After A DNA Surprise: 10 Things No One Wants to Hear

By B.K. Jackson

Until recently, most people likely haven’t encountered someone who’s been knocked off balance by a DNA test result, so it’s understandable they might not appreciate the magnitude of the impact. But it’s just a matter of time. Mind-blowing DNA revelations are becoming so common that some DNA testing companies have trained their customer service staff representatives to respond empathetically. While those employees may know the right thing to say, here in the real world the people around us often haven’t got a clue how it feels — like a punch to the gut.

If you’ve become untethered from your genetic family, you might get a second surprise: some of your friends and loved ones may be remarkably unsympathetic, often infuriatingly judgmental, and sometimes even hostile. It’s clear that although DNA surprises have become ubiquitous, social attitudes haven’t kept pace, and a stigma remains.

When you’re in a free fall and looking for something to grab hold of, negative reactions can set you spinning off your axis.

It shouldn’t be surprising that people may not know what to say to someone who’s received shocking DNA results. After all, few know how to comfort someone who’s experienced the death of a loved one, even though grief is a universal experience.

If your world has been rocked by a DNA surprise, let those around you know what helps and what doesn’t. And if you haven’t been so affected but want to help and support someone who has, it’s worth trying to put yourself in their place and imagine what the experience has been like. Or better yet, simply ask. But think twice before adding to their distress with one of these unhelpful yet commonly heard responses.

This well-meant platitude isn’t comforting to those who didn’t feel loved and nurtured by the dads who raised them. It’s like pressing a bruise. They wonder whether their biological fathers would have given them the love their dads didn’t or if the dads who raised them loved them less because they weren’t true progeny. And those of us lucky enough to have had precious relationships with our dads don’t need that reassurance. It’s like telling the bereaved their loved ones are in a better place. It’s what people say when they don’t know what to say. It doesn’t soothe our roiling emotions or patch the holes in our origin stories.A more cynical take on the same idea, this attempts to make light of those roiling emotions. If we were lucky, we know our dads are the men who loved us, bandaged our knees, held us, worried about us, sacrificed for us. Our love for them and theirs for us is ineffable, immutable, inseverable. But it doesn’t make us any less curious about the men whose not insignificant sperm gave us life and gifted us with half our genetic makeup.This tries to mollify us and discount our feelings at the same time. Blood is exactly what makes family, consanguinity being the first definition of kinship. Certainly there are also families of affinity, but the familial love we feel for them doesn’t alter the fact that our blood relatives exist and they matter to us.Of course we’re the same people! And yet we’re not. We may feel diminished, less of who we thought we were, or, if we always knew deep down something was amiss, more at ease, more authentically ourselves. All the cells in our bodies are different than we thought they were. Each contains the DNA of someone unexpected that encoded the traits that are the foundation of who we are.No, we can’t. But missing is akin to longing. We can wonder what we missed and long for what never was. “What you don’t know can’t hurt you” — the flip side of this comment — is equally untrue. It’s precisely