A Mother Was Made To Choose Between Her Two Kids, But Decades Later A Miracle Happened

By Berni’s own admission, she was a perfectionist from a young age. As a teenager, she embarked on a career as a banker fresh from high school and went on to juggle full-time work with her college studies, just so she could reach her dreams sooner. Her lofty ambitions buried her memories of her painful past — for a while.

For 20 years, Berni built up a successful career in the banking sector. At that point, though, the financial collapse occurred, plunging the economy into recession. The downturn then negatively impacted the financier’s life. Indeed, she came to find that work was more hostile and the culture no longer lined up with her own values.

With that in mind, Berni chose to leave her career in banking behind and began looking for a new job. The recession, however, meant that she was not overwhelmed with options. She spent two years searching for an opportunity with no luck and feared she’d made a terrible mistake.

These feelings of despair would ultimately stir up painful memories from Berni’s childhood. That’s because she’d never forgotten a tragic event that occurred during her early years. This incident would go on to affect the rest of the former banker’s life and lead her to wonder if there was something she could have done to prevent it.

Berni was born in Vietnam in the early 1970s, at the height of the Vietnam War. She and her younger sister Rose were, in some ways, products of the bitter conflict — their mother was South Vietnamese and their father was an American GI. And that the tumultuous time would go on to shape much of her life.

The Vietnam War finally drew to a conclusion after 20 years in 1975. It ended in defeat for the Americans and the Southern Vietnamese, with North Vietnamese troops seizing Saigon. To mark their victory on April 30, Viet Cong flags were raised on top of the city’s Independence Palace.

As the Viet Cong closed in on Saigon, American helicopters began evacuating South Vietnamese and foreign nationals out of the city on April 29, 1975. In scenes that would become iconic, the last U.S. Marines then fled by helicopter from the roof of the American Embassy in the early hours of April 30.

Berni remembers the Fall of Saigon well, even though she was only four at the time. At a TED Talk in 2016, she recalled, “It was pandemonium. We would always hear the beating of helicopters, and we could hear the sirens and even the smell of war around us. But it became such second nature that we were just children in the courtyard and all we wanted to do was play kick the can.”

Nevertheless, Berni and her family were among the crowds set to flee the city. The trio were eligible for rescue due to worries about what might happen to them at the hands of the North Vietnamese. But there was a specific reason for them to fear the conquering troops. In 2019 she told CBS Denver, “There were a lot of rumors that Vietnamese women with Amerasian babies would be tortured.”

With that in mind, Berni, Rose, and their mother were due to be airlifted out of Saigon before it fell. Before they could all reach safety, though, a heartbreaking turn of events would cause the youngest sibling to be separated from her family, just hours before they were due to leave. And the devastating events had a long-lasting effect on the former banker.

Speaking to the Northeast Denver newspaper The Front Porch in 2019, Berni explained the circumstances around her sister’s disappearance. She said, “We kids were playing in the courtyard of our apartment complex when, suddenly, my two-year-old sister, Rose, wasn’t there. My aunt, who was watching us, was frantic. Somehow Rose had gotten out through the gate and into the street.”

Berni’s mother began to look for Rose in a panic, but she was lost to the chaos of the city. As the frantic search for the toddler continued, her family’s flight to the U.S. drew ever closer. And in the end, the frantic mom of two was faced with the agonizing choice of staying in Saigon to find her missing daughter or boarding a plane to safety.

The former banker would later tell The Front Porch, “Mom had a terrible decision to make: keep looking for her missing child or evacuate with the daughter she still had. As a mother, I can’t imagine having to make that choice… We thought we’d never see Rose again, that she was lost forever.”

Faced with this unimaginable decision, in the end, Berni’s mother chose to leave Saigon. She and her eldest daughter made the arduous journey to the United States, where her husband was already waiting for them. The family moved first to Grand Island, Nebraska, before making a home in Littleton, CO, in 1984.

Berni’s parents went on to have a further three children in the U.S. But they never mentioned the daughter they’d lost during the fall of Saigon. This silence left the couple’s oldest child with unanswered questions. As the former banker told CBS Denver, “I could never understand it entirely, and my mother never spoke of it.”

Even worse, Berni felt in some way responsible for Rose’s disappearance. During her TED Talk, she explained, “I thought that maybe it was my fault... I had done something wrong because my aunt had looked at me and asked me, ‘Why weren’t you watching your sister?’ And I thought that maybe my mother had blamed me.”

