Wild Ancestry DNA story

[mysteriouswife]

Part of me wants to do DNA because my dad has one child I know about, but do not know. He also doesn’t know his dad. The other part of me doesn’t want to know. It’s crazy how these test can be happy and life changing

[cville]

A friend of the family, "Jane," was raised her entire life by just her mom, who flat out 100% no matter how many times she was asked, refused to say a THING about who Jane's biological father was other than "we loved each other."

Jane does the DNA upload and discovers that:
1. Her bio dad was married with 3 kids.
2. She was born in between a couple of those kids.
3. He was, legit, a traveling salesman.

Jane learned all of this not from the 3 half siblings of her bio dad's marriage, though. But from one of the FIVE other half siblings who were also on ancestry or whatever. All around the region where bio dad did sales.

They have since found a couple more.

So, essentially, her bio dad was the Johnny Appleseed/Nick Cannon of his day.

His wife died before any of this became known.

Eta: all of the kids are in their 50s and 60s.

[meganew]

I have a hs friend whose whole family did the DNA kits for Christmas the one year and found a half sibling from a one night stand when her dad was still in college- late 70s maybe? The woman is in all their pictures now at family events and it looks like everyone is happy.

[meganew]

Personally, I want to do this so bad because I’m positive I have more half siblings out there.

[rosiebear]

Mar 6, 2023 21:19:08 GMT -5 mcppalmbeach said:

Wow! That is crazy. I imagine I’d still have the energy to be pissed lol.

DITTO!

[Roc A Bee]

Yeah I can’t imagine telling my 82 year old mom this news. Idk maybe that’s just me. I would for sure tell my dad though!

I’ve done the DNA test. My mom is passed now but she didn’t know her birth dad. Someone reached out to me (his niece) and told me about some of the circumstances. It’s all really fascinating.

[starburst604]

Mar 6, 2023 23:26:29 GMT -5 Roc A Bee said:

Yeah I can’t imagine telling my 82 year old mom this news. Idk maybe that’s just me. I would for sure tell my dad though!

I’ve done the DNA test. My mom is passed now but she didn’t know her birth dad. Someone reached out to me (his niece) and told me about some of the circumstances. It’s all really fascinating.

I thought the same! I don’t know how it all unfolded and if the daughter talked to the dad first and he then shared with his wife, or if she just put him on blast to everyone, but it seems the whole family knew very quickly.

C has gone down the rabbit hole searching for her mother’s marriage license and found that she’d been married for 9 months when she met up with the bio dad and conceived her. She’s like damn mom, scandalous!!

[katfco]

My sister and I are pretty sure we have a half sibling and I wonder how he would react if he ever did ancestry or 23 and me. Probably not this well

[dirtyred]

Mar 6, 2023 23:06:44 GMT -5 meganew said:

Personally, I want to do this so bad because I’m positive I have more half siblings out there.

My maternal grandfather was constantly cheating on my grandmother so I'm positive I have quite a few unknown relatives out there somewhere/

[ECB]

DH has a guy who works for him that in his 60’s, found out he has a 40 Year old son! It was before he was married, and he and his son now have a relationship. The mom was like “yeah, I knew you were one of the possible dads, but I wasn’t really sure who it was”.

[ssmjlm]

My old boss found out he had a half brother from doing the ancestry thing. It wasn't a surprise because his parents were divored and his dad toured in a rock band and was an alcoholic. So he's like "yeah, no one is really surprised given Dad's personality and history."

[karinothing]

Did her mom know? I mean obviously she knew that she had an affair, but did she know that he fathered her child?

[scm1011]

This same thing happened to my FIL a couple years ago. He matched with a sister on Ancestry and it was someone he went to high school with. They have forged a great relationship since.

I keep waiting for a half sibling or 2 to pop up as well. My dad was married for 7 years before my mom and is very secretive about it. He was also an abusive alcoholic back in the day so I could see wife #1 fleeing with her kids and never seeing him again.

[wesleycrusher]

I have a good friend who did this and discovered her father was not her bio father. Her mother knew this- had been seeing more than one guy but when she was found out she was pregnant she picked the one with more money and they married (they since divorced many years ago). Friend met bio father, who had no idea, and now has a great relationship with him.

[cjcouple]

Mar 6, 2023 22:25:22 GMT -5 waverly said:

There is a reason that I don’t want to submit my DNA. I joke it’s so I can still commit crimes. But I guess the real reason is once it’s out there it can’t be taken back.

