Ann, who formerly worked caring for the elderly, learned firsthand how chronic conditions could impact you as you age. So this year after looking at her 23andMe reports, she decided to carve out time to address her own health.
“I feel I have been given a chance to improve and enrich my health, all thanks to 23andMe,” Ann said.
When Ann used 23andMe, it was to help her son learn more about his heritage and background. But in looking at her own results, she saw she had an increased genetic likelihood of developing type 2 diabetes. She didn’t need her nursing training to know this was not something to take lightly. She decided to take action.
&nbsp;

 <figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="536" src="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/anne-test-2-1024x536.png" alt="" class="wp-image-29082" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/anne-test-2-1024x536.png 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/anne-test-2-300x157.png 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/anne-test-2-768x402.png 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/anne-test-2-880x461.png 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/anne-test-2-1180x618.png 1180w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/anne-test-2.png 1200w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure>
 
&nbsp;
<a href="https://www.cdc.gov/diabetes/basics/diabetes.html">Type 2 diabetes</a> is a condition where blood sugar is too high. It can develop when your body is unable to make enough insulin and/or respond properly to insulin. An estimated 34 million Americans — or about one in 10 adults in the United States — have type 2 diabetes, according to the <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/diabetes/basics/diabetes.html">Centers for Disease Control and Prevention</a>. Strikingly, one in five people don&#8217;t know they have it. Many others who are prediabetic, about 88 million adults in the United States, don’t even know they are at increased risk. Having type 2 diabetes increases your risk for life-threatening complications, such as heart disease and other organ damage. But, simple changes like eating healthy and getting more exercise can help prevent type 2 diabetes and the complications that can follow. 
23andMe’s Type 2 Diabetes report (Powered by 23andMe Research) estimates your chances of developing the condition by looking at more than 1,000 places in your DNA. It also equips you with information and tools to help you take action since healthy living can help lower your chance of developing it.
With this knowledge from her 23andMe report, Ann and her husband decided to take action to get healthier. After several surgeries, they had both become more sedentary and Ann’s DNA insights inspired them to adopt a healthier lifestyle. They didn’t make any big changes or join any gyms, but they did start walking their dog more, gardening and biking. Ann also bought a new health-focused cookbook and has been making recipes from it ever since. 
Ann and her husband are shocked at how much better food tastes without all the added sugars and fake flavor additives they had used in the past.
“It’s been like a wake-up call for my taste buds. They’ve come alive,” Ann said. They’ve also cut back significantly on sweets. What was once fondly known as their “Blues Drawer” (the vegetable drawer in their fridge filled with chocolate they would dive into when feeling “blue”) hasn’t been refilled since the day Ann opened her reports. While they still indulge from time to time, it’s more about satisfying a craving than overindulging. 
Since making all these changes, Ann and her husband have not only lost weight but generally, just feel better. They love the new recipes they are making and the projects they are working on together.
“This was something positive I could do,” Ann said.

23andMe Blog

23andMe Blog Team

Doing Something Positive For Your Health

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If you&#8217;re lucky, you have a friend who has become so close that you think of them as a sibling.
That&#8217;s what it was like for Julia and Cassie, who first met while working at a bar about nine years ago. They quickly bonded over their shared Dominican heritage and the fact that they&#8217;d both been adopted by families in the states. 
<h6>A Few Things in Common</h6>
It started when Julia noticed the tattoo of a Dominican Republic flag on Cassie&#8217;s arm. &#8220;Hey, are you from the Dominican Republic?&#8221; Julia asked
&#8220;Yeah, but I&#8217;m adopted,&#8221; Cassie said. 
&#8220;Wait, wait, me too,&#8221; Julia said.
Then Julia told her she also had the same Dominican flag tattoo, but it was on her back. So clearly, they had a few things in common.
&nbsp;

 <figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="470" height="1024" src="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1785-470x1024.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-29058" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1785-470x1024.jpeg 470w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1785-138x300.jpeg 138w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1785-404x880.jpeg 404w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1785-541x1180.jpeg 541w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1785.jpeg 639w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 470px) 100vw, 470px" /></figure>
 