Over the years, Berni came to suspect that Rose’s disappearance had eaten her mother up inside. She’d had to, after all, live with the shame and guilt of leaving her daughter all alone in Saigon. But the little girl’s disappearance had an effect on her older sister as well, and eventually, she returned to Vietnam in 1995 to search for her lost sibling.

Berni was not successful in locating Rose during that trip. And alas, her mother died in 2012 without reuniting with her long-lost daughter. The former banker believed a broken heart partially caused her mom’s death. She told CBS Denver, “One of the last things she told me was she always wished she could find Rose to bring her here, and so I know she really wanted a reunion. [...] It haunted her for the rest of her years.”

As a result, Berni kept searching for Rose in the wake of her mom’s death. She even opened up about her sister’s disappearance during her TED Talk in 2016, with the vague hope that it might somehow reach her sibling and the pair could finally reunite. But the former banker never heard from her and began to fear that she never would.

Little did Berni know that there would be some news of her sister in the following years. It all began with an email in December 2018, and from there, the former banker would finally start to piece together what had happened to Rose after she went missing. And she learned that her sister hadn’t been abducted, as her mother had feared.

Berni told The Front Porch, “Everyone has their own version of what happened based on their personal perspective... My mother had thought Rose was abducted because kids were being kidnapped during that time.” But it seems that was not what happened in Rose’s case.

Instead, Berni discovered that Rose had been found wandering around Saigon and was subsequently taken to a nearby police station. It was here that she met the woman who would come to adopt her. She later emigrated to the U.S. with her adopted family, moving to Texas and then the West Coast.

Berni came to learn about Rose’s fate through a woman called Vannessa Pham. She, too, had moved from South Vietnam to America in the years following the war. And like the former banker, she was also searching for long-lost family members. Soon enough, one thing became clear.

It turned out that Vannessa was, in fact, Rose, the sister Berni had always longed to find. Recalling what happened after being found on the streets of Saigon, Vannessa told The Front Porch, “I slept in a jail cell at night and played outside […] during the day. After about 10 days, a policeman put me on his motorcycle, bound for the Operation Babylift airplane to the U.S. But the motorcycle broke down, so we didn’t make it.”

But the faulty motorcycle may have saved Vannessa’s life. She explained, “The plane took off and exploded over the airfield, killing everyone aboard. So, the officer asked his co-worker if she could take me, and she adopted me.” Having agreed to take the little girl in, she eventually renamed her Vannessa and raised her alongside her other children.

Aged 11, Vannessa moved with her adopted family to America, where she had no idea her biological sister was also living. In fact, the little girl didn’t even know that she was adopted, or how she’d been found as an infant. Although Vanessa did have her suspicions growing up that she was somehow different.

Vannessa revealed how her adoptive siblings would make mean comments about how she didn’t belong in their family. First, the young girl realized that she didn’t look like them or her parents. As she told CBS Denver, “It just grew more suspicious. And there were more things.”

In May 2018 Vannessa finally learned the truth – that she’d been adopted after being found all alone in Saigon at the age of two. The revelation was an emotional one for her. She told CBS Denver, “I remember crying so much when she told me that for the first time. It was a relief.”

One of Vannessa’s first thoughts was for her biological relatives who would have no idea what happened to her. She revealed how she’d thought, “I need to go find my own family. I need to go find my mom, she might be looking for me.” But deep down, she had little hope of reuniting with her family.

As a result, Vannessa had practically resigned herself to the possibility she might never reunite with her biological family. Then, she saw an ad for a DNA service on TV. The then-45-year-old figured she had nothing to lose. So she decided to buy one in the hope it might link her to some long-lost relatives.

Vannessa bought a $99 test and returned it with her saliva swabs. And in just a few days, she learned that her DNA matched with some relatives in Colorado. Revealing her reaction to this news, she told CBS Colorado, “It just made me feel so happy. Oh my God, this is confirmation!”

First, Vannessa reached out via email to a distant cousin she found on the DNA database. He then told her that she might have three sisters and a brother, Berni among them. And after some cross-referencing with various ancestry websites, it was confirmed that Vannessa and Berni were indeed full sisters.

Vannessa later described her reaction to the news that she was Berni’s long-lost sister. She told The Front Porch, “It was like a dream.” Though her joy was tinged with sorrow when she discovered that their mother had died in 2012, meaning that she would never get to meet her.

