The incredible story of Cassidy and Zephany Nurse from Cape Town.
The incredible story about her lost sister narrated by Cassidy Nurse from the Cape Townwho in high school discovered that the her best friend friend was actually her biological sister.
According to Cassidy’s account, her sister was abducted from the maternity hospital when she was just three days old and has been missing ever since. Years later when she was in high school, she started hanging out with a girl who looked a lot like her. After a year, everything changed as the big reveal took place.
The woman who raised her, like her mother, was sentenced to 10 years in prison for abducting Zephany Nurse as a baby and renaming her Miché.
Lavon Solomon maintained that she had not kidnapped the infant, but that a woman named Sylvia had arranged for a baby to be brought to her for a fee. After the miscarriage, she desperately wanted a child of her own and the exchange took place at Wynberg train station.
This story was also made into a documentary.
The story in the words of Cassidy Nurse:
My first memory of Zephany is from when I was about four or five years old. My parents told me I had a missing sister. She was only three days old when she was abducted from Groote Schuur Hospital in Cape Town, South Africa in 1997.
Throughout my childhood my parents talked about my sister constantly. They wondered what he was doing. If she was safe and if those who had kidnapped her loved her. I had seen stories on the news about missing children who never came home. So when I was younger I always thought the worst had happened to her.
Honestly, my childhood was not easy. Simple things for a little kid, like playing with your friends or going to play with your neighbors, I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t be out by myself for more than ten minutes without my parents coming looking for me.
Every year we had a birthday party for Zephany, but it wasn’t until I got to high school that I started thinking about her properly. I thought about her every day. I don’t know what changed, I just had this feeling in my heart that maybe it was somewhere around here.
The first time I heard about Miché Solomon was in English class in 2014. My teacher came up to me and told me that I looked exactly like another student. I asked how old she was and she said she was 17, the same age my sister would have been at the time.
One day I left technology class and the hallway was a mess. All the students were shouting: “Look, there are the girls who look alike!”
I turned and looked at Miché’s face. At the same time we both said, “Why does everyone say you look like me!” Then we both laughed. I felt so weird. I had that feeling in my stomach, even now I have that nervous feeling.
The day after we met, I was sitting on the grass. Miché approached me and asked if I wanted to hang out with her. I was only 14 years old. I was a babe in high school and a 17 year old wanted to chill with me? I thought that would be cool so I said ok.
From there, our relationship grew. We ate lunch together every day and he waited for me outside the school every morning. We were getting closer and closer. He said he would watch over me and not let anyone touch me. When she found out about my missing sister she said, “I’ll be your big sister for now.”
One day I asked her to show me pictures of her parents. When he showed them to me, I was stunned. “Your parents don’t look like you,” I told her. “Oh yes. A lot of people tell me that,” he replied. There was absolutely no resemblance, I thought. Their skin, their hair, their noses, their eyes – everything was different.
That’s when I realized I needed to talk to my parents about it. I had this feeling in my stomach. When I told my father about this girl who looked like me, he didn’t take it seriously.
I had arranged for my dad to meet her after school when he would come pick me up. When he met her, he asked her: “Why do you look like me?” But Miché couldn’t see it, and shortly after they met we left.
Miché and I had known each other for about a year when we decided to skip our school sports day and go to a fast food joint. I already knew my dad would scold me for skipping school, but I decided to go anyway.
Some other kids told him that I had gone to get food with my “bestie”. He came to find us and sat at our table. My dad asked to see a picture of Miché’s parents. He said exactly the same thing I said when I saw them. She joked that maybe she was adopted.
I had no idea that my dad was investigating whether we might be related to Miché. I had no idea he had gotten the police involved. Miché didn’t know it either, we just got along like two teenagers.
I can’t remember the exact day it all changed, but I think it was Wednesday. My father was supposed to pick me up from school, but he never arrived. My aunt came instead. He said he was busy at work but I was stressed. I had a feeling something was going to happen. Then I went home. I threw my bag down and the house phone rang.
I picked it up and it was Miché. I asked, “How did you find that number?” He said he wanted to tell me something, but I wanted to know how he got my home phone number, because we usually talk on our cell phones.
Then he said: “I don’t know: Dad gave it to me. I’m your missing sister.” He had taken a DNA test and the results showed a 99.9% match.
I couldn’t believe it, Miché was Zephany. At that moment I didn’t know how to feel, I was just very happy. Zephany wasn’t dead. She was alive and well. I dropped the phone and jumped into the house. I was so overwhelmed with happiness, love and warmth. Even now, I can’t explain it properly.
At first I was not allowed to speak to Zephany. I think he went to a safe house. Then after a few weeks he came to my house to sleep there. My mother and father were separated at this point, but me, Zephany, and my mother talked all night. There was no connection between her and my mother yet because they had just met, but there was a bond between the two of us.
I was too young to attend court, and Zephany and I were not allowed to speak during Lavona Solomon’s trial. After that we didn’t communicate for a while. I think she was confused. I let her deal with it. I didn’t want to overwhelm her or scare her.
Around 2019, our relationship started to grow and become stronger. Zephany started spending more time with our parents and my siblings and saw that we were good people. We don’t see each other often, but our relationship is developing well.
When he came back, both of our lives changed. I was no longer the big sister, Zephany was back now. I have to respect that they are part of the family. I can’t deny her or push her aside because she’s still going through hard things. We both have our own kids now, but we’re both still trying to find ourselves.
Our relationship is still in the process of healing. We are trying to get there, despite all the things that have happened in our lives.
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