Beyond all that, the pair also looked a lot alike. They both have dark hair and brown eyes. And as they talked more, they hit it off and became friends. Customers at the bar in New Haven, would sometimes mistake Julia for Cassie or Cassie for Julia. This prompted the women to kid around that they were sisters, and they sometimes dressed alike. At one point, they even bought shirts: &#8220;I&#8217;m the big sister&#8221; was printed on Cassie&#8217;s shirt. Julia&#8217;s read: &#8220;I&#8217;m the little sister.&#8221; 
It was all meant to be a joke, but earlier this year, they learned that it wasn&#8217;t a joke after all. Julia and Cassie are not just friends; they are sisters.
&#8220;What are the (expletive) odds?&#8221; Cassie said. 
<h6>First They Were Friends</h6>
Julia and Cassie learned early this year through 23andMe that they&#8217;re full sisters, adopted about a year apart from the same family in the Dominican Republic.
They first shared their stunning story with us at 23andMe and on social media back in February, not long after making the discovery. Since then they&#8217;ve been on the <a href="https://www.today.com/video/2-friends-unravel-family-mystery-through-dna-test-109918277983">Today Show</a>, featured in <a href="https://www.goodmorningamerica.com/family/story/friends-worked-learn-biological-sisters-76099870">Good Morning America</a> and on <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NfTXT2arl-A">Inside Edition</a> to name a few outlets. Cassie has running updates on her social media channels, and they&#8217;re working on making a documentary about their story. We&#8217;re sharing it again here on <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friendship_Day">Friendship Day</a>, but the details are interesting enough that we don&#8217;t really need a reason.
Julia and Cassie&#8217;s story is a little complicated. Like many adoptees, they both wanted to know a little more about where they came from and who their birth parents were. However, during the eight years of their friendship, they did wonder if their joke about being sisters or somehow related might have been rooted in truth. At one point, they looked through their adoption records and saw different cities of origin and different family names. They assumed that meant it wasn&#8217;t possible that they were related and left it at that. Of course, it would have been cool if they were related, but that would have been too crazy to have been possible, they thought.
<h6>Cassie&#8217;s Finds Family </h6>
Cassie kept searching, however, and in 2018 after her mom gifted her a 23andMe kit, she opted into <a href="https://www.23andme.com/dna-ancestry" target="_blank" rel="noopener">DNA Relatives</a> and soon found a cousin in Connecticut. The cousin helped her find her biological family in the Dominican Republic. Soon, she connected with her birth father and her seven siblings. In 2019, Cassie traveled there and met them all in person. It was both overwhelming and joyous. She stayed three weeks. Her father, Adriano, cried a lot and kept telling her how sorry he was about giving her up. Still, Cassie knew that he and her birth mom were trying to give her a better life. Sadly, Cassie&#8217;s birth mother had died suddenly of a heart attack just four years before her visit. 
Julia watched all this from the sidelines. She was happy for Cassie, but she didn&#8217;t have the same urge to jump into a search for her biological family. It felt overwhelming. This is where it gets a little complicated. Julia had another friend, a childhood friend, who&#8217;d also been adopted from the Dominican Republic. Her name is Molly. Molly and Julia were adopted on the same day. But last year as Molly was doing her own search she noticed that Julia and her adoption papers appeared to have been mixed up. There were two different last names in the paperwork. One of those was related to Cassie&#8217;s birth family. So filling in Cassie about what they found, Cassie turned around and called her birth father in the Dominican Republic.

 <figure class="wp-block-image size-Large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="2560" height="2560" src="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1513-scaled.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-29060" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1513-scaled.jpeg 2560w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1513-150x150.jpeg 150w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1513-300x300.jpeg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1513-768x768.jpeg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1513-1024x1024.jpeg 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1513-880x880.jpeg 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1513-1180x1180.jpeg 1180w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1513-271x271.jpeg 271w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1513-372x372.jpeg 372w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1513-574x574.jpeg 574w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1513-980x980.jpeg 980w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px" /></figure>
 
&#8220;Papá did you give up another baby, a little girl?&#8221; she asked him.
&#8220;Yes.&#8221; 
He told her that he and her birth mother had given up another girl, about a year after Cassie&#8217;s birth. They were still struggling, and their older son was very ill, and they worried that they wouldn&#8217;t be able to care for her. Cassie wasn&#8217;t upset. She was thrilled. She called Julia. Maybe they are related after all.
<h6>Could it be? </h6>
Then a few days after Christmas, she drove from Virginia to Connecticut to bring a 23andMe kit to Julia and urged her to spit. A few weeks later, when Julia got an email notification that her results were in, she called Cassie, and her friend Molly before opening her results. 

