“The Odds Are Insane”: People Discover Traumatizing Family Connections After Taking DNA Tests
“Order. Spit. Discover” are the three simple steps listed on 23andMe’s website. By sending a saliva collection kit to the ancestry test company, people can learn more about their family origins.
However, the company’s terms and service also contain a warning, “you may discover things about yourself that trouble you and that you may not have the ability to control or change.”
- DNA tests like 23AndMe have unveiled incestuous relationships within families.
- A study in the UK found 1 in 7,000 people is born to parents who are first-degree relatives.
- Ancestry tests have also led to the positive discovery of biological relations between adopted siblings.
A group of people who have used these services have learned this the hard way after discovering that they were born of incestuous relationships.
While the tests can’t say explicitly whether someone is the product of incest, the results can be taken to a third-party genetic testing firm that can.
DNA tests like 23AndMe and Ancestry.com have offered people disturbing revelations about incestuous relationships in their family tree
Image credits: salomonus_/stock.adobe.com
Liane and Marc met on holiday in the Bahamas when they were in their twenties. During their flight home to JFK, Liane had the sudden realization that Marc was The One.
After four decades and two children, the couple learned that they were closer than they thought.
“I got an email from the personalized genomics company 23AndMe with the subject line, ‘You have new DNA relatives.’ Which is how I discovered that my husband Marc and I are related through more than mere marriage,” Liane wrote.
“We’re third cousins.”
Third cousins mean the couple shares at least one great-great-grandparent. The situation doesn’t pose health risks, according to the Genetic Literacy Project.
But the same can’t be said of incestuous relationships between more closely related people.
Babies born of incest are at increased risk of suffering congenital disabilities, developmental delays, and genetic disorders, such as blindness, hearing loss, neonatal diabetes, and limb malformations.
In a separate case, a 30-year-old woman discovered that she and her long-term partner were actually biological siblings through an ancestry test.
People born of incest are at increased risk of suffering congenital disabilities, developmental delays, and genetic disorders
Image credits: Soft White Underbelly
“I just found out that I’ve been dating my biological brother for 6 years,” the woman wrote on Reddit.
As she explained, she was adopted as a baby but didn’t know about it until she was in high school. Her boyfriend/brother was also adopted, a coincidence they bonded over when they met.
“Now I know that the comfort and familiarity is because he’s my brother. Not my half-brother. He is my full brother.”
“I discovered it when we did the DNA test thing to see our ancestry and what exactly we are. I ordered two for us; we spit in the tube and sent it out.”
“I’m just glad we both agreed early on that we don’t want to have kids. I don’t want to deal with the health risks and have to raise a child and [have] them know that their parents are siblings.”
Last year, adopted siblings Frank and Victoria discovered that they are biologically related, thanks to an Ancestry.com test
Image credits: Inside Edition
Meanwhile, Virginia native Steve Edsel found out via AncestryDNA that his parents were first-degree relatives, either siblings or father and daughter, the DailyMail reported.
Edsel became concerned regarding the origins of his conception, which he suspects could have been the result of the sexual assault of his mother carried out by his grandfather.
A study conducted by the University of Edinburgh for the UK showed that one in 7,000 people was born to parents who were first-degree relatives—a brother and a sister or a parent and a child.
“That’s way, way more than I think many people would ever imagine,” Geneticist Jim Wilson said.
The study of incestuous relationships derives from the analysis of “runs of homozygosity,” or ROH: long stretches where the DNA inherited from one’s mother and father are identical.
Many people use ancestry tests to learn more about their family history and find living relatives across the globe
Image credits: Karolina Grabowska/Pexels
Many people use ancestry tests to learn more about their family tree and find living relatives across the globe. This is what Kelli Rowlette intended to do when she sent her saliva kit to Ancestry.com.
Little did she know that the result would indicate that her father was not the man she’d grown up with but Gerald Mortimer, who she later found out had been her parents’ fertility doctor.
Rowlette’s parents, Sally Ashby and Howard Fowler, hired Mortimer because they were struggling to conceive naturally.
The doctor suggested inseminating Rowlette’s mother with a sperm cocktail containing 85 percent of Fowler’s “genetic material” and sourcing the rest from a donor.
In August 1981, Ashby gave birth to Rowlette without the knowledge that her fertility doctor had inseminated her.
But these quick DNA-testing methods–which cost approximately $130—have also brought positive news.
Last year, adopted siblings Frank and Victoria discovered that they were biologically related.
The Staten Island siblings had been adopted separately in the early 2000s by married couple Angela and Dennis.
When their adoptive mother told them the truth about their family origins, Frank and Victoria decided to investigate their history through DNA testing from Ancestry.com.
“I got the match that my brother had popped up as my full sibling, my biological brother,” Vicky told CBS News.
“We were both found a year and a half apart and wound up in the same family,” Frank revealed. “The odds are insane.”
“I suspect this happens more than we think,” someone wrote
If you haven't already seen it, their story was done and posted on a YouTube channel called "soft white underbelly" and is possibly the most pitiful story I've ever heard.
