Unexpected and welcome help

Uploading to FTDna was easy.  But it took quite a while to get all the results opened.  I couldn't contact anyone unless the results were opened and nobody would see us.  This is where Jessica came in VERY HANDY!

Within a few weeks, all the matches were opened.  I saw some "High match" cousins, possibly 2nd, so I reached out to the Email address.  There was a quick reply.  But what we saw was no connection.  NOTHING!

The match HAD to be through her father's side.  It was 3 family members, two siblings and a half-sibling.  Everyone matched Trish, but the mother was different for two.  The father, same.  So we knew it was there.  But WHO?  This was puzzling.  a 188 cM match, a 186, and a 114 (According to Gedmatch)  This means Trisha's match ought to be a 1st cousin or close to it, but... Nothing.  Kristen set to work to find something, to see what she could locate.  It was this time when I asked a daughter of a suspected mother to test for us.  Those results proved it wasn't maternal here.

Kristen's father tested.  Results were unexpected, not as high as I would have hoped.  According to our info, now, Kristen's dad is a 2nd cousin, but so are her brothers and she's third?  Seriously?

When Kristen found the match between Side A and Side B, it was a shock.  It seems that side A and side B were actually all the same side of Trisha's family!  But we now have names at a level with which we can work.  Turns out that our "1C1R" is 2nd cousin.  The match is Great-Grands. We're now on the hunt.  Still don't know if it's father or mother, but now it's all pointing to father's side.  At the Generation listed, we have 6 children.  1 of them died before reaching child bearing years.  Several had passed before 1930.

I started looking for more children.  Not in this Generation.  Only 1 person fit the bill...and he was dead 1 day after Trisha's birth.  But still, wrong generation for the search.

But I was looking for siblings of George.  I had forgotten about offspring.

And I found who I believed was a great-great grandson of our match.

I wrote.  He replied.  Test arranged.  No more answers until January.  The search slows to a sloth's pace.  I begin to check on the Irish side.

Tired.  Frustrated.  But it all continues.

And it was about now that I learned that Kristen's dad wasn't a 2nd cousin at all.  Our match was far more distant.  She is a 6th cousin.  Her father 5C1R.  We're at a loss to explain the high match.  But I'm glad, this strangeness was found.  And I'm grateful I had such a helpful match...even if it was far more distant than we expected!