Over the Thanksgiving weekend, Alta Apantenco hugged her daughter Melissa Highsmith for the first time since 1971.

Fifty-one years ago, Apantenco left her daughter in the care of her roommate at their Fort Worth, Texas home. According to the family, the roommate handed off Melissa to a babysitter, and the child was not seen in the many decades since.

“I can’t describe my feelings. I’m so happy to see my daughter that I didn’t ever think I would see again,” Apanteco said.

A break came when the DNA Melissa Highsmith’s dad submitted to online ancestry databases showed a new lead earlier this month, according to loved ones.

“I’ve never seen her this happy. She’s beyond happy — she’s ecstatic,” Sharon Highsmith said about her mother, Apanteco.

Sharon Highsmith and her sister, Rebecca Delbosque, told 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS they were alerted of a couple of new relatives possibly connected to their dad’s DNA. It wasn’t their missing sister Melissa but people that could be related to her.

“It’s been a whirlwind. Everything is very overwhelming,” Delbosque said.

That’s when the family and those connected to the search reached out to Lisa Jo Schiele, a genealogist from Cherry, Minnesota, to help them interpret the results.

“I was grateful somebody was listening to us,” Sharon Highsmith said.

“At first glance, you look at these…