After much nagging from my older sister, I finally submitted a DNA test late last year. And while I got the results a couple of months ago, didn’t really take the time to peruse them properly…until today.
For the record, I had long had a sneaking suspicion that my bio father was a bloke my mother had had a long-standing affair with, both before and after my birth. Didn’t really bug me too much I must say, and when I first glanced at the DNA results that came back, they ‘appeared’ to confirm that the person I called daddy was, in fact, my father.
Obviously I didn’t read the results properly. So after another phone call today from the nagging sister who suggested we were but half sisters (coming up on HER family-tree thingy), I logged back in to Ancestry and found…DRUMROLL…
My biological father seems to be some random fellow from my distant past! I recognise the name (and the name of his wife) as ‘friends of the family’ when I was very young. NOT the bloke I suspected at all.
So big sister, you are indeed only my half-sister. LOL.
Nope, no different at all. I didn’t grow up with a father anyway, my mum and ‘dad’ split when I was only a year old, so there’s no real sense of betrayal.
Although learning that my mother was somewhat free and easy with relationships back then is a bit of an eye-opener.
Hah, I sang that very song to my 11yr old grandkid this morning when I came to learn the news of my parentage. Alas, not Trinidad, but mid-century Australian suburbia.
My (now half) sister is ten years older than me, and chatting today, she has many more memories of people in our family’s life at the time than I do (obviously). And apparently my genetic father was besties with the father I knew, both working at the same place and socialising regularly. I recall visiting this person and his wife a couple of times when quite young, but apart from the family ‘name’* being legend in OUR family, there was little or no further contact as we kids got older.
I truly doubt whether the bio dad ever knew he fathered a daughter (me), and I’m not really about to open some can of worms at this stage. He died around 50 years ago and his wife just a few years later. From my understanding on Ancestry, (and verification from my sister), he had two kids, one who is also now deceased and one for who there is no information available.
BUT, it seems I have cousins of all sorts out there who want to make contact with me. I am treading veeery carefully, at least until I have better information and or confirmation that my suspicions are correct.
*The DNA test I did linked me to a number of people, one of whom had done a family tree that showed the name/s of the suspected bio father and his wife. I IMMEDIATELY recognised the names, chuckled to myself, then went snooping around for other info. My sister filled me in on other stuff…
The most hilarious thing about this whole schemozzle? My mother (bless her horny cotton socks) used to have a few catchphrases when I was a kid. Y’know, don’t look a gift-horse in the mouth, if you cross your eyes and the wind changes, yada yada. The one I remember today is, “It’s a wise child that knows its own father”.
Yeah, my dad never knew that he actually had three children, not two. Ancestry. com linked me and my sister over to a woman who contacted us saying that our dad was hers as well. Dad didn’t know he’d fathered a kid back in his bachelor days. And dad was dead before any of this came to light. So, yay.
This was not too long after my cousin found out that not only did he have two kids instead of one, but he was also a grandfather. His first kid was with a girl in his high school whom he had never seen since he graduated and joined the army. Now FB keeps trying to make me friends with these folks who are related to my cousin who himself is only my cousin by marriage.
It turns out one of my grandfather’s brothers fathered a child with a 19-year-old teenage African American domestic in the late 19-teens. He and his wife moved within a year or two. I have to imagine that when it became obvious that this child looked like my great-uncle (which he did!), he decided it was best to leave town.
And just in case you’re wondering, no, my grandfather’s brother was not Strom Thurmond–although it was the same state.
My brother’s wife had her DNA done for fun, as did her two “brothers”. They were shocked to find that one of the brothers was just a half brother. All parents are deceased, so I thought it would have no real effect.
Turns out the “real” brother posited that maybe inheritance was done incorrectly and now (years later) none of the siblings are communicating.
I’m jealous of all this drama. See, I had my DNA done, after decades of family joking that I’m not related to my father. And after so many friends discovered that they had new ethnicities.
Well, results came back. Dad’s my dad. Which means I’m 100% White Bread Midwesterner.
I’m not even 1% Jewish (I had friends betting on anywhere from 10 to 25%).
And I’m not related to the Hollywood actor that my mom “was just friends with” in the '50s (again, decades of being reminded that I look more like him than my real father…).
My wife (adopted at three weeks) had a similar situation. Various people had suspected she might have Jewish, Italian, Greek, or Native American ancestry. Nope. Northern European as far back as we could go, with a significant chunk of Swedish.
Re ethnicities, mine are predominantly England and Ireland with a smattering of Scotland and western Europe. Interestingly, there’s a bit of a chunk of me that has origins in the Faroe Islands.
Interesting because MANY years ago (40 odd) I developed a fascination with learning about the Faroe Isles, and would scour the local library for any books/info I could get. Obviously at that point I had no idea my ancestors could have haled from there, what with DNA stuff still a dream away.