Same!!  My (late) dad was in vietnam at 18yo and for all we know, we have an older sibling there.  Not interested in opening up that can of worms.  Our step siblings are enough drama that we do our best to avoid. lol

[Scout'sHonor]

My aunt found out at 50 that she was adopted. She grew up thinking she was a very pale blonde Cuban. Turns out she was nearly 100% Scandinavian. Her mom is alive but has dementia so some other family filled in that she was adopted from a nurse they knew. Somehow they had all kept it secret her entire life!

[purplepenguin7]

My family recently found out that my grandparents had a child before my dad (the oldest) and never told anyone. My grandmother was 17 at the time. It wasn't exactly found out by Ancestry as the adopted child knew she was adopted and had her birth certificate all along, with my grandmothers unique name and she eventually reached out to some of her birth siblings through google searches. But, we did use ancensty to verify the story before asking my grandmother about it. My grandmother claims she was told the baby had died during the birth and that's why she never spoke about it but the whole story is pretty suspicious. The funny part of it is that a few of my family have all done Ancestry DNA and her side of the family had done 23&Me. We probably would have found out by that had we done the same brand test! I find that part kind of wild. well, I mean the whole story is wild but two different brand of DNA tests throws and extra twist into the story.

[mcsangel2]

Mar 7, 2023 8:13:11 GMT -5 karinothing said:

Did her mom know? I mean obviously she knew that she had an affair, but did she know that he fathered her child?

Well her mom is deceased now, so there's no way for her to know.

[mcsangel2]

Mar 7, 2023 10:05:31 GMT -5 purplepenguin7 said:

My family recently found out that my grandparents had a child before my dad (the oldest) and never told anyone. My grandmother was 17 at the time. It wasn't exactly found out by Ancestry as the adopted child knew she was adopted and had her birth certificate all along, with my grandmothers unique name and she eventually reached out to some of her birth siblings through google searches. But, we did use ancensty to verify the story before asking my grandmother about it. My grandmother claims she was told the baby had died during the birth and that's why she never spoke about it but the whole story is pretty suspicious. 

Well that kind of thing definitely happened back then. That's so sad, I can't imagine how your grandmother must be feeling.

[hermione]

I am confused by the people in this thread saying it's too late for the wife to be mad. LOL, no. I don't care how old I am or how long we've been married, if I find out my husband is a cheating cheater who cheats, I am burning shit down.

[maudefindlay]

Mar 7, 2023 10:20:07 GMT -5 hermione said:

I am confused by the people in this thread saying it's too late for the wife to be mad. LOL, no. I don't care how old I am or how long we've been married, if I find out my husband is a cheating cheater who cheats, I am burning shit down.

This and I'll just add it leads you to wonder ok, how many other women did he cheat with?

[purplepenguin7]

Mar 7, 2023 10:18:52 GMT -5 mcsangel2 said:

Mar 7, 2023 10:05:31 GMT -5 purplepenguin7 said:

My family recently found out that my grandparents had a child before my dad (the oldest) and never told anyone. My grandmother was 17 at the time. It wasn't exactly found out by Ancestry as the adopted child knew she was adopted and had her birth certificate all along, with my grandmothers unique name and she eventually reached out to some of her birth siblings through google searches. But, we did use ancensty to verify the story before asking my grandmother about it. My grandmother claims she was told the baby had died during the birth and that's why she never spoke about it but the whole story is pretty suspicious. 

Well that kind of thing definitely happened back then. That's so sad, I can't imagine how your grandmother must be feeling.

it actually worked out suprising well!  My grandmother was very shocked at first as she had put it out of her mind for the past 70ish years. My grandfather also passed several years ago.

The woman turned out to live 5 minutes from her in Florida and they see each other all the time. She is also very friendly with my aunt, also in Florida. It was really the most wild turn of events you could imagine.  I think it helped that she was both my grandmother and grandfathers child and not a product of an affair or bad sitaution. 

[starburst604]

Mar 7, 2023 8:13:11 GMT -5 karinothing said:

Did her mom know? I mean obviously she knew that she had an affair, but did she know that he fathered her child?

She’ll never know but her mom had to have known it was a possibility? She wishes she had found out before her stepdad died last year so she could have asked if he knew anything about if.

[bittybomb]

I found a first cousin I never knew about on ancestry DNA. My other first cousin, her half sibling, also found her, and they met. My first cousin who I knew my whole life doesn't like to talk about it much, so I'm thinking it didn't go very well. Their dad passed away 12 years ago, and I don't think he even knew she existed. But again, the story is very closely kept. I asked my mom about it when I found out, and she had a vague recollection of some rumors around the time this unknown cousin was born, but nothing concrete. They look so much alike as half sisters though, its nuts.

