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In her recently released memoir, “Thicker Than Water,” the 46-year-old Scandal star, Kerry Washington, reveals a startling truth – her father, Earl Washington, is not her biological father, as reported by PEOPLE. This revelation initiated her ongoing journey of self-discovery, turning her world upside down.
Kerry explains that she stumbled upon this family secret shortly after she disclosed her plans to appear on Henry Louis Gates Jr.’s PBS series, “Finding Your Roots.” In this show, celebrities delve into their ancestry through DNA testing. Her parents, Valerie, a professor, and Earl, a real estate agent, who had safeguarded this secret for decades, engaged in a private conversation with Gates. He advised them that it was best for families to discuss such revelations privately before appearing on the show.
The next step, according to Washington, was a text message from her parents, inviting her to a family gathering in the spring of 2018.
“When I received this information, I thought, ‘Oh. I now know my story,'” shares the star. She recollects feeling a sense of relief after discovering this news, as she had long felt her parents were keeping something from her and that an essential piece was missing. “I didn’t know what my story was, but I was playing a supporting role in their story.”
Washington narrates how she remained composed and asked numerous questions, all while trying to offer her parents understanding during what was clearly a challenging moment for them.
She learned that, due to fertility issues, her parents had chosen to use an anonymous sperm donor to conceive. They confessed that they had almost decided never to reveal this to her.
“I think that dissonance, like, ‘Someone is not telling me something about my body,’ made me feel like there was something in my body I had to fix,” she reflects on her years of struggling with anxiety, self-esteem problems, and an eating disorder when she was young. She now believes these may have been symptoms of subconsciously sensing her parents’ hidden secret.
Empowered by this newfound knowledge, Washington felt compelled to share her true story with the world, resulting in her memoir, “Thicker Than Water.”
“This is really kind of me working to understand my life up until now, given this new information that I have that, in many ways, felt like sort of the missing puzzle piece,” she says.
“My parents were not thrilled about me writing this,” she notes, though the couple grew supportive throughout the process. But, says the star, “this really is a book about me. I now get to step into being the most important person in my life.”
The experience ultimately added a new layer to Washington’s bond with her parents.
“I really started to have so much more love and compassion and understanding for my parents,” she says. “Taking this deep dive into our family history made me put myself in their shoes and think about the things that they’ve had to navigate and what they’ve been through and what they’ve sacrificed. And it really made me feel closer to them.”
The revelation about her paternity is just one of the many revelations found in Kerry Washington’s memoir, which is set to be released on Tuesday, September 26. According to a press release, her memoir will offer readers “an intimate perspective into both her public and private lives — as an artist, an advocate, an entrepreneur, a mother, a daughter, a wife, a Black woman.”
Kerry Washington’s memoir, “Thicker Than Water,” is available on September 26 at bookstores and online retailers.
