In "The Fleshy Part of the Thigh," Paulie learns that his dying aunt Dotty, a Sisters of Christian Charity nun, was actually his mother. She had become impregnated by a soldier identified only as "Russ" during World War II. Nucci, the woman Paulie had thought of as his mother, is really his aunt who took him in to hide the scandal. This news sends Paulie into an emotional tailspin, in the grips of which he severed his ties to Nucci and does not attend Dotty's funeral.