Adoptee Night at Tuesday’s Major League Baseball game between the Minnesota Twins and Chicago White Sox in Minneapolis, will be a return home for Holly Choon Hyang<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Mixed-Roots-Foundation-Portrait-Logo-with-IDU-Tagline-Centered-01-300x284.png" alt="" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-25666" width="300" height="284" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Mixed-Roots-Foundation-Portrait-Logo-with-IDU-Tagline-Centered-01-300x284.png 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Mixed-Roots-Foundation-Portrait-Logo-with-IDU-Tagline-Centered-01-768x727.png 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Mixed-Roots-Foundation-Portrait-Logo-with-IDU-Tagline-Centered-01.png 806w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" /> Bachman, founder, and president of the LA-based<a href="https://mixedrootsfoundation.org/"> Mixed Roots Foundation</a>
This is the 5th annual Adoptee Night at the Twins home field. The night is meant to honor those touched by adoption and foster care. For Holly it’s become an annual affair since founding the Mixed Roots Foundation in 2011. It’s also something that she’s duplicated elsewhere putting together a few dozen similar events with other MLB teams, as well as professional soccer teams, the NBA, and soon the NFL.
“We want to raise awareness and funds,” said Holly, herself an adoptee from Korea who was raised in Minnesota.
She hopes that adoption and the journey of adoptees and foster kids become as familiar to everyone as America’s pastime, baseball.
<div id="attachment_25664" style="width: 190px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-25664" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/1a-180x300.jpg" alt="" class="size-medium wp-image-25664" width="180" height="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/1a-180x300.jpg 180w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/1a.jpg 261w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 180px) 100vw, 180px" />Holly just prior to her adoption.</div>
Holly wants to connect with the families who often flock to these games. As little as a generation ago, it was more taboo to talk openly about adoption, but that has changed. An estimated 100 million people are “touched by adoption” in the United States, meaning that someone in their family is adopted or that they know someone who is adopted, according to the Council for Adoption. There are about 500,000 children are in the foster care system.
Holly hopes that this generation will recognize that adoption and foster care is about more than just finding homes for kids who need it; it also involves supporting families and adoptees beyond the actual adoption process, she said.
“Because I&#8217;m adopted, I know that there needs to be more post-adoption resources,” Holly said. “With that, two of our core initiatives for Mixed Roots Foundation are mentoring and DNA testing.”
In particular, testing is used to find biological relatives, but it also helping with family medical history or learning about ancestry. Up to half of all adoptions cross some cultural or ethnic line, according to Mixed Remix Foundation.
For Holly, with her roots from South Korea but adopted into a family with European ancestry, her journey started in high school when she first traveled to Korea and connected with her own Korean ancestry.
With the power of science and technology, adoptees now have access to tools to help them search for biological family, or to connect with their ethnic and cultural roots. Up to half of all adoptions cross some cultural or ethnic line, according to some estimates.
With assisting adoptees and their families discover their biological and cultural roots, Mixed Roots Foundation’s name “mixed roots” came out of this idea of the intermingling of an adoptee’s cultural, biological and adoptive families roots. Part of an adoptees journey is reconciling all of that with their identity, and that’s why there’s a strong diversity message in everything that Mixed Roots does, Holly said.
“We all have mixed roots,” she said. “Learning about that is fundamental to our identity.”
Hosted by the MN Twins and Mixed Roots Foundation, the night is co-sponsored by 23andMe, and the<a href="https://mixedchicks.net/"> Mixed Chicks</a>, maker of the multicultural hair products for men and women with mixed ancestry will be throwing out the First Pitch. Native MN Korean Adoptee singer and song writer,<a href="http://www.kimberlymichaels.com"> Kimberly Michaels</a> will perform the National Anthem.
To learn more, donate or volunteer with Mixed Roots Foundation, please visit <a href="http://www.mixedrootsfoundation.org">www.mixedrootsfoundation.org</a> or follow on social media@mixedroots.

23andMe Blog

23andMe Blog Team

Adoptee Night in Minneapolis

Up until recently, genetic research on personality has yielded few results, but that has changed with the availability of massive datasets for <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/iStock_000015521781Small-300x199.jpg" alt="" class="alignright wp-image-21718 size-medium" width="300" height="199" />genome-wide association studies.
In a series of papers published since mid-2016, scientists have established promising new findings that rely on vast amounts of data from the likes of the the<a href="http://www.ukbiobank.ac.uk/"> UK Biobank</a>, the international<a href="http://www.med.unc.edu/pgc"> Psychiatric Genomics Consortium</a>, and 23andMe.
By conducting genome wide association studies — or meta-analyses — with data from hundreds of thousands of people, researchers have found genetic associations where they could not before. In the last year alone, they’ve found associations for such traits as <a href="https://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v533/n7604/full/nature17671.html">educational attainment,</a> depressive symptoms, <a href="https://www.nature.com/ng/journal/v48/n6/full/ng.3552.html">neuroticism</a>, and <a href="https://www.nature.com/ng/journal/v48/n6/full/ng.3551.html?foxtrotcallback=true">risk-taking behavior</a>. 
The success on these fronts has opened up the hunt for more genetic signals associated with psychological and behavioral traits. Scientists are also doubling back on the research over the last year attempting to replicate the findings — when replication was not conducted in the initial study — to ensure the associations are valid. 
<h5>The Big Five</h5>
In July, scientists from St. Louis University, the University of Cambridge and 23andMe zeroed in variants in two genes, CADM2 and MSRA, found to be associated with personality, specifically risk-taking behavior and irritability. The gene CADM2 is important in organizing the synapses in the brain, while MSRA encodes a family of enzymes in the body.
By going back and conducting a replication study, the researchers were also able to broaden the range of traits they looked at, and include additional personality traits beyond the so-called “Big Five” —neuroticism, extraversion, openness, agreeableness, and conscientiousness. 
For this <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2405844017317346?_rdoc=1&#038;_fmt=high&#038;_origin=gateway&#038;_docanchor=&#038;md5=b8429449ccfc9c30159a5f9aeaa92ffb">replication study</a>, researchers included 19 additional measures to more fully describe the Big Five, adding in data for such things as anxiety, risk-taking, order, altruism, and self-discipline.
The study replicated the associations with a variant in the CADM2 gene for risk-taking, agreeableness, and extraversion. The researchers were also able to replicate the variant in the MSRA gene associated with irritability.
While both exciting and promising, the new findings are also tempered by the hurdles faced by genetic research in general. Just finding the associations is not enough — researchers are still trying to learn more about the genetic architecture and biological mechanisms underlying these complex traits. Also, these associations often have a small effect on the traits. But the findings suggest that with even larger sized studies may offer more insight.
You can read the full replication paper <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2405844017317346?_rdoc=1&#038;_fmt=high&#038;_origin=gateway&#038;_docanchor=&#038;md5=b8429449ccfc9c30159a5f9aeaa92ffb">here</a>.