 <figure class="wp-block-image size-Large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="2560" height="2560" src="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1400-scaled.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-29059" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1400-scaled.jpeg 2560w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1400-150x150.jpeg 150w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1400-300x300.jpeg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1400-768x768.jpeg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1400-1024x1024.jpeg 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1400-880x880.jpeg 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1400-1180x1180.jpeg 1180w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1400-271x271.jpeg 271w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1400-372x372.jpeg 372w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1400-574x574.jpeg 574w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/IMG_1400-980x980.jpeg 980w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px" /></figure>
 
&#8220;Cassie, I am in fact, your biological sister,&#8221; Julia said. 
Cassie broke down crying with joy. She shared the news with her birth father, who was equally overwhelmed. And then adding more good fortune came to her. 
&#8220;Cassie is very pregnant with MY niece,&#8221; said Julia. 
Julia and Cassie will be heading to the Dominican Republic in March so Julia can meet their entire birth family for the first time.

Long Time Friends Find Out They’re Actually Sisters

<figure class="wp-block-image alignright size-full is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="http://35.88.189.111/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/FB_IMG_1623439632505.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-28957" width="480" height="479" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/FB_IMG_1623439632505.jpg 640w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/FB_IMG_1623439632505-150x150.jpg 150w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/FB_IMG_1623439632505-300x300.jpg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/FB_IMG_1623439632505-271x271.jpg 271w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/FB_IMG_1623439632505-372x372.jpg 372w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/FB_IMG_1623439632505-574x574.jpg 574w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 480px) 100vw, 480px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Stephanie McKenna</figcaption></figure>



Tom Chaney was the kind of cop who was married to his job. During his more than two decades in law enforcement, he&#8217;d grab shifts on holidays, fill in for other officers to work Christmas, or New Year&#8217;s Eve, or Thanksgiving.&nbsp;



&#8220;I was single and didn&#8217;t have any kids, so I figured I might as well,&#8221; Tom said. &#8220;Holidays were never really a big deal for me.&#8221;



Earlier this year, due in part to 23andMe and a call from a woman he&#8217;d never heard of before, Tom&#8217;s perceptions about kids, holidays, and Father&#8217;s Day in particular shifted, dramatically.&nbsp;



The call came from Stephanie McKenna, a 34-year-old operations assistant at the Museum of American Art in Arkansas. She stunned him with some news. Stephanie thought she might be his daughter.



Once they determined this wasn&#8217;t just a wild guess but an actual DNA match, the first thing Tom said to Stephanie was:



&#8220;I&#8217;m sorry, I didn&#8217;t know.&#8221;



<h6 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-decades-of-searching">Decades of Searching</h6>



For Stephanie, it was a good sign. She&#8217;d feared rejection.



When at 16, she&#8217;d reached out to her biological mother, it had been a harrowing experience. Her birth mom didn&#8217;t reject her; she simply wasn&#8217;t interested in establishing a relationship. But that disappointment and hurt didn&#8217;t prevent Stephanie from looking for her birth father.



Stephanie was an adoptee with loving and supportive parents, but she still wanted to know more about her origins. It took receiving 23andMe as a Christmas gift — that Stephanie got from her mom and dad — to connect her to Tom, or more precisely to Tom&#8217;s dad, Tom Sr. Both Stephanie and Tom Sr. had opted into <a href="https://www.23andme.com/dna-ancestry" target="_blank" rel="noopener">DNA Relatives</a>. After making that connection, she then quickly connected to Tom himself.



<figure class="wp-block-image alignright size-large is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="http://35.88.189.111/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/IMG_20210314_152309065-1024x768.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-28947" width="512" height="384" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/IMG_20210314_152309065-1024x768.jpg 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/IMG_20210314_152309065-300x225.jpg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/IMG_20210314_152309065-768x576.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/IMG_20210314_152309065-880x660.jpg 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/IMG_20210314_152309065-1180x885.jpg 1180w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 512px) 100vw, 512px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption"> Tom Chaney early in his career as a police officer. </figcaption></figure>



&#8220;It was a meeting 34 years in the making,&#8221; she said.



