Doobie Brothers’ Michael McDonald reconnects with his adopted son

One of the Doobie brothers reconnected with a long-lost Doobie son.

As NBC reports, Michael McDonald made contact a year and a half ago with his biological son Michael Goessling, who remembers establishing it in a preliminary phone call that he was related to a rock star.

Adopted as a baby, Goessling, 59, told the outlet he never knew his birth parents until last year, when he received a letter saying they wanted to meet him. His first conversation with McDonald took place over the phone.

“I just said, ‘What a voice this guy has!’” Goessling said. “It seemed so familiar, but I couldn’t place it. Finally, I just said, ‘Are you Michael McDonald?’ And he laughed and he said, ‘Yeah, I’m afraid so.’

Goessling also discovered the identity of his biological father after McDonald told him he was a musician with a concert that evening at the Hollywood Casino Amphitheater. A quick Google search showed that the Doobie Brothers were booked for the venue on that date.

“There are still days when I wake up, and my first thought is that I’m coming out of the wildest dream, and it’s been a year and a half,” Goessling added. “I’m still trying to figure this all out.”

When McDonald was 14, he had a child with his middle school sweetheart. The couple put the child up for adoption and the musician later replaced Tom Johnston as lead singer of the Doobie Brothers. McDonald has five Grammys to his name and helped lead the Doobie Brothers to the Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 hit “What A Fool Believes,” as well as other top 10 hits such as “Real Love” and “The Doctor.”

Goessling also told NBC that he never felt resentful toward his birth parents — who he said are still good friends — for putting him up for adoption. “I just wanted to thank them for the choices they made on my behalf and for giving me a chance in this world, and how grateful I was for that,” he said. “They have always been heroes in my story.”