Research Confirms Genetic Associations For Personality Traits

When Ryan’s mother and father adopted him as an infant, there was a typewritten note slipped into his adoption records with a message from his birth parents:
“We pray that you are happy,” it said.
For most of his 36 years, Ryan has been happy, and for most of his life, he’s been searching for his birth parents to tell them that in person.
“I was [happy]. I am, and I always will be,” Ryan said recently.
This year on his birthday, after all those decades of searching, he typed out his own message listing the reasons he feels blessed. At the end of that list he said this:
“Today, July 29th, my family and I met my birth parents and their families,” Ryan wrote. “Today, on my birthday … for the very first time I can see them, hug them, and tell them ‘Thank You,’ which is the greatest birthday gift that I could ever receive. Today my family gets new members. Today I can share with them all the happiness and love in my life. Today, I am so thankful.”
<div id="attachment_25615" style="width: 970px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-25615" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20479643_10207976905895232_8908593567052941357_n.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-25615 size-full" height="540" width="960" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20479643_10207976905895232_8908593567052941357_n.jpg 960w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20479643_10207976905895232_8908593567052941357_n-300x169.jpg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20479643_10207976905895232_8908593567052941357_n-768x432.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20479643_10207976905895232_8908593567052941357_n-880x495.jpg 880w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px" />Ryan on the right meets his biological father Ed, his biological mother, Karen and his biological sister Caroline  for the first time on his birthday. Photo: <a href="http://www.jacpfef.com/">Jackie Foley</a> </div>
But like all good things, this good thing didn’t come easy.

<h5>Where it started </h5>
Ryan&#8217;s parents adopted him in North Carolina, which has closed adoption records. So even though he always knew he was adopted, finding out more about his origins was problematic. On top of that, because his dad was in the Army, the family moved a lot. 
<div id="attachment_25619" style="width: 970px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-25619" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20604263_10207976904415195_3109513256002552356_n.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-25619 size-full" height="640" width="960" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20604263_10207976904415195_3109513256002552356_n.jpg 960w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20604263_10207976904415195_3109513256002552356_n-300x200.jpg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20604263_10207976904415195_3109513256002552356_n-768x512.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20604263_10207976904415195_3109513256002552356_n-880x587.jpg 880w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px" />Ryan meeting his father for the first time. Photo: <a href="http://www.jacpfef.com/">Jackie Foley</a></div>
His parents, Jack and Terri Moore, picked up the family — Ryan and his younger sister Allisen — as they moved to posts that ranged from Kansas to Korea. That made it harder for Ryan to track down records. But it didn’t stop him from looking or asking questions. When Ryan was in 5th grade, he did an oral report for class at Spencer Elementary School in Chicopee, Massachusetts. The assignment was on what was unique about his family, and his topic was his adoption. 
&nbsp;
<h5>Life Gets In The Way</h5>
Two years later was when he first read that note from his birth parents.
But as he got older, even though he was still trying to find his biological family, he eventually had to put his search on hold. 
“Life got in the way,” Ryan said.
There was college, the Army, deploying to Afghanistan, starting a new career, and getting married. The years slipped by, and his search was pushed to the side until he and his wife Debby decided to have kids — two sons, Ian, 5, and Ellis, 3. 
It was that last milestone that again stirred in Ryan the need to know more about his biological family.
“I always wanted to know,” said Ryan, 36. “But having a family that sparked in my mind, ‘OK I got to find this out.’” 
Like most adoptees, when Ryan visited a doctor and had to answer questions about whether he had medical issues in his family, he was at a loss.
“I have no idea.” 
That was easy to brush off when it was just about him, but having kids changed that.
“I realized that I didn&#8217;t have any health history information for our son,” Ryan said.
<h5>We have to find them </h5>
At first, that meant just diving back into his adoption records; he found “crib notes” from a foster parent that took care of him before his parents adopted him. Ryan’s wife immediately saw in those notes parallels with the type of things she’d seen with their first son.
<div id="attachment_25616" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-25616" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20526063_10207976905815230_2891730427791474607_n-300x200.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-25616 size-medium" height="200" width="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20526063_10207976905815230_2891730427791474607_n-300x200.jpg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20526063_10207976905815230_2891730427791474607_n-768x512.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20526063_10207976905815230_2891730427791474607_n-880x587.jpg 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20526063_10207976905815230_2891730427791474607_n.jpg 960w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Ryan&#8217;s parents, Jack and Terri Moore watch as he meets his biological parents. Photo: <a href="http://www.jacpfef.com/">Jackie Foley</a></div>&#8220;We have to find them,&#8221; she told Ryan.
But the paper records didn’t get him very far with closed adoption policies. Then last year, his wife gave him a 23andMe kit for Christmas. He saw it as a chance to learn about his ancestry and health, and maybe find more about his biological family. The health and ancestry information offered a refreshing opportunity to learn things he hadn’t know about himself. The family stuff came later.
About a month ago, someone popped up on his DNA Relatives as a predicted uncle. It’s hard to convey how momentous something like this is for an adoptee. It was the first person he was ever connected to biologically, his first blood relative.
Ryan took a long time working on the wording of his message. He was afraid that he might say something that would turn this newly found relative away. That’s not what happened.
Almost immediately after sending a carefully worded note, he got a response.
&#8220;He is my uncle,&#8221; Ryan said, describing the response. &#8220;He knows of me. He wants to help.”
<h5>Contact</h5>
When in the past it had taken years, decades even, to find the smallest of details, Ryan found himself on the edge of learning the whole truth in just hours. Two days after that exchange with his uncle, while he and Debby sat and watched a performance of Hamilton on Broadway, Ryan got a text that changed his life forever:
&#8220;Ryan, your biological mother, Karen, and myself, Ed, your biological father, have hoped and dreamed of this day.&#8221;
Soon, they talked on the phone, and Karen and Ed spoke with Ryan&#8217;s parents Jack and Terri. His wife spoke with them. So too did his sister Allisen. Ryan learned that he had another sister, a full sister, named Caroline. And he learned a bit of the back story.
His biological father, Ed, had been in North Carolina helping his dad open a new restaurant while on summer break from college when he met his biological mother, Karen, who was also in college but working a summer job. They started dating but went back to school in the fall, and that&#8217;s when she found out she was pregnant. They agreed that adoption was the best option. After Ryan&#8217;s birth, Karen and Ed drifted apart, but several years later they met again and married, and had Caroline, Ryan&#8217;s biological sister. It was a few years after that they got a divorce but remained amicable, and continued to live near each other in the Boston area.
<h5>Best Birthday Present Ever</h5>
<div id="attachment_25614" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-25614" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20597315_10207976901815130_2834176105222409161_n-300x200.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-25614 size-medium" height="200" width="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20597315_10207976901815130_2834176105222409161_n-300x200.jpg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20597315_10207976901815130_2834176105222409161_n-768x512.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20597315_10207976901815130_2834176105222409161_n-880x587.jpg 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20597315_10207976901815130_2834176105222409161_n.jpg 960w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Ryan, center, with his new extended family on his birthday. Photo: <a href="http://www.jacpfef.com/">Jackie Foley</a></div>
After Ryan finally found them, they all arranged to get together in person at Ed&#8217;s home on Ryan&#8217;s birthday. It turned out to be the best gift.
It was a shock, seeing family members who looked like him and even shared some of the same mannerisms. Ryan and his biological father share an odd trait of raising their voices an octave or two when they kid around, and they both love Formula 1 racing.
&#8220;That whole nature versus nurture thing is hard to get your head around,&#8221; Ryan said.
But Ryan was just as excited that his biological parents could meet his parents, Jack and Terri. He wanted them to see how lucky he was to have the life that they had given him.
&#8220;I have lived a happy life,&#8221; he said. &#8220;I know how hard the decision was that they made 36 years ago, but I wanted to express to them how thankful I am for it.&#8221;

