DNA tests have shown that two adopted 10-year-old Chinese girls from Guangdong Province, one who went to live in Dayton Ohio and the other to Birmingham Alabama, are twins.  

Their extraordinary story recently appeared in Newsweek magazine.

Separated and Abandoned

The mother of Meredith Grace Rittenhouse and Meredith Ellen Harrington separately abandoned her fraternal twin daughters shortly after their birth in December 1999. They were taken into care by the Jiangmen Welfare Institute in Guangdong.  

Their first meeting in 2003

Nine months later, Jim and Susan Rittenhouse, who have since moved from Dayton Ohio to Chicago Illinois, adopted one of the girls and named her Meredith Grace, and Mike and Leigh Anne Harrington from Birmingham, Alabama became the adoptive parents of her sister, unaccountably naming her Meredith Ellen. 

Cyber-reunion

Jim Rittenhouse made contact with Meredith Ellen's parents on-line in 2003 in the course of looking for an adoptive sister for his daughter Meredith Grace. Having searched out other couples who had adopted children from the Jiangmen Welfare Institute, he recalled exchanging messages with one who had also named their daughter Meredith. When he saw Meredith Ellen's picture online, everything fell into place.

The twin Merediths meet for dinner

Jim's wife Susan compiled a chart of detailed information on the two girls, comparing their weight, height and character traits, and sent it to Meredith Ellen's parents, raising the possibility that they might be blood sisters. Notable among her comparisons was that both girls had a keen interest in geography, and asked for globes before the age of 4.

DNA tests revealed that Meredith Ellen and Meredith Grace are indeed fraternal twins.  

Both girls displayed an instinctive awareness of a sibling. Meredith Grace often told her kindergarten teacher that she had a sister in China, and Meredith Ellen always yearned for what she felt was a lost sister.

After detailed arrangements by the Rittenhouses and Harringtons, Ellen and Grace met for the first time in 2003.Their bonding was instantaneous.

Happy together

Over the past six years the twins have met at least twice a year. Both cry for days after parting. As Susan Rittenhouse has observed, "They are so close, there must be something other than just genes that bind them."

Ten Pairs of Estranged Twins

Time Magazine revealed that Merediths Ellen and Grace are one of 10 sets of Chinese twins – five fraternal and five identical -- who were adopted by American couples soon after being abandoned 10 years ago. Director of the Fullerton Twin Research Center at the University of California Nancy Segel is basing her research into the instinctive bond between twins on these 20 orphans.

She has yet to find any hard conclusive evidence to substantiate the apparently psychic connection that exists between twins. But as the Merediths displayed such an obvious intimacy at first meeting and always feel so bereft at being parted, Segal believes there is a magnetic affinity between twin siblings that goes beyond familial love. Susan Rittenhouse concludes, "I am so glad my daughter has found her twin. It has made her life complete."

（Source: Yangtze Evening Post/Translated by womenofchina.cn）