‘Tis the season to spend time with family — and since a Calgary woman discovered that her hairdresser is actually her half-brother a few months ago, she has been doing just that.

Andrea Quint Fleck says she was a longtime client of stylist Troy Winget when they each joined genealogy sites and separately began tracing their ancestry.

In September, they told the CBC that it led to a startling revelation. The client and hairdresser, whom Troy says already felt like “kindred spirits,” share a biological father — Erik Quint, who didn’t know he had a son.

Months after the discovery, Troy, Andrea and Erik told the Calgary Eyeopener on Dec. 30 that their new family dynamic is flourishing.

They’ve visited each other “20 times at least,” Erik says — including Christmas Day — and have unearthed unexpected commonalities.

“One day we were at Andrea’s, and Troy … said, ‘I have no hair in my legs,'” said Erik with a laugh. “I said, ‘Welcome to the club,’ [and] I rolled up my pant leg.”

Troy says there are more similarities between father and son.

“We walk the same, [our] teeth are the same, [our] sense of humour is the same — a little sarcastic, a little bit of a bite to it,” said Troy. 

A California holiday with the ‘middleman’

Troy and Andrea, who were using different genealogy sites when the discovery was made, possibly wouldn’t have come across each other at all if it weren’t for a relative in common — their half-uncle P.J., who lives in the U.S.

But luckily, they say, P.J. had registered DNA on multiple sites, and noticed that he matched to both Troy Winget and Quint Fleck in Calgary.

In September, Andrea described the hair standing up on the back of her neck when P.J. reached out to send her a photo of a probable relative. It was Troy.

“[P.J.] was the middleman,” Andrea said.

Right after Thanksgiving in October, Troy, Andrea and Erik went to visit the man who brought them together in California. 

“It’s just an awesome experience,” Erik said.

A smooth transition

The adjustment for the rest of the family has been easy, Andrea says; her children, who had accompanied her to hair appointments for years, already had a friendly relationship with Troy.

“They’re the easiest ones to explain it to … They would sit in the salon while I was getting my hair done with an ice cream cone, and Troy would come over and talk to them and tease them,” Andrea said.

“Finding out that he was their uncle was just the coolest thing to them.”

For Erik, whose siblings had passed away, discovering that Troy is his son — and also finding half-brother P.J. — helped quell the loneliness that comes with a gradually shrinking family.

“I thought, boy, what an empty feeling,” said Erik.

“My one brother and two sisters have all passed on, and then to find Troy 15 years later from that — wow. And then, to find P.J. — we’ve got a lot of family now.”