I discovered that my husband, Paul, was having an affair with our next-door neighbor. When I confronted him, he admitted it and filed for divorce. But I told him he was going to pay through the nose in child support.

“I’m not going to pay because I’ll get full custody of those kids!” he yelled. I laughed, but he smiled smugly as if he knew something I didn’t. We started our court proceedings, and my husband started lying through his nose.

“My wife traveled all the time during her pregnancies and came back with a baby. I think she tricked me and used an illegal surrogate to have my babies. But they don’t belong to her,” he told the judge.

I couldn’t believe he would say something so crazy. I delivered all three of my children, but he wasn’t around because he always drank with his buddies. He never saw me giving birth.

“Let’s get a DNA test, and it’ll show that those kids are mine but not hers!” Paul exclaimed again. The judge didn’t believe him but ordered the tests anyway. Much to everyone’s shock, he was right.

My three children, who I carried for nine months, didn’t share my DNA. “This is impossible,” I muttered during our meeting with the lawyers and the judge.

“See? She can’t have those children because they’re mine, and she probably did something illegal to avoid being a mother herself. She’s a criminal, Your Honor. You can’t let her have custody,” Paul added.

My lawyer protested and stated that despite DNA results, I was still their legal mother. But after considering the evidence, the judge ruled in my husband’s favor. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Warren. But until we conduct a formal investigation into this, the children will stay with their father,” the judge declared.

“No, this can’t be happening to me,” I cried to my lawyer, Mr. Wombs.

“This is not over, Amanda. But you need to tell me the truth. Did you do something illegal? Did you use a surrogate and lie to your husband? Right now, the judge believes Mr. Warren because the DNA proved his words right,” Mr. Wombs asked.

“Yes! I swear those babies are mine. I carried them. I spent 15 hours in labor with my first son, Luca. Mason and Frankie took around 10 hours each, but all three are mine!” I declared vehemently.

Ok. I believe you. I’m going to find out what happened,” Mr. Wombs replied. But I was too distraught at losing my babies to believe him. Did Paul fake those results? Did he pay a doctor to alter them? What happened?

A few days later, Mr. Wombs called me and asked me to get some tests done. “Listen, one of my friends is a doctor, and he told me about a case similar to yours. Now, it’s rare, and I don’t want to get your hopes up. But did anyone ever talk to you about chimera?”

“No, what is that?” I asked.

“My friend explained that it’s a condition where a living being has two sets of DNA. In humans, that can only happen when one twin absorbs the other.”

“OMG! But wouldn’t the doctors have caught it when my mother was pregnant?” I wondered.

“I don’t know. I’m not a physician myself, but we’re going to see a few specialists and discover if this happened to you,” Mr. Wombs assured.

We went to see several people, including DNA specialist Dr. Zack Goldman, who confirmed my condition. I absorbed my twin so early while my mother was pregnant that her doctor wouldn’t have noticed she was carrying twins at all.

“You see, Your Honor. The DNA in Mrs. Warren’s hair and skin doesn’t match the same for her three children, but the specialist collected DNA from her cervical region, which matched the kids,” Mr. Wombs told the judge.

“They are lying! That’s not possible!” Paul screamed.

“Luckily, I have proof from past medical journals that this has happened to other women before. It’s rare, but Mrs. Warren is carrying both her DNA and her twin’s. Her children inherited one set of her DNA that can be found in other places of her body,” Mr. Wombs explained.

After reviewing the records, the judge ruled in my favor. He granted the divorce, and my ex-husband had to pay a huge amount for child support and restitution for the pain he caused me with his lies.

I researched everything about chimera and even got close to the specialist who had helped Mr. Wombs clear my case. As fate would have it, we eventually got married and pregnant. He was there to see me give birth.

Oh, and my ex-husband? His mistress dumped him because he had no money. You gotta love karma!

What can we learn from this story?

• The truth will always come out. Paul lied in court to avoid paying child support, but the truth prevailed in the end.
• Be informed. While Amanda couldn’t have known anything about chimera, research and being more informed helped her gain her children’s custody back.

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If you enjoyed this story, you might like this one about a man who rewrote his will but lost everything dear to him.

This account is inspired by our reader’s story but written by a professional writer. All names have been changed to protect identities and ensure privacy. Share your story with us; maybe it will change someone’s life. If you would like to share your story, please send it to info@amomama.com.