Ryan’s Search For Family

We are all 100 percent human.<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/AllHuman_FB-300x300.png" alt="" class="alignright wp-image-25658 size-medium" width="300" height="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/AllHuman_FB-300x300.png 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/AllHuman_FB-150x150.png 150w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/AllHuman_FB-768x768.png 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/AllHuman_FB-1024x1024.png 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/AllHuman_FB-880x880.png 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/AllHuman_FB-271x271.png 271w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/AllHuman_FB-372x372.png 372w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/AllHuman_FB-574x574.png 574w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/AllHuman_FB-980x980.png 980w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/AllHuman_FB.png 1080w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
The DNA that 23andMe empowers customers to explore is fascinating not because we are so different but rather because we are so similar — 99.5 percent the same.
Any two of us can find a common ancestor. Many of us can find relatives around the world that connect us to people and cultures we never before experienced. It is only the tiny fraction of our DNA — the 0.5 percent — that is different and leads to the amazing variety and talent in the world.
23andMe condemns all forms of racism, including people who are using genetic testing to advance hate-based dogma. If we see it on our site, we ban it and close the offenders’ accounts. These individuals, who use their data in this way, are missing the fundamental point that their DNA is connected to the world and everyone on it.
There is no superior DNA;  we are all from the same common ancestors and we share the same building blocks of life.
We are all 100 percent human.
&nbsp;

<div style="float: center; text-align: justified; width: 640px; background-color: #eee; padding: 15px; margin-left: 10px;">Here are some answers to questions on this issue:
• How does 23andMe moderate its forums for hate speech?
We do not tolerate hate speech and other forms of abuse on our forums, blog and messaging applications within the 23andMe product. 23andMe’s customer care team moderates these 23andMe-specific channels, along with a team that monitors our social media profiles. If we identify hate speech or any other abuse of 23andMe-specific channels, we remove those comments and ban the users. If we identify inappropriate comments on our social profiles we remove those wherever possible.</div>
<div style="float: center; text-align: justified; width: 640px; background-color: #eee; padding: 15px; margin-left: 10px;">• Have you kicked any white supremacist customers off your forums, or taken any other action against them?</div>
<div style="float: center; text-align: justified; width: 640px; background-color: #eee; padding: 15px; margin-left: 10px;">We have banned people from our forums and from commenting on our blog. These bans were based on inappropriate comments and forum behavior, but we have not had a case that specifically involved a white supremacist. 
We condemn racism in all forms. We consistently promote a message of inclusion, and we believe our service has the power to change minds. Our hope is all individuals see our test as an opportunity to learn more about themselves, and also understand we are more alike than different. In fact science tells us we’re 99.5% genetically identical.
</div>