The 45-year-old then described what it was like to hear of the death of her mother. Vannessa told CBS Denver, “It felt like a thousand heavy weights dropped. It was like a big disappointment. And I was like, ‘I am only six years late.’” But at least she had Berni and her other siblings to tell her all about their mom.

The siblings finally reunited in January 2019, when Vannessa flew from California, where she lives, to meet them in Denver. For Berni, it had been almost 44 years since she’d last seen her little sister, and they had a lot of catching up to do. So they spent a long weekend in each other’s company, just talking, laughing, and crying.

Upon their reunion, Berni told Vannessa, “I don’t know how long you have been searching, but for me, it’s been a very long time. It’s surreal that you are here sitting next to me.” During the meeting, she told her sister the name their parents had given her. As a result, she started calling herself Vannessa Rose.

A month after their initial meeting in Denver, Berni and her family visited Vannessa in California. The two sisters remained in constant contact and even planned to return to their native Vietnam together, in an attempt to retrace their past and visit family there. This included their aunt and an older half-brother.

Vannessa also hopes to one day build a relationship with her biological father, who has remarried and lives in Texas. The return of his long-lost daughter came as a major shock to him. So while they’ve been in touch through Facebook, he wants to take things slow, which she respects.

After all, Vannessa was struggling to come to terms with the reunion herself. She told CBS Denver, “This is a dream… And I’m afraid to wake up. I have been walking for so long. I have been gone, walking and wandering for 43 years, and I just want to come home, and I found my way home.” When it came to their DNA tests, these sisters were incredibly lucky...

Because for some other families, these genetic revelations have made their lives incredibly complicated. When Rebecca Cartellone purchased her mom and dad DNA testing kits for Christmas, she thought the trio could explore their family history together. Perhaps she and her parents could bond over tracing their roots, too. But at the time, Rebecca had no idea just how much trouble her well-intentioned gift would cause. You see, when the Cartellones received the results of their respective tests, they uncovered a dark – and completely shocking – secret.

Rebecca had been born in November 1994 to Joseph and Jennifer Cartellone, and she had remained the couple’s much beloved only child even as she grew up. In time, though, the Cartellones’ daughter was eager to learn more about her unique family heritage, which was Italian on her father’s side.

With that in mind, Rebecca decided to gift her parents DNA tests so that they could all learn more about their roots. She would undergo the same procedure, too, so that she and her mom and dad could examine their shared heritage together. As Rebecca handed over the presents to her folks, though, she had no idea that the findings would come to tear her world apart.

It’s fair to say that at-home DNA testing has emerged as something of a phenomenon in the last decade. That rise seems to have been fueled, moreover, by the public’s interest in family history. In 2014, in fact, genealogy became the second most popular hobby in the United States. And the concept of tracing one’s heritage is now a billion-dollar enterprise that is catered to by a number of websites, books and TV shows.

Meanwhile, genetic testing kits as we know them today first hit the market in 2007 – the same year that 23andMe launched its saliva-based DNA test. Family history giant Ancestry followed by launching its own DNA service in 2012, and this has since risen to become one of the most popular such schemes in the world. It may have helped, however, that as of 2019 Ancestry has accumulated over ten million people on its database – thus making the chances of finding previously unknown relatives a distinct possibility.

So, how do these tests work? Well, naturally, they require a user to provide a DNA sample, and this typically comes by way of a spit cup, a cheek swab, mouthwash or even chewing gum. The customer then returns their completed kit to a provider, which subsequently analyzes the DNA to give an estimate of that person’s ethnicity. But while the results can give some fascinating insights into your heritage, there are nevertheless some risks to the process, too.

You see, as DNA genealogy testing has risen in popularity, occasional horror stories have emerged. There are people who have been given the wrong results, for instance, while others have made discoveries that have changed their lives forever. So while the equipment used in the analysis of your DNA is generally sound, the findings themselves may come as a shock.

For example, one man claimed online that he had unknowingly been dating his half-sister. According to the poster, the couple had known beforehand that they had both been born through IVF and sperm donation, and so they had each hoped to learn more about their paternal heritage. The anonymous Reddit user added that his girlfriend had therefore bought both of them DNA test kits for Christmas.

The Redditor said, however, that when the pair had received their DNA results, they had found that they were in fact half-siblings who shared the same father. It seemed likely, then, that both had been conceived using sperm from the same donor. And when sharing the news in 2019, the poster revealed his astonishment, writing, “I have to express what my mental state is now. To put it in simple words: I feel traumatized.”

