Latest news with #LisaDyke
Telegraph
10 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Is it really suitable to televise this heartbreaking moment?
A typically emotional journey of highs and hard-to-watch heartbreak kicked off a seventh series of Long Lost Family: Born Without Trace (ITV1), which set Davina McCall and Nicky Campbell on the identity trail of two more foundlings. One, Simon Prothero, was left in an outside toilet block in Neath. The other, Lisa Dyke, was found in a car park in another child's pram outside a health clinic. They came to the LLF team to find out what happened. Both of their paths to finding out who left them and why were copybook Long Lost Family, which is to say, extremely moving throughout. I clocked the LLF TTT (Long Lost Family Time to Tears) at 3 minutes and 41 seconds, and I was welling up not long afterwards. Even for this most lachrymose of series, this is a resplendent triumph. If that sounds soulless and cynical, remember that this is commercial television that, for its success, relies on fomenting, through DNA testing, hugely sensitive situations and then filming the outcome to transfer those emotions to the empathetic viewer. Of course, the aim is to help your Simons and your Lisas to find out 'who they are', in the common coinage. But that's not the only aim. Long Lost Family does tread very carefully, which is to its credit. Difficult news is broken to its subjects off-camera. The meetings with newfound family are filmed in good taste and with minimal American-style schmaltz. On the other hand, television is always manipulative. Is it fair, for example, in the case of Simon here, to find his birth mother and then have to tell him that she didn't want to be contacted? Might that not make Simon feel lost and unwanted a second time over? To these jaded eyes, it makes Long Lost Family slightly queezy viewing. The great DNA revolution, with home testing and the concomitant genealogy boom, has undoubtedly helped lots of people to find out who they are. But it comes with side effects, too. Lots of people have found things out that, on reflection, it might have been better not to have known, and that now can't be un-known. Whatever your position, it certainly shouldn't be television producers influencing these genuinely life-altering choices. What was particularly fascinating in this episode was Simon's admitting that it was watching old series of Long Lost Family: Born Without Trace that inspired him to apply to the programme and dig up his own history in the first place. There's a cultural genealogy to television, too, one in which over time the things we watch affect how we behave. It's probably too early to tell whether the repeated posing of the question, 'Who do you think you are?' and the ability to find out on camera in the presence of Davina McCall and Nicky Campbell, has been an unmitigated good. Simon would be worth asking, but we never got that far.
The Sun
19 hours ago
- Entertainment
- The Sun
Emotional Long Lost Family foundling left stunned by shocking family secret
AN emotional foundling on Long Lost Family was stunned after learning a shocking family secret. A foundling is a child whom is abandoned at birth with no obvious trace or connection to a set of birth parents. 5 5 5 Lisa Dyke, 55, was left in another baby's pram in Christchurch, Hampshire. Although raised by loving adoptive parents, she had lingering questions about her origins. However, Lisa was left stunned by what was ultimately revealed to her. Lisa's parents had three other children - all full siblings to her. In fact, she is the third-born child - and the only one to be left. Lisa has an older brother and sister, Tim and Jen, as well as younger sister Lynn. She told host Davina McCall: "I'm trying to process it. Unfortunately, both of Lisa's birth parents had already passed away. Taking to X, one viewer penned: "Goodness, how does anybody try and process that, I've no idea." Another wrote: "It must be so hard to find out that after you were left another baby came along." A third shared: "Lisa's story has broken me. I am a dry husk after all the tears." While a fourth remarked: "Wow thats such a big revelation for bith Lisa and her siblings." It's not the first time the ITV show has featured heartbreaking stories. A previous Born Without Trace instalment followed the story of Thomas Yeo. Three newborns abadoned by same parents 'Baby Elsa', named after the protagonist in Frozen, was found in sub-zero temperatures in Newham, east London. She was believed to be less than an hour old when she was discovered by a dog walker, wrapped in a towel inside a reusable shopping bag with her umbilical cord still attached. The Metropolitan Police suspect Elsa was born after a 'concealed pregnancy' - where a woman does not tell health professionals she is expecting. DNA tests have since revealed Elsa has two siblings - a brother and a sister, who were abandoned in 2017 and 2019 respectively, within miles of where she was found. The other babies, Harry and Roman, were discovered wrapped in blankets. They have both been adopted. The parents of the three children are yet to be identified At East London Family Court last week, Judge Carol Atkinson ruled the biological link between 'Elsa' and the other two children could be reported. It was deemed of "great public interest" due to babies rarely being abandoned in modern Britain. The trio are among five cases of children being abandoned at birth within the last four years in England and Wales. In 2020, a baby was discovered in Hackney, east London, and another was found in Birmingham in 2021. Both of their mothers were tracked down several months later. Having submitted his DNA to a database, the team found a first cousin, Martina, in Ireland. But in a shock twist, it transpired that Martina, like Thomas, was also a foundling. The two cousins met but ultimately continued their searches separately. 5 5
Daily Mail
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
Woman abandoned in pram as a baby with a heartbreaking note from her impoverished mother finally meets her real siblings after 55 years