[pixy0stix]

The only thing I'm shocked at anymore with these stories is the people that submit their DNA without thinking that a new relative or revelation isn't going to happen.

[sonrisa]

Mar 7, 2023 10:05:31 GMT -5 purplepenguin7 said:

My grandmother claims she was told the baby had died during the birth and that's why she never spoke about it 

Women had so few rights at that time and she was a minor, so I can see this happening. At that time, plenty of medical decisions and medical information would only be shared with the husband/father/parents. Those were the days when you could die of breast cancer that your husband and doctor knew about without anyone telling you. I can easily imagine parents of a teen giving up a grandchild without telling the birth mom.

My own grandmother (who was a married 30 year old) was told my mom was stillborn because the doctors didn't expect her to live and my grandfather wanted to "spare her the pain" of meeting, then losing the baby. Days later, they come back to her hospital room (bad labor and old fashioned higher care practices so grandma was still there) and said "Surprise!" the baby lived! She's baptized and all because your husband brought in a priest right away to save her little soul!" If she had only survived days, my grandmother would have gone through life thinking she was stillborn, never having met her, while her doctors, husband and parish priest all knew otherwise. 

[stemmie]

I would be crushed if this happened to me. My dad likely has at least 2 children outside my parents' marriage. I only found out about this when I was about 28 and saw a picture of a young woman named Valedictorian from the local girls Catholic school-- she is the image of my younger sister. Mom spilled everything including another she knows about who was conceived when I was in high school and dad was teaching night classes for people who wanted a HS diploma. FTR, this still pains my mother. I think I ran into the former once at a nail salon. I was getting a pedi and there was a big bridal party doing a mani/pedi night. The MOB still looked just like my sister-- the personality, the voice and even mannerism matched. It freaked me the fuck out.

Dad wasn't much of a husband; around the time the Valedictorian was conceived, dad had another longer-term girlfriend who "cheated" on him with another guy who caught them once and beat the crap out of dad. In high school I dated a guy for 3 years and once had an occasion to introduce the parents. His dad and my dad were super awkward and it turns out BF's dad was the one who beat dad up.

I know of 2 folks who got surprises related to Ancestry.

One friend adopted an infant from a woman in an abusive relationship who didn't want to be tied to the man forever. It was an open adoption but the woman didn't share the pregnancy with her family. Fast forward 20 years and the birthmom's brother died. The women's sister did Ancestry because she assumed her "player" brother might have kids out there. She got the match to friend's son and was excited to share with her sister who was forced to come clean about the pregnancy with the man her family hated.

Another friend got a call from some random man who was matched to her and her nephews. It turns out her late brother had gotten his college girlfriend pregnant. She chose not to share with him and married her high school boyfriend instead. Sadly, his mom died when he was about 4 and he had no other sibs. He stepdad raised him as his own giving him a terrific life. It was only when the SD died that the son found a cache of letters discussing the situation that he did the DNA test and found some matches. He initially reached out to my friend rather than his half-sibs to ask for a meeting. My friend was super suspicious and did contact her nephews who elected not to tell their mom even though this predated their relationship. My friend's brother had a heart attack and died on a few months before, so the wife wasn't in a receptive mood.

Friend met the man who seems like a nice enough guy. He's an engineer like her brother had been. She didn't introduce him to her mom which seemed odd. Her brother had been the favorite and I think she didn't want to upset her 90 year old mom that "golden boy" did a thing. They don't really have a relationship, but the exchange of health information was useful as this man had undiagnosed heart disease which is now being addressed. I think he talks to his half-brothers once in a while.

[rupertpenny]

I had a secret sibling but found out the good old-fashioned way: my older half-sister, who I always knew, blackmailed my dad into telling me about the secret, younger half-sister. Older Sister said she would invite Secret Sister to her wedding so he should probably tell me ASAP.

[thedutchgirl]

That's a crazy story, but not that uncommon any more these days. A lot of adults found out their parents used donor gametes (using donor sperm is a lot more common) by DNA/genetic tests. Back in the day, people were told not to tell the kids. The advice/recommendation is totally different now, but they didn't envision the development of commercial DNA testing for fun 30+ years ago

[maudefindlay]

I love that all those rapists/murderers who never got caught are now hopefully living in fear. Not fair they got to be free as long as they did, but I hope they all are suffering.