Actress Tia Mowry-Hardrict grew emotional — her eyes filled with tears — as she spoke about the results of a DNA test that she took to learn more about her family history.
Mowry-Hardrict’s mother is black and her father is white, but she learned a lot of details that gave her tremendous insight into who she is as a person.
The former “Sister, Sister” star shared her findings on “Tia Mowry’s Quick Fix,” her series on YouTube. She said the results left her “with chills” afterwards.
“I got my results and here’s what I found,” she began. “My ancestry confirmed some things that I already knew. My mom is black and she’s from the Bahamas. That’s where her roots came from. And my dad’s white. I always knew I had some European, Irish blood.”
But Mowry-Hardrict learned that on her father’s side, her ancestry is connected to Great Britain, Ireland, Germany, France and Scandinavia. On her mother’s side, her roots come from Nigeria.
“What up my Nigerians!” said the 41-year-old. “One of my really, really good friends is Nigerian. It’s just so amazing to really know the fine details of where your ancestors were from.”
Mowry-Hardrict then said as she’s gotten older, it’s become more important for her to learn about who she is.
Plus, she wanted to learn more about her dad’s side of the family since she knew more about her mother’s side growing up.
“My dad is white and when my mom and my dad, when they got married, on my dad’s side, there wasn’t a lot of support until now,” she explained.
But Mowry-Hardrict said that she eventually connected with some of her family members on her father’s side through social media.
She also talked about feeling pride that people on both sides of her family showed fortitude by fleeing their countries to escape slavery and other harsh conditions.
Then around the 5:13 mark of the clip, Mowry-Hardrict began to cry.
“Now I see why my ancestors are so strong,” she explained. “To overcome slavery and racism and segregation and then to have my mom and my dad blend together to make me. Maybe that’s why I’m just a very generous, loving, kind person, ’cause my ancestors live in me. So I have a lot of gratitude for them.”
“It’s amazing how Tamera cried too on the real when she got her DNA results and she said the same thing about how her ancestors are so strong and how they survived slavery too,” one person wrote afterwards on YouTube. “Truly Tia and Tamera are one person. This is so beautiful to watch and it also made me cry Tia. ❤️”
“When Tia started crying I felt and understood that and I too started crying,” wrote someone else.