A woman who was discovered at just a few hours old in another baby's pram outside a health clinic has found her birth siblings after 55 years of separation. In May 1969, Lisa Dyke, 55, who now lives in France, was found as a newborn in Dorset, Christchurch, with a note pinned to her from her birth mother, reading, 'Please take care of her. 'I cannot and never will be able to give her a good home where she will be happy. She is just born and needs a doctor.' Fortunately, Lisa went on to have a happy childhood with her adoptive family in Hampshire. However, she understandably longed for answers regarding her heritage and sought the help of ITV 's Long Lost Family: Born Without a Trace team and hosts Davina McCall and Nicky Campbell. 'My story started the day I was found,' Lisa said, adding, 'What I need to know now is what happened before. Why was I left in another child's pram? Who left me? I assume it was my birth mother. I just want to know the truth.' In her quest for answers, Lisa revisited the site of the clinic where her birth mother put her to try and understand how she might have felt at the time. She said, 'I feel that she must have been local to have known about the clinic. I'm trying to think how she might've been feeling, waiting to see somebody leave their pram outside and take that opportunity to put me in there – just waiting for that perfect moment so that I would be found quickly.' In an emotional episode, which airs on Wednesday at 9pm, Lisa discovered through DNA testing that though her birth parents have sadly died, she has three siblings, who did not initially know of her existence but are now eager to welcome her into the family. Lisa accessed her adoption file in 2005, which is when she learned of the note and who placed her in another child's pram. 'To have the original note means so much to me, because it's the one thing I've got that connects me to her… It takes the negativity of abandonment away because I know she cared,' Lisa said. Lisa's adoptive parents Sylvia and Brian raised her Hampshire, where she had her son, Ryan, as a single mother at the aged of 19. 'I could not have wanted better parents. My mum was just everything,' Lisa said. Lisa's close bond with Sylvia put her search for answers about her birth family on the backburner. However, in 2023, Sylvia sadly died. Lisa's loss led her to decide that it was time to turn to DNA testing to discover information about her past. Lisa said, 'Having Ryan at a young age made me reflect on my circumstances. I've thought about who my birth mother was over the years, but because I had such a wonderful mum, I would just put it to one side. Unfortunately, we lost her two years ago.' 'I don't want to force myself into anybody else's lives, I just need to know what happened, I need to know who I am.' Lisa's DNA led Long Lost Family's Ariel Bruce and her search team to find Lin, who they initially believed to be her half sibling. But after further testing, Ariel found their connection to be stronger - Lin is Lisa's full, younger sibling. With this information, Ariel learned the identity of Lisa's birth parents, Christine and Brian. Sadly, both of Lisa's birth parents have died. However, Lin revealed that Lisa has two other, full siblings - Tim and Jen, who are both older and grew up together with Lin in Christchurch, where Lisa was left. 'There's been this secret in the family that had to make them revise their perception of what their family was,' Ariel said of Lin, Tim, and Jen. Learning of Lisa proved to be a difficult moment for the siblings, who had no idea that their parents had another child. The discovery was especially challenging for Lin, given that she was born after Lisa but, unlike Lisa, grew up with her birth mother. In an emotional moment, host Nicky Campbell showed the siblings a photograph of Lisa, and they immediately recognised physical similarities. They told Nicky of their childhood, explaining that their parents relationship was fractious, but that their mother, whom they remember fondly, absolutely loved their father, who worked as a merchant seaman and drove lorries. He left when Lin was seven. Money was tight during their childhood, and their mother juggled three jobs to provide for her children. Their financial circumstances led the siblings to worry that social services would intervene at any given point. After Lisa learned of her parent's death off camera, Davina travelled to check up on her and tell her the extraordinary news that she has three siblings. Discussing her sadness at the news regarding her parents, Lisa said, 'I half expected that kind of news. But hearing it, it still shakes you a little.' She also expressed her surprise about her birth family structure. Initially, she thought her birth mother might have been young and forced to conceal her birth. However, Davina informed her that she was 25 and in a relationship with her birth father at the time. The surprised continued when Davina told Lisa of her siblings - Tim born in 1967, Jen born in 1968, and Lin born in 1972, three years after Lisa's birth in 1969. 'A younger sister. It's, I'm trying to process it. I feel like I've gone from having nobody to now having three full siblings, all very similar ages,' Lisa said. Davina told Lisa of her sibling's memory that there was always a fear of social services coming around to take them away during their childhood. 'I can start to see perhaps now what the picture was…to understand why she felt that she couldn't keep me if he wasn't always there,' she said. Lisa said, '55 years ago, I was left as a foundling. I never, ever thought I'd find out anything about my birth family. I never anticipated finding a full sibling, let alone three.' After Davina's chat with Lisa, the four, full siblings finally met, with Lin, Jen, and Tim, all keen to welcome Lisa into the family. Lisa put the others at ease with kind words about her birth mother. 'Whatever your mum did, she the right thing for me. She made sure that I was found very early, and I thank her for that.' After the heartwarming meet, Lisa added, 'I feel like I've gone from having nobody to having three siblings all very similar ages.'