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Wait, so the couple who found they were full brother and sister are going to keep dating? Holy schmoly... my brother and I don't even like our elbows to touch when we sit on the same couch.
Why not? They didn't grow up together, they were strangers as much as you and I are. They love each other like... well... lovers, not like siblings. It's icky in your mind for some reason, but in reality it's only icky if they grew up as siblings.
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My father grew up in a polygamist community where they rarely let outsiders join their "group". His father had 39 children with 9 different women, and in their community, which is the only one I am speaking about, it is forbidden to marry if you have a father in common (but not a mother in common with different fathers - many times, they don't know who their bio mom is), however there have been instances of men marrying sisters and mother/daughters. I have several cousins married to each other. It is weird.
The start and end of this article are very weird. 3 cousins is not alarming at all- especially when you look at the fact that there are communities that are still deliberately choosing to wed first cousins, despite knowing the risks. And to end with the penultimate comment saying marrying a relative is more likely on an island nation like the UK, that's weird too. The UK has a large population which is very diverse thanks to the history of invasion both ways; we were invaded many times over the centuries, introducing new DNA, and also colonised around the world and brought back fresh blood. It's a weird example to pick.
My family is getting ready to do a spate of ancestry genetics. In the past couple years it has turned out that a number of our "family aches and pains" are actually due to Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome; commonly called "hyper-flexibility"; but much more complex. They keep calling it "rare", but we're not so sure- and it's all through our family, for sure, thanks to my mom. The recent shocker was when my daughter was genetically tested- and turned up one ED gene where she had copies from BOTH parents. It was news to my wife that she had any. Ancestry searching- mostly we're curious as to where the heck this came from - but it's also a puzzle scientists are just starting to dig into- we usually have to tell our doctors about it, it wasn't in their textbooks in med school.
I've order DNA tests twice now and let them both expire. I'm adopted and I'm not sure I want to know.
One of the commenters in the articles asked how isolated Amish and Mormon communities deal with it. Mormons are super-hot on geneology, so no worries there. The Amish know their community. They are not small families who don't know their neighbours. They know who they are related to, and how closely.
That's not always true. There are a lot of genetic issues within the Amish communities because of lack of genetic diversity within those communities. Eye and ear problems are just the tip of the iceberg, and while they will get their children to hospitals for treatment of the eye and ear issues, they refuse to submit to testing to determine the genetic causes as "English intrusions". The Amish DGAF until an issue manifests, they just ride the wave.
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An acquaintance of mine found out she was related to J. Goebbels. As you can guess, she wasn't thrilled.
there are three men who live on long island who are adolf hitler's great nephews. their father was william hitler, hitler's brother alois. son. william hitler did not get along with uncle adolf. he was on an anti uncle adolf speaking tour in the united states when it entered WW2. william hitler served in the u.s. navy during WW2. after the war, he settled on long island, changed his name to houston and had 4 sons. one son died in the early 90s in a car wreck while working for the new york city police. all four sons have never married nor children and have changed their last names a few times.
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I started doing genealogy, because my grandfather, who was orphaned at nine, was curious about his unusual last name. Anyways, I found out that my dad's dad, and my mom's grandpa, are first cousins, through a couple that had 19 children live to adulthood. That was kinda weird, but whatever, they're from a small town, and there weren't a lot of options. But, a couple years ago, I found through my research that my mom's OTHER grandmother, on her dad's (who died when he was 23) side, was ALSO the first cousin of the other two! All three, of the above mentioned people married immigrants, from three different countries. At least my genes got some new input. Lol. And my other great grandparents, on my dad's mom's side, aren't related at all. They're from two other countries. I'm a mutt, who's also kinda inbred.
Third cousins only share about 16% of inherited genetics. That's the same percentage as a random person from the same ethnographic group. It's when you get multigenerational intermarriage in a small kinship group that you start to see genetic issues. Parent-child and sibling incest is much more likely to cause a random genetic issue. It must be difficult for that man whose essentially living evidence of his mother's sexual abuse.
The reality is that in the grand scheme of things, this particular taboo is relatively modern, and despite the taboo it's still not that uncommon for people to KNOWINGLY marry their first cousins...and the only significant biological issues are seen by those who have generations long history of reproducing with blood relatives. Children born to parents who are first cousins have a less than 3% increased chance of developmental issues, about on par with children born to mothers who are over the age of 40. I'm certainly not condoning incest, but there's a big difference between hooking up with someone you grew up with, and finding out the stranger you fell in love with happens to have a blood relation.
I’ve done an Ancestry DNA test, luckily nothing like *this* has turned up. However, I have a c**p ton of cousins with lots of different family names so when I do decide to start dating again, before stuff gets serious, I’m going to buy them a DNA kit.
When you think about how small the world population was when humans first began and how big it is today... I mean... Are we really that surprised that there's gonna be a lot of genetic crossover between a lot of different people and families? Come on now.
If you haven't already seen it, their story was done and posted on a YouTube channel called "soft white underbelly" and is possibly the most pitiful story I've ever heard.
