Marine vet and long-lost daughter reunited after 60 years

• Tylin Rosser, 62, only learned recently that the dad she knew all along was only her stepfather.
• With the help of a DNA test, Tylin was able to find her dad, a Marine veteran her mom met while he was stationed in the Philippines.
• Tylin and her dad Thomas Williams met on July 4, and were able to catch up and get to know each other more.

It could have been mixed emotions when Tylin Rosser, 62, knew that her step-father, whom she had long known as her dad, wasn’t her real pop.

The only time her mother told her the truth was when her stepdad passed away. The decades-old secret shocked Tylin, but what was more appalling was that all her mother could remember “was just William,” as she was suffering the effects of dementia.

Tylin’s daughter gave her a DNA test from Ancestry.com.

“I got some information maybe about 6 weeks later saying Carla Minor Williams was a cousin or close relative,” Tylin said. “I said that must be the ‘William’ my mom was always saying.”

That was close enough. Carla Williams is one of his biological dad’s American children who decided to surprise him. So, they flew Tylin, her children and her grandchildren from their home in Ohio to Alabama on July 4. And finally, Tylin was meeting her dad, Thomas William, for the first time in her life.

“I think about you all the time. I always did,” Thomas, 81, said as he wrapped his arms around Tylin.

Marine vet dad and daughter meet after more than 60 years following DNA site link-up https://t.co/i37g8zsNAK— CBS News (@CBSNews) July 5, 2021

“I’m here,” his emotional daughter replied.

“God answers prayers,” the elderly man responded.

The two had the time to catch up, and Tylin was able to know his story. He said that he knew he had fathered a baby during a relationship he had while stationed in the Philippines, but didn’t know how to find the child.

“A friend of mine in the Marines showed me a picture and I didn’t know whether it was a little girl or boy because it was so small, and he said ‘this is your baby,’” the Marine veteran told his long-lost daughter.

Tylin also learned that her dad had a tattoo he’d gotten while in the Philippines, and the reason why he didn’t reach out to her.

“My mother got terminally ill,” he said. “That’s the only reason I didn’t come back there, but then after that I didn’t know how to find you.”

Good thing, now, they have set eyes on each other, after all those years apart.

Source: Inside Edition