what we don’t know that does hurt us. We don’t know where we came from, what genetic landmines could detonate our health, or the biological relatives who may be out there, somewhere, not even realizing we exist.Letting loose the family skeletons tends to be frowned upon. But just as grief is too heavy to be carried alone, keeping secrets is a lingering burden that feeds isolation and loneliness. It’s a comment that whispers, “You’re a dirty little secret.” It’s not our shame, but it is our truth to tell. As Anne Lamott famously wrote in “Bird by Bird,” “You own everything that happened to you. Tell your stories. If people wanted you to write warmly about them, they should have behaved better.”Wonder and longing often fuel a desire for reunion with biological relatives, which may be perceived as an affront by our families or as a threat by biological relatives who fear the shame exposure of their long-kept secrets would arouse. Discouraging a search for biological family sends the message that our need to know fundamental truths is insignificant compared to others’ needs to protect their secrets.That millions take DNA tests to see where they come from and millions more trace their lineage seems evidence enough that knowing about one’s pedigree matters. But tracing a family tree isn’t an option for NPEs (non-parental events or not parent expected) who can’t establish filiation, nor is protecting themselves against collateral damage — invisible health risks. For example, I worried my whole life about birth defects, cancers, and other genetic diseases that were the legacy of my Russian ancestors. Fortunately, I discovered I descend from robust Sicilians who lived long, healthy lives. Not so lucky is the ticking time bomb of a 40-year old NPE who doesn’t know he has a father and four half-brothers who all died of heart disease before 45. We simply want the same knowledge everyone else has.Having a good life doesn’t make us immune to despair, confusion, or grief. Ask anyone who’s lost a parent. Comments such as these disregard the sense of dislocation we feel after having been unceremoniously severed from our family trees. And lack of ceremony is key, because when something is lost, even if it’s something we didn’t know we had, there’s grieving to be done, whether the unknown father is dead or yet living. But there are no ceremonies, rituals, or social supports for this particular bereavement.We likely won’t get over it unless we’re able to grieve our losses and gain answers to the questions that others never have to ask about the things they take for granted — knowledge that is their birthright, but, they believe, not ours.Understand it’s complicated. The issues and feelings a DNA surprise give rise to are numerous and diverse. The most meaningful thing you can do is listen and acknowledge the feelings, but withhold judgment. Sometimes a willing ear and kind silence is the best response. Consider how you might feel if you learned you’ve been a secret for decades and what it’s like to see your family tree pruned by half. Erase everything you know about your father: his name, appearance, forebears, and medical history. Erase everything you share with him: his surname, religion, ethnicity. If you didn’t know all this, would you still be who you are? Would you not feel stripped bare and dispossessed? As Michael Crichton wrote in “Timeline,” “If you didn’t know history, you didn’t know anything. You were a leaf that didn’t know it was part of a tree.”Return to our home page to see more articles about NPEs. And if you’re an NPE, adoptee, donor-conceived individual, helping professional or genetic genealogist, join Severance’s private facebook group.BEFORE YOU GO…