The man in question also posted what appeared to be the results from the DNA service and claimed that he’d been torn between his love for his girlfriend and the notion that they’d been unwittingly committing incest. And as you can imagine, the discovery apparently left both him and his partner in utter shock and desperately seeking further answers.

Elsewhere online, there are countless stories of people who have found out the real truth of their parentage. For instance, in 2018 The Guardian relayed the story of a woman named only as Michèle, who had reportedly discovered that the man who had raised her as his daughter wasn’t her biological father.

Prior to sending off her DNA for analysis, Michèle had taken a keen interest in her heritage. In fact, she’d managed to trace her supposed father’s bloodline all the way back to the 1600s. When the results of the DNA test came back, however, they were at odds with what Michèle had learned; instead, they claimed that she was around half Italian. And, understandably, the puzzled woman duly went to her nearest and dearest for answers.

But while Michèle’s mother claimed not to know anything about her daughter’s Italian ancestry, another family member appeared more clued up. You see, the Ancestry database suggested that Michèle had first cousins with an Italian surname in her hometown of Syracuse, New York. And Michèle’s aunt was able to link her niece to the strangers, too.

In fact, Michèle’s relative recalled something astonishing: when Michèle’s mom had been 18, she’d had a prom date who happened to possess the same last name as the cousins in Syracuse. And while, sadly, this man had since died, it nonetheless seemed likely that he was Michèle’s biological father.

Yet genealogist Debbie Kennett knows that Michèle’s experience is not all that uncommon. Indeed, Kennett told The Guardian that DNA testing may actually open up a “can of worms” for certain people. She added, “There have been a lot of secrets covered up in the past, and they are starting to come out.”

Revealing what happens in such cases, Kennett continued, “When people get these unexpected findings, they tend to distrust the science at first... But even close matches can only reveal so much in isolation. The DNA on its own doesn’t give the science; you need the contextual family information as well.”

As a result of such cases, then, Catherine St Clair launched the NPE Friends Facebook group in 2017. “NPE” stands for “Not Parent Expected,” with the community itself being a place that people can join after DNA testing reveals that their mothers or fathers are not who they believed they were. St Clair created the group, moreover, after she discovered that the man who had raised her was not her biological dad.

Describing how she had felt when she had unearthed her true parentage, St Clair told the New York Post in 2018, “You feel completely alone and isolated. It’s like having an infection that’s deep under your skin that keeps festering. And it’s painful, and it’s getting worse and worse. Only after it’s exposed to air can it start to heal.”

It’s safe to say, then, that some people who’ve partaken in at-home DNA testing have discovered more than they bargained for. And as it happens, the Cartellones would find themselves among that unfortunate group. Yes, after they had received the results of their individual genealogy kits, the tight-knit family came to see that they had been living a lie.

It only became clear that something was amiss, however, when Rebecca, Joseph and Jennifer’s DNA results came back in February 2019. These findings showed that while Rebecca appeared to be matched to her mother, there seemed to be less of a link with her father. In fact, it appeared that Rebecca and Joseph had no genetic makeup in common.

And when talking to Good Morning America in August 2019, Joseph revealed what had subsequently transpired. The distraught dad said, “When we looked at the results, what we immediately noticed was that there were no traces of Italian DNA in [Rebecca’s results] at all... And her DNA matched my wife’s pretty closely.”

At first, then, Joseph believed that there had been some kind of mistake with the DNA results, and this led him to call the kit’s maker. In response, though, the company explained the process that the samples underwent. And, ultimately, Joseph began to realize that there was a chance he and Rebecca weren’t related after all.

So, in order to get to the bottom of the mystery, Joseph and Rebecca took a paternity test together. And when the results of that study came back, the pair’s greatest fear was realized: they were not biologically connected at all. Joseph went on to explain to Good Morning America, “My disbelief turned quickly to shock and then ultimately to anger that this could possibly be the case.”

In an attempt to find answers to his questions, though, Joseph had to go all the way back to 1993. During that year, he and Jennifer had visited what was then named the Greater Cincinnati Institute for Reproductive Health after they had experienced difficulties conceiving. And after seeing what offers they had on the table, the couple had decided to try in vitro fertilization, or IVF.

As many will know, IVF involves an egg being fertilized with sperm in a lab environment before it is implanted inside a woman’s uterus. And before the Cartellones underwent the procedure, they had been assured that Joseph’s sperm would be used to inseminate Jennifer’s eggs. So, just what had gone wrong?