First, through a series of phone calls and then video calls over Zoom and texts, the two got to know each other.



Tom didn&#8217;t know he&#8217;d had a child. He and Stephanie&#8217;s birth mom dated for a few weeks while they both were stationed in Alaska. Tom was in the Marines, and Stephanie&#8217;s birth mom was in the Navy. The relationship was brief, and then Tom shipped off to another billet in Hawaii. At the same time, Stephanie&#8217;s birth mom wound up on a base in Virginia. Tom never even knew she&#8217;d been the pregnant.&nbsp;



<h6 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-a-first-meeting">A First Meeting</h6>



Finding out he now had a daughter pushed Tom to learn more about Stephanie and do his best to establish a relationship. After all the calls, texts, and Zoom chats, Stephanie&nbsp; came to Arizona in early June to visit him. The first time Tom greeted her at the airport he was wearing his Marine Corps t-shirt and holding a sign that read:&nbsp;&nbsp;



&#8220;Stephanie, here is your father.&#8221;



A flood of emotion, tears, and laughter came out of them as they embraced for the first time.&nbsp;



When he and his wife, Krissy, brought Stephanie home, there was a sign that read:&nbsp;



&#8220;It&#8217;s a girl.&#8221; 



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<iframe loading="lazy" title="Tom and Stephanie" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/3_DIyb5Mu74?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
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<h6 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-getting-to-know-each-other">Getting to Know Each Other</h6>



What followed was a visit to get to know each other. Tom introduced Stephanie to his family and friends. The two shared old photos of themselves. They did everything they could to go from being strangers to being a daughter and a father.&nbsp;



&#8220;It&#8217;s uncanny how many things we share in common,&#8221; Stephanie said.



From mannerisms to personalities to even the kinds of things they each find humorous.&nbsp;



&#8220;Even the way we talk, there&#8217;s a similar cadence and similar facial expressions,&#8221; she said.&nbsp;



Meeting him helped explain some of her own characteristics. Like her, Tom was an extrovert, someone who seemed to thrive with many people around him. And there were little things that were similar too, like Tom&#8217;s involvement with a motorcycle club for retired police officers. Stephanie is involved in a horse riding club on the side.&nbsp;&nbsp;



Ironically perhaps, is that the two also shared something else in common. Neither Tom nor Stephanie wanted to have kids. Stephanie said it&#8217;s just not something she&#8217;s focused on right now.



<figure class="wp-block-image alignright size-full is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="http://35.88.189.111/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/rsSNs.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-28948" width="512" height="384" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/rsSNs.jpeg 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/rsSNs-300x225.jpeg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/rsSNs-768x576.jpeg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/rsSNs-880x660.jpeg 880w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 512px) 100vw, 512px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Stephanie visiting Tom at his home in Arizona.</figcaption></figure>



<h6 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-a-bigger-family">A Bigger Family</h6>



For Tom, it was his focus on his work. Something he&#8217;d picked up from his father. Like Tom, his dad had been a Marine first, and then a career police officer, and Tom followed in his dad&#8217;s footsteps in all ways but one. The one exception was that he never wanted a family.



&#8220;I didn&#8217;t want to put a kid through that,&#8221; he said.



That&#8217;s why he never had kids. He was fine with the decision, or at least he thought he was.&nbsp;



But in sharing the time with Stephanie over a few days in early June and looking at old photos of when she was a little girl, Tom felt a pang of regret. It&#8217;s hard for him to even talk about without getting emotional about everything that he missed out on. On the eve of her visit, he couldn&#8217;t sleep. When they looked at old photos of her growing up, he felt that tug of emotion even more.



&#8220;It&#8217;s all those things that I missed, that I wasn&#8217;t there for and couldn&#8217;t share with her,&#8221; he said. &#8220;That hurts inside, but it&#8217;s in the past, and now I want to make the most of it.&#8221;



So does Stephanie. He&#8217;s coming to visit her and her family in a few months.



&#8220;They (her parents) are so awesome. They want to share this with me and see it more like bringing someone else into the family,&#8221; she said.



Father&#8217;s Day will take on a new meaning this year, but more importantly, it&#8217;s part of this new chapter in Tom’s life.