All Human

Paul Leventhal is a patient man.
<div id="attachment_22516" style="width: 278px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-22516" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/Jimmy-Paul1-268x300.jpg" alt="" class="size-medium wp-image-22516" width="268" height="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/Jimmy-Paul1-268x300.jpg 268w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/Jimmy-Paul1.jpg 449w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 268px) 100vw, 268px" />Paul, right, and his brother Jimmy.</div>In his 70s now, he’s been searching for his biological father since he was 18.
More than two years ago, we wrote about Paul finding his half brother, Jimmy, using 23andMe. <a href="https://blog.23andme.com/23andme-customer-stories/a-fantastical-story/">Their story</a> — spanning decades and several continents — was dramatic and inspiring, but for Paul, at least, there were still chapters to be written.
“I joined 23andMe …primarily to trace down my genetic father,” he said. “Never did I imagine I would find a half brother on my maternal side who was born three years after me.”
It was a joyful surprise, and the two have built a relationship.
“(Jimmy) and I get along well. We bonded, and that’s never going to fall way,” Paul said.
And finding Jimmy using 23andMe gave him hope that perhaps his patience might pay off and he would uncover the identity of his biological father, too.
“I just waited for somebody to match,” Paul said of continued search on 23andMe.
It was a long shot.
<div id="attachment_25634" style="width: 235px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-25634" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20116871_10214016903441210_8432463590217499637_o-225x300.jpg" alt="" class="size-medium wp-image-25634" width="225" height="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20116871_10214016903441210_8432463590217499637_o-225x300.jpg 225w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20116871_10214016903441210_8432463590217499637_o-660x880.jpg 660w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20116871_10214016903441210_8432463590217499637_o.jpg 768w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 225px) 100vw, 225px" />Paul&#8217;s (and Jimmy&#8217;s) biological mother.</div>
<h5>Waiting on a Match</h5>
Paul’s story is complicated, and like his brother, his childhood has a Dickens kind of bleakness.
Paul’s mother and father had divorced when he was just a year old. She’d become pregnant with Paul when his father was serving in Europe during the Second World War. The timing was odd, but Paul didn’t know that until later.
His mother, who he only has vague memories of, was hospitalized off and on for psychological problems throughout her life. When Paul was just one year-old, she put and him his older brother in a foster home where he stayed until he was almost five.
Around then, her former husband (and the man Paul at first thought was his father) brought him to Chicago to live with him and his new wife. Throughout his childhood, his father and stepmother remained distant to him. As for Paul’s connection to his mother, it was almost non-existent.
He has one fleeting memory of sitting on his mother’s knee — everything else he knows about his mother is from relatives. It wasn’t until Paul was 18 — when his father died suddenly of a heart attack — that he learned that his father wasn’t his biological father. 
“He was on my birth certificate, but not my father,” Paul said. “My life was turned upside down.”  
Paul lived with this, his mother’s rejection and her family shunning him. Paul still feels deep disappointment toward her family for letting him be shipped off to a foster home for five years.
“I must have been quite an embarrassment to them and my maternal grandmother, who was still living at the time.”
Paul’s half-brother Jimmy’s young life was more filled with physical abuse, but Paul suffered more from emotional abuse.
Rejected by his mother and her family, Paul spent years trying to find his biological father. That’s part of why he eventually got his DNA tested with 23andMe. Connecting with Jimmy more than two years ago opened up a door into his family history, and renewed his hope of finding something out about his father.
So he waited.
“All I did was spit into a tube and sit back and wait,” Paul said.
<h5>Finding His Sisters</h5>
<div id="attachment_25635" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-25635" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20032047_10214011921236658_8904163204533659120_n-300x300.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-25635 size-medium" width="300" height="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20032047_10214011921236658_8904163204533659120_n-300x300.jpg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20032047_10214011921236658_8904163204533659120_n-150x150.jpg 150w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20032047_10214011921236658_8904163204533659120_n-271x271.jpg 271w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20032047_10214011921236658_8904163204533659120_n-372x372.jpg 372w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20032047_10214011921236658_8904163204533659120_n-574x574.jpg 574w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/20032047_10214011921236658_8904163204533659120_n.jpg 768w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Paul&#8217;s biological father Bennett White.</div>
And then earlier this year, a new relative named Catilin popped up on his 23andMe results.
“Without DNA, I never would have found Caitlin, I never would have made this match,” said Paul. “It was like a bomb going off.”
Caitlin was a niece, the daughter of a half sister with whom he matches on his father’s side. Over the next few weeks, he met Caitlin’s mother, his half-sister, and his two other sisters. They shared with him a photo of their and Paul’s father, Bennett White, who died in 1960.
“He looked like me,” Paul said.
Tall and thin, his father hadn’t been a great dad to his daughters or husband to his wife. A teacher, his drinking problems drove him to quit and take a factory job. How Bennett and Paul’s mother met, he does not know, but his mother was at one point at a state hospital in Ohio where Bennett lived. Paul thought it was possible that his biological father could have been in detox at the hospital when his mother was there being treated for her psychological problems, but he does not know. 
“I believe I was the product of a brief affair,” Paul said. “I don’t even think he knew I existed.”
Paul has communicated with his sisters, Penny, Pam and Jane. They had one other sister who died as a baby. One of the sisters lives near him at his home in Florida, and they have met in person. Paul learned that his father had numerous affairs. It turns out he was married, and his wife was two months pregnant when he had an affair with Paul’s mother.
Later, he married another woman with whom he had two children, both of whom died at a young age. 
As with meeting his brother Jimmy, Paul is trying to get to know his sisters, seeing what they have in common, and how they are different. And answering this question that has lingered with him almost his entire life has changed him a bit.
“It’s both a big relief to know who he was and to put a face and name and character to this man,” Paul said. “It has put my mind at ease a bit, but I don’t think I’m done searching.”
He also notes that none of this would have been possible without 23andMe.
“I never would have found Bennett or Jimmy without it,” he said.