Well, in light of Rebecca’s DNA results, it appears that sperm belonging to someone else was used during the IVF process. Naturally, then, the Cartellone family felt as though they had been betrayed. Speaking at a news conference in August 2019, Joseph explained, “This has been extremely difficult for my family.”

Joseph continued, “I never would have imagined the Christmas gift of a home DNA kit would unveil this kind of abuse of our trust. For our daughter Rebecca, it’s even tougher. She’s experiencing significant emotional stress and confusion concerning her own identity.” It appeared, too, that the results had also had a major impact on the man who had previously assumed he was Rebecca’s biological father.

Speaking candidly at the news conference, Joseph said, “It’s hard to explain the shock and agony when you find out that someone you love and care for — your own daughter — is not genetically related to you… There’s a mix of anger, pain and confusion that comes along with having to accept this and having to break the news to our family.”

And while speaking about Jennifer’s reaction, Joseph revealed, “She has to deal with the fact that this clinic… fertilized her eggs with a complete stranger’s sperm and placed them in her body… She’s profoundly disappointed that she can no longer give birth to a child with both of our genetics... And that’s exactly why we sought the help of doctors… in the first place.”

So, after making their shocking discovery, Joseph and Jennifer filed a civil lawsuit against The Christ Hospital Health Network, Ovation Fertility Cincinnati and what is today called the Institute for Reproductive Health. In particular, the Cartellones alleged that the original lab that had helped them conceive Rebecca had in fact used another man’s sperm.

The law firm representing the family, Peiffer Wolf Carr & Kane, specializes in taking on fertility clinics for alleged misconduct. And while speaking at the Cartellones’ press conference, managing shareholder Joseph C. Peiffer said of the family’s case, “This is a massive betrayal of trust and an unthinkable break of trust.”

According to the firm, moreover, only one of five people could be Rebecca’s biological father – with a doctor at The Christ Hospital allegedly among these individuals. Crucially, The Christ Hospital had previously been associated with the Greater Cincinnati Institute for Reproductive Health, where Joseph and Jennifer had undergone IVF.

Commenting on Rebecca’s potential paternity, the Cartellones’ lawyer Adam Wolf told the Daily Mail, “The defense should go through their records and find whose sperm they used to create the embryo… We have no idea if this was intentional or a horrifically negligent accident. We’ve asked, but we’ve been met with radio silence.”

And as you would expect, Joseph and Jennifer had signed a contract with The Christ Hospital before the procedure went ahead. However, according to an August 2019 report by CNN, the medical establishment was withholding comment owing to the pending litigation. Instead, The Christ Hospital simply stated that it was “evaluating the allegations surrounding events alleged to have occurred in the early 1990s.”

The affiliated Institute for Reproductive Health, by contrast, issued a statement that said it hadn’t been in operation in 1994. Any possible error, then, lay at the feet of The Christ Hospital’s former lab. The message to CNN read, “Because this alleged incident occurred in The Christ Hospital’s laboratory before our practice and laboratory existed, we cannot comment on what may or may not have occurred in their laboratory.” But perhaps it’s not that straightforward.

You see, Wolf has claimed that the lab director and doctor who had previously worked at the original Greater Cincinnati Institute were now based at the newer Institute for Reproductive Health. Even so, neither of those people were named as defendants in the lawsuit, which alleges negligence and breach of contract.

According to CNN, the lawsuit also asserts that Jennifer was the victim of battery, as she hadn’t agreed to have her embryo fertilized by a stranger. With that in mind, the Cartellones were seeking financial compensation of an unknown sum; the couple have also requested the name of Rebecca’s biological dad along with his medical history.

In addition, the Cartellones are apparently eager to know if Joseph’s sperm was used elsewhere. In August 2019 Wolf told NBC-affiliated channel WCMH-TV, “If you provide sperm to create an embryo, and you find out that sperm was not used for your daughter, you have to wonder, ‘Where did your sperm go?’”

Plus, Wolf and his clients have called for a change in the way in which the fertility industry is run in the United States. The lawyer explained to the Daily Mail, “There need to be mandatory inspections of facilities, consequences if something in the facility [goes wrong] and certification requirements for fertility clinics… In most states, you don’t need even need to be certified to run. In Ohio, you can open up a center in your basement.”

As of 2021, the Cartellones’ suit continues to make its way through legal proceedings, although it may be a long journey to the truth. And in the meantime, Rebecca can only wonder about who she is and whether she has further biological relatives – ones that she may not have known about if it hadn’t been for an at-home DNA test.