ROCKFORD, Mich. — Chaz Varady grew up being told that two different men may be his biological father. Eventually, during the summer of 2023, he decided to look into the realm of genetic genealogy in an attempt to track down any potential family, hopefully his father.
This decision led him and his wife of 27 years, Kristen, down a path they could have never expected.
Varady was born in Rapid City, South Dakota, and grew up with his mother and sister.
After taking some DNA tests, Kristen started piecing together a family tree.
"The results we had for about a month," Varady began to explain Wednesday morning.
Kristen interrupts, "Two months!".
"Two months," Varady corrects himself.
"And every time I looked at it, it made me nervous and sad."
Eventually he would call a woman named Brook Sharp— he knew that they were likely relatives of some sort.
They decided to meet for coffee at Sweetland in downtown Rockford.
“I see him sitting back there," Sharp recalled.
"It was like looking at my dad, a younger version of my dad.”
Sitting across from one another, it was clear to both Sharp and Varady that they were long lost siblings.
“All my family is in South Dakota and Colorado. I don't have family here, other than my boys," Sharp explained Wednesday.
"I don't want to get too emotional here, but it's like God gave me a gift.”
The pair fell in to a legitimate brother/ sister relationship.
"We just love each other so much already. It's hard to describe," Sharp said.
As it turns out, the two only live 14 minutes apart in the Rockford area, and their kids already knew each other.
“Man makes plans, God laughs,” is how Varady described the entire situation.
“I'm blessed that I'm found now, I'm very happy.”
The pair has already teamed up to travel to Colorado where Varady met his father and brothers for the first time.
"It was overwhelming," Varady said.
They are planning parties, family reunions, and everything you might want to experience with a sibling you didn't know you had.
Siblings Chaz Varady and Brook Sharp are making one memory at a time as the new relationship takes root.