Using 23andMe To Find Family

Papa was a rolling stone. (His Y chromosome was anyway.)
The story of your paternal-line ancestry is the story of an extraordinary migration. Over 300,000 years and 10,000 generations, Dad’s male-line descendants have rolled over land and sea, hunted mammoths, created pottery, forged iron and survived an Ice Age. And today, the genetic voyage leads to the person reading this blog — you!
Through 23andMe&#8217;s new and improved <a href="https://you.23andme.com/reports/paternal_haplogroup/">Paternal Haplogroup report</a>, customers* can trace the footsteps of their paternal-line ancestors over thousands of generations of human history. And that should be music to the ears of anybody interested in their family’s unique history. 
<h6>What is a Paternal Haplogroup?</h6>
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/male_line-300x214.png" alt="" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-25625" width="300" height="214" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/male_line-300x214.png 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/male_line-768x548.png 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/male_line-1024x731.png 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/male_line-880x628.png 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/male_line-1180x842.png 1180w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/male_line.png 1450w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />The most obvious artifact of your paternal ancestry may be your surname. But surnames are actually a pretty recent invention, and names change over time as records are rewritten or lost. For some cultures, even the concept of a paternal surname is foreign. 
Genetics offers another way to discover your paternal-line history that doesn&#8217;t depend on a paper trail. And it can tell a story that reaches back hundreds of thousands of years.
Each generation, fathers pass down copies of their Y chromosomes to their sons. So if you are a genetic male, you inherited your Y chromosome — and all the genetic markers it contains — from the unbroken line of men in your paternal lineage.
Alone, this doesn&#8217;t reveal that much about your heritage. But by comparing the genetic markers on Y chromosomes from men all over the world, researchers have built a genealogical tree of all paternal lineages. This tree reaches back more than 275,000 years to just one man who lived in East Africa: the most recent paternal-line common ancestor of all humans living today. 
Your paternal-line &#8220;haplogroup&#8221; describes how your lineage is related to all the others. Each haplogroup is a family of lines that descend from a common ancestor. In the Paternal Haplogroup tree, this is represented by a branch or a cluster of branches. <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/paternal_hap_tree-300x176.png" alt="" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-25627" width="300" height="176" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/paternal_hap_tree-300x176.png 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/paternal_hap_tree-768x450.png 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/paternal_hap_tree-1024x600.png 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/paternal_hap_tree-880x516.png 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/paternal_hap_tree-1180x692.png 1180w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/paternal_hap_tree.png 1790w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
To trace your ancient paternal-line history, we can follow the path from the root of the tree out to your particular branch. And, just as you and a first cousin are connected through your grandparents, you and many others around the world are connected through the common ancestor of your haplogroup. 
If your lineage carries haplogroup R-M405, for example, you and King Henry IV of France can trace your paternal lines back to the father of haplogroup R-M405. 
<h6>Tracing the Migrations of Your Paternal-Line Ancestors</h6>
<div id="attachment_25626" style="width: 1034px" class="wp-caption alignnone"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-25626" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/hap_C_migrations-1024x432.png" alt="" class="wp-image-25626 size-large" width="1024" height="432" />Major migration routes of Haplogroup C-M130</div>
Researchers can discover the geographic origins and migrations of some of our paternal-line ancestors by comparing where different haplogroups are found around the world and how they are related to each other. All of our stories begin at the root of the haplogroup tree in eastern Africa. For over 200,000 years, our ancestors hunted ancient gazelle across the seas of grass and split into diverse groups within Africa. Then, sometime around sixty thousand years ago, one small group crossed the Red Sea and forged new paths across all of Eurasia.
In the new Paternal Haplogroup report, customers follow the major migration routes of their paternal lineage, branch by branch, over tens of thousands of years.
<h6>Ancient DNA Sheds New Light on Old Stories&#8230;<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/yamnaya_paternal-263x300.jpg" alt="" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-25629" width="263" height="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/yamnaya_paternal-263x300.jpg 263w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/yamnaya_paternal.jpg 350w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 263px) 100vw, 263px" /></h6>
With major improvements in technology, geneticists are unraveling more of our ancestral mysteries. One prime example is the origin and spread of haplogroup R — the dominant paternal haplogroup in western Eurasia. In the early 2000s, the available evidence suggested that men bearing haplogroup R reached their prominence after surviving the last great peak of the Ice Age nearly 20,000 years ago.
But just in the last several years, researchers using  DNA extracted from the remains of men who lived in Central Asia and Europe thousands of years ago have connected the recent spread of haplogroup R to <a href="http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/02/thousands-horsemen-may-have-swept-bronze-age-europe-transforming-local-population">men who swept down from the steppes</a> only 5,000 years ago. 
These migrations began with an early Bronze-Age culture called the Yamnaya. They were herders, and needed to travel fast to keep their livestock fed. Atop the world&#8217;s first domesticated horses and armed with some of the earliest bronze tools and weapons, Yamnaya men spilled east into Central Asia and west into the Balkans. Their descendants eventually stretched from the British Isles to India.
In addition to their technology and paternal lines, the Yamnaya also brought their language. This language was the ancestor of the Indo-European language family, a group that includes 445 living languages spoken historically from the western tip of Europe to central and southern Asia.
<h6>&#8230;And New Stories Are Written</h6>
With the technology to <a href="http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/10/game-changing-study-suggests-first-polynesians-voyaged-all-way-east-asia">extract ancient DNA</a> and <a href="http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/09/almost-all-living-people-outside-africa-trace-back-single-migration-more-50000-years">sequence the entire human genome</a>, new doors are opening in the study of human population history and the pace of new discoveries about our ancestors is accelerating.
What&#8217;s more, researchers from all fields have a new set of tools: people like you. From professional genealogists to beginner hobbyists, individuals are researching their family histories and sharing data like never before.
As geneticists, genealogists, and citizen scientists work together to uncover new evidence and gain new insights, new details will be added to all of our ancestral stories. 
* Because genetic females do not have Y chromosomes, 23andMe is unable to directly determine the haplogroup of their paternal line. Female customers can, however, link accounts with a brother or father to receive their paternal haplogroup results.

