Kerry Washington reveals Earl Washington is not her biological father

Kerry Washington has revealed that her dad Earl Washington was not her biological father.

In an excerpt of her upcoming memoir - titled Thicker Than Water - the Scandal star shared that in 2018 she learned that Earl was not her biological father.

"It really turned my world upside down," Kerry, 46, told People in a new interview. "When I got this information, I was like, 'Oh. I now know my story.'"

The actress said she had previously sensed some information about herself was missing: "I didn't know what my story was, but I was playing the supporting character in their story."

Kerry discovered the family secret shortly after she told her parents that she planned to appear on Henry Louis Gates Jr.'s Finding Your Roots, a PBS documentary series where celebrities learn about their ancestors through DNA testing.

Henry privately told Kerry's parents that revelations about parentage were best discussed within the family prior to filming, so Earl and Kerry's mother Valerie invited their daughter to a family sit-down in the spring of 2018.

"I think that dissonance of like, 'Somebody is not telling me something about my body' made me feel like there was something in my body I had to fix," Kerry said, speculating that her previous struggles with body image may have resulted from subconsciously sensing her parents' secret. "This is really kind of me working to understand my life up until now, given this new information that I have that, in many ways, felt like sort of the missing puzzle piece."

Earl and Valerie confessed that they had used an anonymous sperm donor to conceive after struggling with fertility issues, and had decided not to tell her.