NO SURPRISES

It's Mothers Day, so appropriately I'm thinking of my mom, grandmother, aunts...those who contributed to making me both physically and psychologically.  I thank them for so much and used to hold them responsible for some too.  Actually, I've come to believe that holding onto "it's my mom's fault" past the age of about 30, when you really should know better, is just mean.  Take some responsibility for you own life!  See a shrink!  I can be very judge-y about his because I hung on to my resentments and blame for FAR too long and now I'd like a do-over.  I'm just glad I woke up in time to have a decade or so with my mom when we were able to really share our thoughts and feelings and enjoy each other...I wish it had happened sooner, because toward the end she had dementia and we sort of reversed roles and that was weird, but healing for me to be able to care for her.  And none of that is what this post is about....but Happy Mothers Day.

Speaking of heritage, in March I decided to overcome my fear that this fad of shipping your saliva to windowless laboratories to discover your heritage is sending it off to nothing more than DNA repositories for duplicating us in some parallel universe, having 3D printed a batch of skeletons and needing a body and face to plaster on the outside.  (I may watch too much TV -- Westworld, anyone?)

There are a bunch of options: Ancestry, 23 & Me, and Family Tree DNA were listed in an article I read as being most legit.  There are others that apparently are less so.  Not sure why.  I read about those three and got confused and impulsively just went with Ancestry.  Today I got my results!

I've never been pregnant so I don't know how it feels to pee on a stick and see if it's "yes" or "no", but I felt a little thrill over opening my results email, which might be similar.  I had spit in the tube and waited all these weeks for my results.  I was so hoping for a big reveal!  Something completely out of left field! Something no one would ever suspect, something I could claim with familial pride as I learned all about my new and exotic heritage.

Nope.  Nothing I didn't already know.  Here's the breakdown:  41% Great Britain (England, Scotland, Wales); 20% Scandinavian (Sweden, Norway, Denmark); 19% Irish (Ireland, Scotland, Wales); 14% Western European (Belgium, France, Germany, Netherlands, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Lichtenstein).  Then they gave the following "Low Confidence", so just guessing:  3% Italy/Greece; 1% Iberian Peninsula; <1% European Jewish; <1% Finland/Russia.

First of all, this isn't very specific.  I don't know why I expected this, but I thought they would really narrow down the country and then region of that country.  Now I'm going to have to take the entire Great Britain/Ireland tour and not just the Scottish Highlands Tour (where I will fall through a stone circle and meet my Jamie....sorry, Outlander obsession digression).

On the other hand, I am impressed with how my mother's very amateur and pre-internet sleuthing into family history was so on the mark.  I know my maternal grandmother and her sisters still spoke Norwegian on occasion when I was a kid.  They laughed uproariously while doing so, so I can only imagine the bawdy Lutheran humor they were sharing.  My maternal grandfather's family, according to Mom's notes, came over from England in the 1600's but perhaps originated in Wales and there was a hint of French ancestry in his line too.  Mom's maiden name has also been traced to Lowland Scotland.

When you get right down to it, does it really matter?  I'm obviously northern European/Scandinavian, with not a speck of African, Native American, Hispanic, or Asian DNA to be found.  Bummer.  (I'm lookin' at you 3% Italian/Greek, to explain my more flamboyant tendencies -- also about 3% of the time.)

So, now I'm tempted at another go at it with 23 & Me.  They also do medical predispositions.  I'm not sure I really want to know what I may have in store for me, but Hub, ever practical, said if I know then I can take action to avoid.  We'll see.  Mostly I just think maybe my sample was contaminated by the piece of dark chocolate I'd eaten a while before I spit.  The result was a little murky.  Perhaps a more pristine sample will reveal a previously unknown genetic heritage -- or just that I'd better start checking my blood sugar.  Probably.

At least, that's the view from here....©