The Paternal-Line Story Written In Your DNA

<div id="attachment_25595" style="width: 294px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-25595" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Fah-284x300.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-25595 size-medium" width="284" height="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Fah-284x300.jpg 284w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Fah.jpg 346w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 284px) 100vw, 284px" />Fah getting ready for his trek to Everest base camp. Everest can be seen in the background.</div>
On vacation trekking the Himalayas with his partner, 23andMe computational biologist Fah Sathirapongsasuti didn’t just take snapshots of surrounding peaks, he also did a little science at 17,000 feet.
As he hoofed along the trail to Everest base camp, Fah recorded the toll of hiking at altitude took on his body, monitoring his heart rate, the oxygen saturation in his blood, the number of calories he burned, and his disrupted sleep patterns.
“There were a few days that I felt pretty miserable,” he said.
Collecting data on vacation might not be on the top of your trip itinerary, but Fah saw an opportunity. He saw a chance to record in real time and with real data, the impact of altitude on the human body. And, he thought if enough people like him recorded their data and pooled it together, perhaps he could learn something more about why some of us do better than others at higher elevations. (You can see morea about how he tracked his data <a href="https://scholar.harvard.edu/fah/science-little-altitude">here</a>, or look at the sidebar to learn more about how you could track your own data if you’re planning a trip to higher elevations.)
“I don’t think you need to be a geek or a scientist to enjoy collecting data during your vacation,” said Fah. “Our ability to adapt to foreign environments such as high altitude is a testament to the wonder of the human body. Quantifying it will help you see and appreciate your own body more.”

<div style="float: right; text-align: justified; width: 350px; background-color: #eee; padding: 15px; margin-left: 10px;">
Fah&#8217;s DIY Altitude Science Field Guide 
I don’t think you need to be a geek or a scientist to enjoy collecting data during your vacation. Our ability to adapt to foreign environments such as high altitude is a testament to the wonder of the human body. Quantifying it will help you see and appreciate your body more. Plus, monitoring your blood oxygen level (SpO2) during high altitude trekking can literally save your life!
My data from Everest Base Camp Trekking can be found <a href="https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1LQA3bKR-fcssExZcvDPMyKOgIzIgahPcjjP12krvqjY/edit?usp=sharing">here</a>. If you are planning a trip up the mountains, to elevations higher than 9,000 feet, I’ve outlined how you too can track this data.
What to track?
If you are traveling to a “very high altitude” — defined as anything higher than 11,500 ft (e.g. Mt Whitney, Machu Picchu, or Mount Kilimanjaro) — there are a few experiments you can try. 
I found that the oxygen saturation in my blood, now easily measured using a pulse oximeter that can be clipped to your finger and also tracks your pulse rate. 
The key here is to record at three consistent times each day:

<ol>
<li>On arrival at your resting point (e.g. campsite or , lodge)</li>
<li>Before bed</li>
<li>Morning, within the first hour after waking up</li>
</ol>
When recording the data, you should also make note of the elevation, and whether you have any symptoms of altitude sickness. For me, that amounted to nausea, dizziness, restless sleep and blurred vision.  Beyond those three key points of measuring your blood oxygen, you should also measure immediately after exertion, that could include hiking or climbing or skiing. Whatever you are doing at elevation that is physically taxing.  Record the exercise. Measure your heart rate and SpO2 immediate after exercise. Keep repeatedly measuring every 30 seconds after you’ve finished the “exercise” until your heart rate returns to normal. For me, this was instructive because I was able to see that I could recover even from the most strenuous exertions relatively quickly with a relatively  If you are going to a moderately high altitude location (4,900-11,500 ft), such as Aspen or Lake Tahoe, it is less likely that you will experience altitude sickness., But you may observe changes in your physiology especially during an exercise.  You might consider doing some strenuous exercise such as a sprint and measure your SpO2.  You might be surprised by how low it can get.
What You’ll Need 
Like any good experiment you’ll need a few things to ensure you can record good data. You&#8217;lld need a good pulse oximeter.  There are several brands.  The one I used is iHealth Air Pulse Oximeter available on <a href="https://www.amazon.com/iHealth-Pulse-Oximeter-Apple-Android/dp/B00D7MDXCU">Amazon</a>. In addition you&#8217;ll need a fitness tracker.  There are several acceptable, each with its own features and quirks.  I use Fitbit Charge HR, mostly for the balance between price and features.  Make sure it has continuous heart rate monitor and accelerometer (for steps and elevation gain estimate). 
</div>
Although we can acclimatize to exertion at elevation, some people adapt to life at higher altitudes better than others. Sherpas, the ethnic group that has lived for thousands of years in the Himalayas, have a genetic advantage for life in the thin oxygen air of their homelands. So do Tibetans. Their genetic advantage is something they inherited from our ancient human cousins, the<a href="https://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v512/n7513/full/nature13408.html"> Denisovians</a>, more than 40,000 years ago. Variants in two genes EPAS1 and EGLN1 are prevalent in Tibetans. Among everyone else, it’s hard to predict who will be get sick at high elevations and who won’t. 
Most people know that climbing Everest is fraught with peril, but fewer know that just trekking to base camp can pose a danger due to altitude sickness. Although there aren&#8217;t accurate statistics on the number of trekkers hit by altitude sickness on the trail, a few die each year from what’s called Acute Mountain Sickness or underlying conditions that are exacerbated by exertion at altitude. But currently there is no good way to determine who might get sick and who won’t.
Fah and his partner were careful and prepared for their trek. Both of them are in shape, but even so they had days that were very difficult. Fah thought this was likely so he wanted to record the data to see how his body changed during the hike, and to see how it affected him differently than others.
“I know what I felt, but I wanted to see the data too,” he said.
There were some obvious data points. The higher Fah went, the lower the oxygen saturation in his blood.
“Duh,” he joked.
Although it wasn’t surprising, the data dramatically illustrated the impact of altitude. As Fah crossed the pass between Lobuche and Gorakshep at more than 16,000 feet, his oxygen saturation dropped below 80 percent, and his resting heart rate spiked upward. He got headaches, felt dizzy and his vision blurred. Fah slept less. None of that is atypical. In fact having your oxygen saturation drop below 80 percent for an extended period is very dangerous.
Over the week long trip, Fah slowly acclimatized to the higher elevations.  And his numbers got better, but in general, there was a direct correlation between how bad he felt and elevation gain. Beyond what he felt and what he was recording, Fah also knew that there are many studies <a href="https://www.nap.edu/read/5197/chapter/24"> on this</a>.
Out of curiosity Fah also added one other data point, he measured the oxygen saturation of three of the Sherpas helping to ferry some of the supplies for the trekkers. On average their oxygen levels were three to five percentage points higher than Fah, and they were much more comfortable.
As Andrew Murry, a physiologist at the University of Cambridge in the UK <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2017/05/28/530204187/the-science-behind-the-super-abilities-of-sherpas">recently told NPR</a>:
“You don&#8217;t need to spend very long in that part of the world to see that the people living there, particularly the Sherpas, perform extremely well at altitude — a lot better than we do.&#8221;
Over time many of us can acclimate ourselves to exertions at higher altitudes, improving our blood oxygen saturation levels, for instance. And Fah was able to see how, even in the short time he was in Nepal, his body acclimated itself to the higher elevations.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Graph-SpO2-1024x612.png" alt="" class="aligncenter wp-image-25596 size-large" width="1024" height="612" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Graph-SpO2-1024x612.png 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Graph-SpO2-300x179.png 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Graph-SpO2-768x459.png 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Graph-SpO2-880x526.png 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Graph-SpO2-1180x705.png 1180w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Graph-SpO2.png 1388w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" />
Oxygen saturation (SpO2, gray line) decreased as the elevation (blue line) increased. Symptoms of altitude sickness such as headaches, blurry vision, and sleeplessness are common when SpO2 dropped below 80, between Day 5 and Day 8.
But even acclimatizing won’t entirely relieve the symptoms and it’s still difficult to predict why some people get sick, and altitudes and others do not. So Fah decided to invite others with plans to trek at elevation — 11,000 feet or higher — to record their data.
“The lesson I learn as a scientist at 23andMe is that crowd-sourcing can give us the power to make a discovery at an unprecedented rate and scale. Together we might be able to discover a way to predict and prevent altitude sickness,” he said.