Q&A: Therapist Jodi Klugman-Rabb

In 2014, I decided to do a 23andMe test to learn about my father’s family and feel closer to him. I had lost him to a heart attack in 1996, and his family had not been warm with me since his death. When the results came back, they showed none of the Russian and German heritage I expected from his family, but instead indicated I was 50% Scottish.Yes, this was not the first NPE revelation I had. To start, when I was born, my mother was married to her second husband. They were very unhappily married and she began a series of affairs. Because of her marriage and very Catholic parents, she created the ruse that I was the product of the marriage, so his name is on my birth certificate. I had weekly Saturday visits with him for 11 years, until mom disclosed he wasn’t my father and that my step-father since I was 2 years old was really my biological father. About 12 or 13 years ago, a DNA test proved my birth certificate father was not biological, and my step-father adopted me. I changed my name to Klugman and lived very happily with my step-father as my father all that time until his sudden death from a heart attack. I had never felt like I fit into my father’s side of the family: I shared no physical resemblance or mannerisms. I’d always felt like an outsider that they put up with. So in essence I was primed to deal with this issue already because of my early life story.Even though I had something similar in the past, I was still shocked. I had completely identified with my dad (step-dad), even though his family was clearly not having it. In film, there’s a shot in which the foreground and background move simultaneously, but the center image remains fixed, creating an illusion of surreality. That’s what I felt immediately and in spurts for months afterward — like aftershocks.I think my training did help. I specialize in trauma, so I was immediately aware of the effects of trauma on my functioning, and I got back into therapy with Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR). I knew I was experiencing grief and had some compassion for myself.No. It was completely foreign until I hired a genealogist, Christina Bryan Fitzgibbons. Once she explained it, I learned this was a thing after all.I freaked out for a few months, but in the back of my mind I knew I needed answers. I asked my dad’s sister to test, assuming it would come back with no match, and I was right. Originally I had assumed it was the birth certificate father since he was of British ancestry, so I hired the genealogist only to confirm that. She knew immediately without doing any research that was wrong and found the real bio dad within two months.In hindsight I did, although I had no idea what that was until learning about NPEs. The crux of my professional focus in the NPE area has been the effect of surprise DNA revelations to identity. It’s a foundational issue that’s necessary to have us feel affiliation and value with our groups, tribes, communities.No. It was an easy choice for me, more like a compulsion. When I made the decision to go forward, it couldn’t happen fast enough.I turned to her right away because I did not believe I understood how to go about the search. Some people find everything themselves, but I don’t think it would have been that easy for me. I didn’t understand about centimorgans or how to triangulate relationships in family trees when they were distant. Christina knows all the intricacies and was able to find my biological dad based on his second cousin’s tree posted on Ancestry.com. That was not something I would have put together.Impatience, wonder, fear of rejection, anger.Once I had the initial meeting with my bio-dad, I was in the most indescribable turmoil that I can’t explain. I was uncomfortable in my own skin and I wanted to kill my mother (figuratively), but within a day or two, all the pain I had felt from my dad’s family not accepting me was fitting into place and sort of melted away. I had answers to lifelong issues that then made sense and I didn’t have to struggle with the pain of not knowing anymore. There was a sort of relief that allowed me to move on.Immediately upon identifying my bio dad, my husband challenged me to do something about this professionally. As a therapist, I’m very comfortable listening behind the scenes. I would never have put this out so publicly, but innately I knew I had to in order to heal. I was 100% correct.Because I’m an EMDR expert and have training in grief, I used those two pieces to formulate the bones of it. I’ve been doing research ever since, really focusing on identity. I’m developing a certificate curriculum to train clinicians for continuing education units (CEUs) on how to work with the NPE population since it’s a specialty approach.Identity is big, followed closely by connection in the form of support, acceptance, or lack thereof, namely rejection. Because of the nature of our conceptions, others (namely the mothers) feel they have ownership of the story and can control the dissemination of the information. Being seen and understood is a basic component of therapy and being a human being.Absolutely! In my blog I write about the seven key characteristics of NPEs I’ve discovered from collecting stories from clients, my podcast interviews, my own story, and those on the secret Facebook group for NPEs I’m part of. They include feeling a stranger within the family, discovery, grief, identity confusion, intuitive knowing, managing family relationships, and being in reunion with new family. Not every NPE experiences each characteristic in the same way, but there are unmistakable commonalities that thread them together.They’re almost the same, just the paths to get there veer off slightly. Usually adoptees discover their stories “when they’re old enough,” and NPE stories are often taken to the grave. There’s no right time to tell your child you’ve been lying to them about who their parent is. However, adoptive parents usually understand from the beginning they will have to tell their child their origin story at some point and just wait for that point to present itself. NPE mothers typically have no intention of ever telling, and until the advent of commercial DNA tests, there was no risk of people learning the truth.I don’t think they are that different. If you take Dani Shapiro’s latest book, “Inheritance,” she describes my story, but with one less father. She had no idea, like I had no idea. There are several ways to be an NPE — donor conceived, adoptions, surrogates, and others all technically are NPEs. The major difference besides their conception is in how the individuals find out.I offer a podcast, Sex, Lies & The Truth, for NPEs and their families to feel connected to a larger community and learn about aspects they felt alone with but can now relate to others, learning about themselves as they go. Same with my Finding Family blog on “Psychology Today,” where I write about the unique aspects of being an NPE, what I now call Parental Identity Discovery.™ I coined the term to be more inclusive of mothers who are unknown parents from adoptions, surrogates, etc. and will now use the term to title my certificate curriculum. I am a licensed marriage and family therapist and licensed professional counselor in California and see NPEs in person in my private practice or via tele-therapy throughout the state. I also offer virtual coaching for those living outside California, including a virtual support group for NPEs.



