Adriana, a cosmetics saleswoman, hadn’t seen her estranged mother since she was one year old, leaving her to be raised by the her father. Meanwhile, truck driver Leandro, who was brought up by his stepmother, knew his mother had also abandoned him in his hometown of Sao Paulo when he was eight years old.
While Leandro remained in the city, Adriana left their hometown to work as a housemaid, married for 15 years and had three children.
The pair met for the first time ten years ago after Adriana’s marriage broke down and she returned to Sao Paulo. They soon fell in love and moved in together.
Unable to give up the search for her mother, Adriana contacted a radio station in the city to ask for help.
This week the two were reunited live on air.
But at the end of the interview on Radio Globo’s The Time Is Now programme, which specializes in finding lost relatives, the mother revealed she also had a son who didn’t know her called Leandro.
Upon realizing her husband is also her brother, an emotional Adriana said: “I don’t believe that you’re telling me this. Leandro is my husband. Now I’m scared to go home and find out that Leandro doesn’t want me anymore. I love him so much.”
Adriana and Leandro told Radio Globo that they would stay together, despite the bombshell that they are actually brother and sister.
Adriana said: “Only death is going to separate us. All this happened because God wanted it to happen. Of course it would have been different if we had known all this before, but we didn’t and we fell in love. We thought it was funny that both our mothers had the same name, but it is a common name so we just thought it was a coincidence.
“At first we were really knocked by it all, but we had a family meeting and told everyone that we are going to stay husband and wife, whatever anyone might think. We have so many plans together. Nothing is going to break us up. Nothing.”
The couple, who said they didn’t blame their mother for leaving them, have spoken with her a number of times and plan to meet up soon.