Science With A Little Altitude

Annie was looking at a note from a woman she didn’t know. Someone she’d been searching for all her life. A woman named Harley, who just might be her biological mother.
<div id="attachment_25598" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-25598" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2842-300x300.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-25598 size-medium" height="300" width="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2842-300x300.jpg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2842-150x150.jpg 150w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2842-768x768.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2842-1024x1024.jpg 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2842-880x880.jpg 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2842-1180x1180.jpg 1180w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2842-271x271.jpg 271w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2842-372x372.jpg 372w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2842-574x574.jpg 574w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2842-980x980.jpg 980w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Harley, on the left, and Annie.</div>“I can’t wait to talk to you,” Harley told her in the email. “Here’s my phone number.”
Annie tried to describe what she was feeling at that moment.
“I’m freaking out,” she said. “I literally almost vomited on the floor.”
Annie’s story — and it’s a doozy — is set to air this week on a new podcast called My Gay Life.
The Seattle-based producers Rebecca Fernandez and Cyndi Butz-Houghton put the show together. Annie’s story, titled “Are you my mom?” is just the second episode, so the team has already set the bar pretty high.
Rebecca, who gave us the heads-up on Annie’s hour-long story, told us it made them all “laugh, cry and get goose bumps.” Not a bad review. We heard it, and all of us here were right there with the Kleenex and group hugs.
In Rebecca’s quick summary of the story, she said, “(It) features a 30-year-old lesbian who was reunited with her birth mother — partially in thanks to 23andMe.”
But the story is way way more than that.
It’s about Annie first coming out to her parents at 14. (Her father was like “Duh”, but her mom was a little surprised.) What it was like to grow up “hella gay, in a hella small town.” And the story is about Annie finally finding a solid relationship with her partner, Alejandra, and about building strong bonds with her adoptive family, as well as with Alejandra’s parents.<div id="attachment_25599" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-25599" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2837-300x300.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-25599 size-medium" height="300" width="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2837-300x300.jpg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2837-150x150.jpg 150w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2837-768x768.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2837-1024x1024.jpg 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2837-880x880.jpg 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2837-1180x1180.jpg 1180w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2837-271x271.jpg 271w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2837-372x372.jpg 372w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2837-574x574.jpg 574w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2837-980x980.jpg 980w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/IMG_2837.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />A picture of Annie on the right as a teenager, next to a photo of her mother Harley as a teenager, on the left.</div>
Annie’s story is unique, but much of what she talks about will sound familiar to other adoptees, like growing up and being keenly aware that, unlike her friends, she didn’t look like her parents, or the fact that she didn’t have a family tree, or even a family medical history.Annie knew that she was born in a small town in Idaho and that she’d been handed over to her adoptive parents when she was just 12 hours old. That was the extent of what she knew of her birth. So what she carried her whole life were questions about her origins and the mother who gave her up for adoption.
But, as someone who had a wonderful, loving relationship with her adoptive parents, asking those questions brought up other uncomfortable issues. She didn’t ever want her parents to feel like her search meant that she felt they were in any way inadequate. Many adoptees express similar feelings. So much of her searching was internal. She thought about her biological mother more than she went out and searched for her.
“When you’re adopted and don’t know where you come from, or what your family looks like, you make up this vision,” said Annie.
For her, it was creating this “cookie cutter” version of a family with a mom who had the perfect hair, at home baking cookies.
The truth was a little different than that, Annie said. And after learning about everything, she felt she was fortunate that it took this long, because maybe earlier in her life she might not have been ready.Then this year after turning 30, Annie said she was finally feeling ready to answer the biggest question of her life:Where did I come from?
“My life was falling into place, so I decided I would start looking again,” Annie said. “I was at a point mentally that it was OK.”
Other things seemed to fall into place as well, and almost immediately after beginning her search, she started getting answers, first through a free search site for adoptees and then using 23andMe to confirm her connection. Within 24 hours, she connected with Harley, who shared photos.Right away some of the fantasies about her birth mother were set straight. Her birth mom had tattoos and worked in a bar. Annie, who has tattoos of her own, said the photo went counter to her idolized version of her birth mother, baking cookies at home.
“That was not what I was expecting,” Annie said.
At first, Annie didn’t even see the resemblance. She thought that once she talked to her birth mom, there would be this instant connection. That didn’t happen, but as they talked Annie felt drawn to her. And she heard for the first time the story of her birth. It was hard to hear.
Her birth mother was just 17 when she became pregnant. She ran away from home, but came back just before the birth. They told her that the baby would be adopted, so she asked her dad if she could at least see the baby after she was born. He said of course, but that’s not what happened. She never saw Annie. She didn’t even know if she had had a boy or a girl. Her parents had told her conflicting stories, even giving her wrong information to hide where Annie ended up.
Everything wasn’t cookie cutter and perfect for her birth mom. She had two more kids, two sons, who went to live with her sister and mother in Olympia, Washington. Harley spent some time in jail for a drug offense. One of the many twists in the story was that at one point, after being moved, Harley’s cellmate was one of Annie’s closest childhood friends.
Not long ago, Annie traveled to Sand Point, Idaho to meet her biological mother. She called it the “biggest day of my life.” And oddly she’s grown closer to her adoptive parents through all this.
As she thinks of everything that has happened in such a short time — she only began searching again in May — she realized that perhaps she could have solved the mystery of her birth long ago, “but I wasn’t ready.”
It wasn’t until now that she was ready. The timing was perfect.
Alejandra, Annie’s partner, told recently how the experience seemed to change her.
“’You are happy now,’” Alejandra told her. “It’s a positive change. You have a bounce in your step.’”
We’re feeling a little of that bounce. You can too by listening to Annie’s story <a href="https://soundcloud.com/mygaylife/episode-102-are-you-my-mom">here</a>.
And here&#8217;s a video of Annie going back to Sand Point to meet Harley for the first time. If you are not a patient person you can go to about the 3:30 mark, but keep the Kleenex close.
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Listen To Annie’s Story