DNA Testing for Newbies: Where to Start

When it comes to DNA tests for finding family or confirming suspected relationships, the choices can be bewildering. As direct-to-consumer DNA testing has exploded in popularity, more companies are marketing tests, and each company offers different features. Those features can be very important once your results are in, but preferences about them shouldn’t form the basis of your initial choice of test. Your first objective should be to get your DNA in as many databases as possible to increase your likelihood of success.

There are three steps to getting started. Know what kind of test to take, choose which test to take first, and then make the most of the results.There are three types of DNA tests used for genealogical purposes. Autosomal DNA tests look at the DNA we inherit from each of our parents, which is recombined from generation to generation. A number of companies offer autosomal DNA testing, but for purposes of finding family, you need only pay attention to the big four: AncestryDNA, 23andMe, FamilyTreeDNA (FDTNA), and MyHeritage. (If among your testing goals is learning more information about your health risks, only two of these companies’ autosomal tests provide information about health traits: 23andMe and, a newcomer as of this May, MyHeritage.

Autosomal DNA testing offers you a breakdown of your ethnic heritage, but more important, it provides you with matches to DNA relatives — the pieces you’ll need to put together the puzzle of your origins. If you’re lucky, when your results come in you’ll find at the top of your match list the parent or sibling for whom you’re searching. Once uncommon, it happens more and more as the databases grow. But it’s not the most likely scenario, so don’t be disheartened if you don’t immediately find a close family match. You can still learn to explore relationships among your closest matches, which will also yield pieces to the puzzle. (Look for more on that in future articles.)

There are two additional types of DNA tests for genealogical purposes, available only from FTDNA, both of which trace a direct line of your ancestry. Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) traces the direct female line (from mother to mother to mother) and Y-DNA traces the father’s direct line. While mitochondrial testing is of little use to individuals trying to find close biological relatives, Y-DNA testing may have value. Because the Y chromosome is handed down intact and essentially unaltered from father to son generation after generation, and since men generally keep their father’s surnames, Y-DNA testing may help men discover their family names, which, when combined with genealogical research, may yield important clues. There are various levels of Y-DNA tests, each analyzing a different number of genetic markers, ranging from 37 to 700. Learn more about this here.You may be tempted to choose one test and call it a day. But it’s an approach that won’t help you if the person you’re looking for has tested at a different company. Consider these scenarios: You’re looking for your biological father. You test at AncestryDNA but get no parent match because he’s tested at 23andMe. Or your bio-dad hasn’t tested and you’ll need to rely on cousin matches to figure out his identity. One close cousin on your bio-dad’s paternal side has tested at MyHeritage, and another at FTDNA. You’ve tested at Ancestry, so you don’t know about either of those close cousins who could hold the key to the identity of your parent. It’s like waiting on the corner to meet someone only to find they’re on another corner.

One solution, if money isn’t an object and you’re very impatient for the broadest possible results, is to test immediately at all four of the leading companies. But for most people, there’s a better way to achieve the same results over an only slightly longer period of time. Most experts agree that all journeys begin with an AncestryDNA test, because with more than 15 million testers in Ancestry’s database, you’re casting the widest net in the biggest pool of testers. Your DNA will be tested against that of far more individuals than with any other test.

Purchase an AncestryDNA test and sign up at the same time for a free account that will allow you to begin to build trees. Later, in order to make the most of your matches’ trees, you’ll need to purchase a basic subscription to the service or use it at a local library. AncestryDNA tests go on sale frequently, typically before holidays, so if Thanksgiving, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, or St. Patrick’s Day isn’t far off, you can save a bit by waiting.You might be tempted to sit back and wait the six to eight weeks it takes for the results to roll in, but don’t. The wait can seem interminable, and being proactive will help keep you from chewing your nails and wondering if you’ll find what you’re looking for. Instead, roll up your sleeves and start to learn about how to make the most of your results once they’re available. Contrary to what DNA test commercials would have you believe, the test doesn’t do all the work. Unless you were blessed with a science brain, understanding DNA will be like learning a new language or taking up a musical instrument.

