ago, OP received an award for her digital artwork, but her parents refused to go to the exhibit because they hadn't gotten their booster shots yet. However, when Sofia won a student leader award, they threw a party to celebrate it.

Although OP knew that Sofia's award was much bigger than hers and her parents had gotten booster shots by then, she still felt terrible watching them standing proudly beside Sofia. This prompted her to walk out of the party. She explained what happened then:

"Sofia saw I was going from across the room and asked kind of loud where I was going, and then everyone turned to stare at me and just I started crying and ran away."

OP confessed she felt terrible knowing she wasn't her parents' real daughter and that she couldn't meet her biological parents because they died in a car accident.

Twenty-one days after posting her story on Reddit, she wrote another post updating Redditors about her situation. She shared that while she held Sofia responsible for everything, she later discovered that she was the one who understood her feelings very well.

After OP left the party, Sofia followed her and found her in the old treehouse. She climbed and hugged OP, telling her the party didn't matter and that OP was more important to her. OP apologized for spoiling it.

Hearing Sofia's words made OP feel even more terrible. She couldn't believe Sofia cared for her so much and felt she didn't deserve it. She recalled:

"For the next week relatives scolded me about 'overreacting', but it didn't hurt so bad because someone was on my side."

A few days later, Sofia urged OP to take her to the exhibit to see her digital artwork. She praised OP and made her feel like she was exceptionally talented.

When the girls went shopping, Sofia recommended OP the cream her late mother used, thinking it would help OP because their skin types must be similar. It turned out that the cream did make OP's acne disappear.

OP remembered when Sofia broke down in tears while telling her that she had her mother's nose and her father's eyes. She even said that OP's laugh reminded her of her father.

OP confessed that she had stopped resenting Sofia because she now understood why her parents clicked with her better. She was also grateful to Sofia for defending her whenever her cousins or schoolmates bullied her. Sofia stood with her when no one else did, and that's what made OP believe she was her true sister.

Other Redditors were delighted after reading the update on OP's post. Elisemiet praised OP's biological parents for raising a beautiful person. KneelNotKneal replied:

"I’m so happy the sister is on OP’s side but SHAME on the parents for clearly neglecting them so much now that their “real” daughter is around."

DarthKrayt98 agreed and felt OP's parents should acknowledge that she also lost her biological parents when Sofia lost her mother and father.

Meanwhile, emzbobo highlighted OP's struggle considering she learned her parents were not her birth parents and she also had no way of meeting her biological parents who were already dead. She questioned:

"Have the parents who've raised her even bothered to talk to her about how's she's feeling about all of this, or offered to get her into therapy?"

Most Redditors agreed Sofia's biological parents were at fault for not acknowledging what OP was going through. They sympathized with OP and praised Sofia for understanding her feelings.

Questions to Ponder:

Do you think OP's biological parents indirectly helped her?

It might be right to think that OP's biological parents indirectly helped her by raising such a wonderful human being. If Sofia wasn't kind and considerate, things would have been much different for OP. She might have needed a therapist to help her accept Sofia's presence. What do you think?

Would you blame OP's parents for being insensitive?

Most Redditors agreed that OP's parents needed to pay attention to her feelings. Instead, they only focused on celebrating their reunion with Sofia. Do you also think they were insensitive towards OP?

If you enjoyed reading this story, you might like this one about a man who refused to look at his daughter after her birth and demanded a paternity test.

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