Two men have filed a lawsuit against a North Dakota hospital after DNA tests revealed they were accidentally switched at birth nearly four decades ago, a discovery that has left two families grappling with a lifetime of lost memories and unanswered questions.
The lawsuit, filed last week in a North Dakota state court, accuses Unity Medical Center in Grafton of sending the newborns home with the wrong families after they were born on January 26, 1988.
The startling mistake came to light two years ago when Kyle Bylin received an at-home DNA test kit as a Christmas gift. After uploading his results to a genealogy website, he was unexpectedly matched with his biological aunt.
Further testing by her nephew, Jeremy Morrison, confirmed what neither family could have imagined—they had been switched at birth.
“That’s when my mind was just completely blown,” Bylin recalled. “We could have never imagined that it was an actual birth switch that occurred.”
Morrison said his suspicions began after he saw a photograph of Bylin’s brother and noticed an uncanny resemblance.
According to the lawsuit, Bylin and Morrison were the only babies born at the hospital that day, making them the only possible infants involved in the mix-up.
Although the hospital has denied responsibility, Bylin—who was born as Jeremy Morrison—said he still possesses the hospital identification bracelet that mistakenly identified him as Kyle Bylin.
The revelation has forced both families to confront 38 years of missed milestones, altered lives and broken biological ties.
“Kyle is still my son—that is never going to change,” said Evelyn Newton, who raised Bylin.
“But I feel robbed of the life I should have had with my biological son. You can’t go back and replace 35 years. First steps, driving a car, getting married—how do you make up for that?” she lamented.
In a statement, Unity Medical expressed sympathy for the families but insisted it had found no evidence linking its staff to the baby swap.
“We recognize the profound impact this discovery has had on them and their families,” the hospital said.
“Unfortunately, because of the passage of nearly four decades, the medical and staffing records that might have provided additional clarity no longer exist, and no members of the delivery team from that time are still employed by the hospital.”
Despite the life-changing revelation, Morrison said his love for the family that raised him remains unchanged.
“I was loved. I played sports. I did well in school,” he said. “A DNA test is not going to take away 38 years of memories.”
Now living in Colorado and working as a welding inspector for a wind energy company, Morrison believes his life could have taken a completely different path had he remained with his biological family on their North Dakota grain farm.
Newton said she never questioned Bylin’s place in the family, despite differences in hair colour, attributing them to extended family traits and the fact that she herself was adopted.
For Bylin, however, the discovery finally explained why he had always felt different from the family that raised him.
“You’re just kind of shaking your fist, like, how can this be my family? How am I so different from them?” he said. “It turns out that we’re just totally different people, period.”
Both men have since met their biological parents in emotional but awkward reunions. Although they have yet to meet each other face-to-face, they have spoken by telephone and are gradually building relationships with their newly discovered families.
“We’ve tried to unite as a group and just recognize that no matter what, there’s different ways that this can be socially messy,” Bylin said. “Everyone’s getting to know people that they didn’t know before.”
