In what has been described as a story of chance and fate, two women from Philadelphia have discovered that they are actually sisters, after nearly 17 years of friendship.
The women, Ashley Thomas and Toya Wimberly, who started their friendship from Sulzberger Middle School in Philadelphia, just found out that they have the same father.
At school, Thomas, 31, a 6th-grader at the time, would practice stylizing hair on her new best friend, Wimberly. Many also said that the pair looked and acted like sisters.
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“Both grew up having huge gaps in their front teeth and high cheekbones. Funnily enough, they both are currently wearing braces to fix the former,” ABC 6 reported.
Fifteen years ago, Thomas learned that her dad, Mike, was not her biological father. This never stopped Mike from being around and taking care of her. Unfortunately, her mother passed away several years later.
Following the death of her mother, her best friend’s father, Kenneth Wimberly, always joked that she was his daughter. However, they only discovered it was true late last week.
It became clearer at Wimberly’s engagement after pictures of Kenneth were posted on Facebook, generating some online reactions.
Thomas’ late mother’s best friend recognized Kenneth as someone they used to hang out with. Kenneth remembered the women and started connecting the dots.
The group subsequently conducted a DNA test. This confirmed that Thomas is also the daughter of Kenneth, ABC 13 reported.
Although the finding was initially shocking, the women share a number of similarities which included the love for entrepreneurship. They also got pregnant at the same time with men who are brothers themselves.
It’s unclear why it took this long but Kenneth said he had “mixed emotions” after discovering he has another daughter.
“I was hurt, but also happy to find out that this beautiful and successful young lady was my daughter,” he said. “It was just God’s work, man.”