In collaboration with The Milken Institute and Lundbeck, 23andMe is launching a groundbreaking<a href="https://www.23andme.com/depression-bipolar/"> new study</a> leveraging 23andMe’s unique research model to look at the <img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://blog-api.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/BiPolar_metadata_1200x628-300x157.png" alt="" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-25590" width="300" height="157" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/BiPolar_metadata_1200x628-300x157.png 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/BiPolar_metadata_1200x628-768x402.png 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/BiPolar_metadata_1200x628-1024x536.png 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/BiPolar_metadata_1200x628-880x461.png 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/BiPolar_metadata_1200x628-1180x618.png 1180w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/BiPolar_metadata_1200x628.png 1200w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />genetics underlying depression and bipolar disorder.
In the United States alone, depression and bipolar disorders impact more than <a href="http://www.adaa.org/about-adaa/press-room/facts-statistics">16 million people</a>, and fewer than half ever receive effective treatment. According to the World Health Organization, depression alone accounts for the most<a href="https://www.nature.com/news/mental-health-a-world-of-depression-1.16318"> ‘years lost’</a> in disability than any other health condition worldwide.
Although scientists have spent decades studying the conditions, our understanding of the underlying biology remains rudimentary. Recent studies have offered some intriguing clues for future inquiry, but there’s still so much left to discover. This study will combine genetic information with cognitive assessments and behavioral data that researchers hope will glean new insights that could inform new treatments.
“We need a wider, more varied data set to make additional discoveries,” said Emily Drabant Conley, PhD., vice president of Business Development at 23andMe. “By studying intermediate phenotypes such as cognitive function alongside genetics and other environmental variables on a massive scale, we hope to take a significant step forward in the study of depression and bipolar.” 
   
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The goal is to enroll 15,000 people with depression and 10,000 individuals with bipolar disorder and then incorporate their data to assess better how genes influence brain processes such as attention, decision-making and visual perception.
It’s a unique approach that leverages 23andMe’s research model, which can rapidly gather vast amounts of genetic, cognitive and behavioral data for the study.
Already considered a pioneer in genetic research, 23andMe has successfully established research communities to study Parkinson’s disease, lupus, IBD, and fertility, adding to the more than 75 studies the company has already published in scientific journals to date. Additionally, this research builds on the largest study of its kind on the genetics of major depressive disorder conducted by 23andMe.
Last summer 23andMe, along with Massachusetts General Hospital and Pfizer, published findings in what was by far the<a href="http://nature.com/articles/doi:10.1038/ng.3623"> largest study</a> of its kind focused on major depressive disorder. In that study, researchers identified 15 new genetic regions linked to depression. The study was instructive not just in what it found, but in how it drew on the massive amount of data from 23andMe customers who had consented to research.
And that is the hope here &#8211; that 23andMe’s unique research model, and its ability to quickly recruit individuals with depression and bipolar disorder will help lead to new breakthroughs in research into these conditions.
Go<a href="https://www.23andme.com/depression-bipolar/"> here</a> to find out more about this study.

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