Edward Di Gangi is a returning guest.

Adopted at birth, Edward Di Gangi was born and raised in New York City. Although he knew for most of his life that he was adopted, it wasn’t until he approached his 70th birthday that he began to search for the identity of his birth mother. His journey and the many surprising discoveries he made as he searched are recounted in his memoir, The Gift Best Given. Edward and his wife now live in Hillsborough, North Carolina. He is a popular book club presenter and podcast guest. The Gift Best Given is his first full-length book.

In this episode, Edward shares the research he continues to do in preparation for his next book, how he has come to better understand the birth mother’s experience, the month of May and how some things have not changed since 1948, the year he was born.

Website: https://www.digangiauthor.com/

Music by Corey Quinn

Heather G. Marshall is an adoptee, author, speaker, teacher, and traveler. Her short fiction has been published in a variety of journals, including Black Middens: New Writing Scotland, and Quarried, an anthology of the best of three decades of Pine Mountain Sand and Gravel. Her first novel, The Thorn Tree, released in 2014 (MP Publishing). When the Ocean Flies, Heather’s second novel (Vine Leaves Press), released in February 2024. Her TED talk, “Letting Go of Expectations,” centers around her adoption and reunion. In addition to writing, Heather is a mindfulness and yoga teacher and offers mindful writing classes and workshops for adoptees. Originally from Scotland, Heather emigrated to Ireland and then the US. She’s currently based in Massachusetts.

Website: heathergmarshall.com When the Ocean Flies

TEDx: "Letting go of Expectations" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=meka3_pUVqc

Music by Corey Quinn

Michael Knox is a returning guest, and after four years of listening to podcasts and interacting with his biological family, he has a different view on adoption. Coming out of the fog, he thinks is a real thing. Nobody can really define it, but there are things that he discovered that might help explain it for some people. The fact that after 25 years of sobriety, his way of handling it was going back to drinking was the wrong way to deal with it.

Michael was adopted in 1961 in Illinois. He grew up with two younger sisters; 1 adopted 1 bio. His family moved to Southern California when he was five. He has been married for 38 years and has three wonderful children and two granddaughters. He worked in the television industry for many years and moved his family to Atlanta work on Olympics and never left Atlanta.

Around 2002, Michael started running, biking and swimming one thing led to another and he started doing Iron Man triathlons. If you asked him to describe himself in 2019 he would say “A husband, father, grandfather & athlete”. He did both Ancestry and 23andMe out of curiosity and was never searching for family. there was a match on 23andMe and life changed forever! Now, he describes himself as ADOPTED, husband, father, grandfather & athlete.

At years 58 years old on July 3 2019, Michael found his birth mom and maternal half brother and sister. With a little more research he found his birth father who passed away in 2011. He had 4 sons and 1 daughter. Michael now has a total of 9 siblings!

Michael's first appearance was during Season 3, episode 44.

Recommended Books: "The Girls Who Went Away"- Ann Fessler, "The Primal Wound"-Nancy Verrier, "The Body Keeps the Score"-Bessell van der Kolk

Recommended Podcasts: Adoptees on, Who am I really?, Adoption; The Making of Me, Pulled by the Root, The Adoption Files, Thriving Adoptees, Voice of Adoptees, Adoption Unfiltered, Unraveling Adoption, Birth Mom’s Real Talk, DNA Surprises, Everything is Relative, and NPE Stories

Music by Corey Quinn