As mentioned previously, if close matches don’t appear right way, newcomers may become discouraged and think all they can do is wait and watch. But with some knowledge and, perhaps, sweat and tears, there’s a great deal that can be learned from second, third, and even fourth cousin matches. You’ll need to explore relationships among matches, often with no direct input from them. You’ll also need to create family trees based on those relationships, building and building the trees until patterns and connections emerge. Finding family can take time, and there’s definitely a learning curve, but the more knowledge you acquire about both DNA and genealogy while you’re waiting and afterward, the more successful your search is likely to be.

Ancestry Academy offers a collection of free tutorials, and you can search YouTube for helpful videos. Search in particular for videos by Ancestry’s Crista Cowan, known as the Barefoot Genealogist. Look for articles, blogs, books, and other tools that will help you get up to speed in our Resources section.

If you were adopted, other steps you can take while waiting include signing up at adoption reunion registries. Start with the International Soundex Reunion Registry and search online for state registries. And visit DNA Adoption, which has excellent resources and offers online classes about how to use DNA in a search.

In addition, if you do not live in one of the states that permit partial or full access to your adoption records (see a list here), you can contact your state or the agency that handled your adoption to request your non-identifying information.

In most cases you won’t have any information about the family you’re hoping to find, but if you do, begin creating a tree on Ancestry.com. And join the DNA Detectives Facebook group, which offers a wealth of information and support. You’ll learn from members who share their knowledge as well as from search assistants who can offer more advanced guidance and help. Another group, Search Squad, can help with search matters unrelated to DNA, and there are numerous other groups that can boost you farther up the learning curve, including DNA Newbie, DNA for the Donor Conceived, and more. In these groups you can ask questions and gain support as you see how others manage the stress of the search. When you join, be sure to look for posted files that often have valuable information.So that you don’t have to shell out cold cash to all the testing companies in order to find DNA matches in all possible pools, you can upload your Ancestry results (your raw DNA) for free to MyHeritage, FamilyTreeDNA, and Gedmatch Genesis — a database where individuals can compare results with those of others who’ve tested at various companies. Follow these five steps.

  1. Download your raw DNA file from AncestryDNA using these instructions. Scroll down to “Requesting Your DNA Data.”
  2. Transfer your raw DNA to Gedmatch Genesis. Register and then login. Be sure to read carefully the information about opting in or out of making your information available to law enforcement and consider researching the controversial issue carefully before you decide. Here’s how to upload your DNA.
  3. Transfer your raw data to MyHeritage. The company offers a free transfer that allows you to receive all DNA matches and contact them, use the chromosome browser, and receive an ethnicity report, but you’ll need to pay a fee of $29 for additional features, such as the ability to view trees and share matches’ DNA. That fee is waived for MyHeritage subscribers.
  4. Transfer your raw DNA to FamilyTreeDNA. You’ll receive free access to your DNA matches and the Family Finder Matrix, which allows you to compare relationships among 10 selected matches in a grid matrix. For an additional $19, you’ll get access to all features, including the chromosome browsers and ethnicity reports.
  5. If the above steps haven’t yielded the information you seek, if you want to cover all bases, or if you also want access to information about health risks, test at 23andMe.

More than likely you’ve already experienced a shock of some sort, you suspect that a family relationship isn’t what you believed it to be, or you wish to confirm an unexpected relationship. But everyone considering taking a DNA test should be aware that test results can be a minefield of surprises — even beyond those you may already suspect. Consider carefully why you’re testing, what you hope to gain, and balance that against the risk of upset any further surprising information might bring, and try to have support in place should you receive troubling results.

Many consumers have questions about the privacy of genetic material they submit. Some are concerned as well about the growing practice of using DNA to help in criminal investigations. Carefully read each testing site’s terms of service before testing. If you have any lingering concerns, contact the company before sending in your sample. To learn more about best practices and guidelines when testing, visit Genetic Genealogy Standards.Look for more articles here soon on what else you can do when your test results come in, techniques for making the most of those results, and about professionals who may be able to help.