Load More Replies... Wait, so the couple who found they were full brother and sister are going to keep dating? Holy schmoly... my brother and I don't even like our elbows to touch when we sit on the same couch.
Why not? They didn't grow up together, they were strangers as much as you and I are. They love each other like... well... lovers, not like siblings. It's icky in your mind for some reason, but in reality it's only icky if they grew up as siblings.
Load More Replies... My father grew up in a polygamist community where they rarely let outsiders join their "group". His father had 39 children with 9 different women, and in their community, which is the only one I am speaking about, it is forbidden to marry if you have a father in common (but not a mother in common with different fathers - many times, they don't know who their bio mom is), however there have been instances of men marrying sisters and mother/daughters. I have several cousins married to each other. It is weird.
The start and end of this article are very weird. 3 cousins is not alarming at all- especially when you look at the fact that there are communities that are still deliberately choosing to wed first cousins, despite knowing the risks. And to end with the penultimate comment saying marrying a relative is more likely on an island nation like the UK, that's weird too. The UK has a large population which is very diverse thanks to the history of invasion both ways; we were invaded many times over the centuries, introducing new DNA, and also colonised around the world and brought back fresh blood. It's a weird example to pick.
My family is getting ready to do a spate of ancestry genetics. In the past couple years it has turned out that a number of our "family aches and pains" are actually due to Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome; commonly called "hyper-flexibility"; but much more complex. They keep calling it "rare", but we're not so sure- and it's all through our family, for sure, thanks to my mom. The recent shocker was when my daughter was genetically tested- and turned up one ED gene where she had copies from BOTH parents. It was news to my wife that she had any. Ancestry searching- mostly we're curious as to where the heck this came from - but it's also a puzzle scientists are just starting to dig into- we usually have to tell our doctors about it, it wasn't in their textbooks in med school.
I've order DNA tests twice now and let them both expire. I'm adopted and I'm not sure I want to know.
One of the commenters in the articles asked how isolated Amish and Mormon communities deal with it. Mormons are super-hot on geneology, so no worries there. The Amish know their community. They are not small families who don't know their neighbours. They know who they are related to, and how closely.
That's not always true. There are a lot of genetic issues within the Amish communities because of lack of genetic diversity within those communities. Eye and ear problems are just the tip of the iceberg, and while they will get their children to hospitals for treatment of the eye and ear issues, they refuse to submit to testing to determine the genetic causes as "English intrusions". The Amish DGAF until an issue manifests, they just ride the wave.
Load More Replies... An acquaintance of mine found out she was related to J. Goebbels. As you can guess, she wasn't thrilled.
there are three men who live on long island who are adolf hitler's great nephews. their father was william hitler, hitler's brother alois. son. william hitler did not get along with uncle adolf. he was on an anti uncle adolf speaking tour in the united states when it entered WW2. william hitler served in the u.s. navy during WW2. after the war, he settled on long island, changed his name to houston and had 4 sons. one son died in the early 90s in a car wreck while working for the new york city police. all four sons have never married nor children and have changed their last names a few times.
Load More Replies... I started doing genealogy, because my grandfather, who was orphaned at nine, was curious about his unusual last name. Anyways, I found out that my dad's dad, and my mom's grandpa, are first cousins, through a couple that had 19 children live to adulthood. That was kinda weird, but whatever, they're from a small town, and there weren't a lot of options. But, a couple years ago, I found through my research that my mom's OTHER grandmother, on her dad's (who died when he was 23) side, was ALSO the first cousin of the other two! All three, of the above mentioned people married immigrants, from three different countries. At least my genes got some new input. Lol. And my other great grandparents, on my dad's mom's side, aren't related at all. They're from two other countries. I'm a mutt, who's also kinda inbred.
Third cousins only share about 16% of inherited genetics. That's the same percentage as a random person from the same ethnographic group. It's when you get multigenerational intermarriage in a small kinship group that you start to see genetic issues. Parent-child and sibling incest is much more likely to cause a random genetic issue. It must be difficult for that man whose essentially living evidence of his mother's sexual abuse.
The reality is that in the grand scheme of things, this particular taboo is relatively modern, and despite the taboo it's still not that uncommon for people to KNOWINGLY marry their first cousins...and the only significant biological issues are seen by those who have generations long history of reproducing with blood relatives. Children born to parents who are first cousins have a less than 3% increased chance of developmental issues, about on par with children born to mothers who are over the age of 40. I'm certainly not condoning incest, but there's a big difference between hooking up with someone you grew up with, and finding out the stranger you fell in love with happens to have a blood relation.
I’ve done an Ancestry DNA test, luckily nothing like *this* has turned up. However, I have a c**p ton of cousins with lots of different family names so when I do decide to start dating again, before stuff gets serious, I’m going to buy them a DNA kit.
When you think about how small the world population was when humans first began and how big it is today... I mean... Are we really that surprised that there's gonna be a lot of genetic crossover between a lot of different people and families? Come on now.
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