DNA problems

Ancestry DNA gave me some nice answers. The proved I was related to my sister and my cousin. They also proved that I had a first-step-cousin I had only discovered this last year.  I will write about the whole discover later. A few other relationships were confirmed, and then there were the questions.

In my last blog, I talked about my great grandfather Sherman Andrew Miller and the possibility that he had a completely unrelated dad that I never had researched or that maybe his dad was actually someone I thought was his brother.

In this blog I want to discuss another conundrum.

What to do when you order DNA tests for your relations?  I had thought this was going to be straight up.  I would test certain relatives who were related to me through certain ancestors which would lead me further back in time by cross matching people who matches us both.

Simple on paper, but in reality there are some real problems with it. These are things you probably will want to discuss with people BEFORE you have them tested.

The biggest problem that turned up was not being related at all. That can only mean the family tree we had drawn for ourselves was incorrect and there was either infidelity, and early pregnancy or adoption involved. How do you tell your relative,  hey sorry, I think you were adopted?  Also, one of my relatives knew there was a problem with her tree, and didn't tell me until after I had ordered the test. Not a huge deal, but if I had been testing her for only one specific thing, or if she had been adopted rather than just a product of and early pregnancy by another man, I might spent money where it didn't do much good.