What If Your Identity Was Built on a Secret? Late-Discovery Adoption, Family Secrets & Reclaiming Identity with Al Isaacs

What happens when everyone in your family knows the truth about your life except you? Al Isaacs, author of Finding Mary Smith and longtime comedian and improv teacher, joins Lisa Lacy to talk about discovering at 52 that he had been adopted and what happens to identity when the foundation of your own story suddenly shifts. Al takes us inside the ordinary phone call from his mother’s oncologist that accidentally exposed a secret his family had kept for more than five decades, and the search that followed through DNA, genealogy, Search Angels and the trail of a folk singer named Mary Smith. The conversation also moves into imposter syndrome, forgiveness, the power of improv’s “yes, and,” and the painful cost of family secrets, including the conversations we may lose when truth is withheld. In this episode: Late-discovery adoption and identity Family secrets, truth and belonging Gray-market adoption in the late 1960s DNA testing, genealogy and Search Angels Searching for a biological mother decades later Imposter syndrome and reclaiming identity Forgiveness without erasing what happened How “yes, and” helped Al keep moving when he wanted to give up The memories and relationships family secrecy can cost us Connect with Al: AlIsaacs.com Finding Mary Smith is available in paperback, eBook and audiobook. Connect with Lisa: LisaLacy.com What did you perform in order to survive? Welcome to the Edge. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.