&#8220;I&#8217;ve got 34 years to catch up on,&#8221; he said.

A Father and Daughter Meet for the First Time

For almost five years, Megan McCarthy didn’t celebrate Mother’s Day. She couldn’t; it was too painful. 



It reminded her of losing her mom, who passed away 13 years ago. It was all too much. But this year, and for the last three years, Megan is all in.



“It’s a full celebration again,” Megan said.



She describes her story of losing one mother only to find another with the help of 23andMe as miraculous.



“There are no words for the abundance of gratitude I feel for this marvel,” Megan said recently after sharing the story. “What child gets to feel the extraordinary love of two mothers in one lifetime? A miracle.”



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="848" height="880" src="http://35.88.189.111/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Nike-blur-848x880.jpg" alt="Megan and her birth mom Mary." class="wp-image-28855" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Nike-blur-848x880.jpg 848w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Nike-blur-289x300.jpg 289w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Nike-blur-986x1024.jpg 986w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Nike-blur-768x797.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Nike-blur-1137x1180.jpg 1137w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Nike-blur.jpg 1259w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 848px) 100vw, 848px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">Megan and her birth mom, Mary, soon after meeting for the first time.</figcaption></figure>



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-guilt">Guilt</h2>



It was never a secret. Megan always knew she was adopted. It was something her parents shared with her early in life.



They also never let her forget how loved she was and created a family—Megan and her brother, Mike—bonded by that love. For her, it was like she’d “won the adoption lottery.”



Her mother stayed home to raise her and her brother. Her dad was an honest, hard-working role model. They offered lessons in faith, family, and love. Her parents knew she might one day be curious to learn more about her birth mother, and let her know that was OK, but that didn’t erase the guilt Megan felt about wondering about her birth mother.



Raised in the Midwest, Megan and her family would sometimes visit Chicago, and she remembers seeing women among the crowds of people on the streets and wondering. “Is that my mom?” In her head, the questions bubbled up: Who was she? What was she like? Would she embrace me if we met?



“Deep down I wanted to know her, to see her face, to have her arms around me, but something always stopped me,” Megan said.



With those feelings came the guilt.&nbsp; After all, Megan had two parents who loved her unconditionally. Wasn’t that enough?



And there was something else. Megan worried that maybe her birth mom had closed that chapter of her life. If Megan searched and found her, maybe that would just reopen the pain of having to give up a child.



“How could I do that to her when she made the decision to give me a better life than she could have provided?” Megan said. “The ultimate act of love: letting go. I made my peace with this decision but that never stopped the yearning to potentially love the woman who gave birth to me and to have her love me back.”



The one thing Megan knew was that her birth mom had been 18, and she didn’t want to reopen what might have been a traumatic moment in her birth mom’s life.&nbsp;



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-an-instant-sister">An Instant Sister</h2>



So, Megan didn’t search. Instead, she buried her yearnings and moved on with her life.



She started her own family. Megan and her husband had a daughter.



Even a few years ago, when on the cusp of turning 50, she decided to use 23andMe, it wasn’t to connect with family. Megan was focused on her health. Being an adoptee, she didn’t know her family&#8217;s<a href="https://www.23andme.com/dna-health-ancestry"> health history</a>. She wondered if there might be something in her genome she should know about.



Only after she got her reports did she become curious, and she didn’t see anything surprising in her health results. First, she realized she was less Irish and more French than she thought. And then there was this curious thing called DNA Relatives, which, like the name implies, could connect her with people with whom she shared DNA, essentially blood relatives. She opted in, but even then the significance of that didn’t quite register. The next day, she had a new “DNA Relative Match.”



She figured it was just some very, very distant cousin. “Whatever,” she thought.



But she logged in anyway.



“At the top of the matches was a half-sister,” she said.



She was stunned.



“Wow, an instant sister,” she thought as the blood drained from her face.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-is-she-alive">Is She Alive?</h2>



There are moments when she tells her story that Megan has to stop herself, and her smiling and positive demeanor cracks a bit, and the tears flow.



“It still makes me cry,” she said recalling the moments that altered her life so dramatically a few years ago.



She eventually put it down in writing.



“It’s amazing what raw emotion can do for someone’s creativity,” Megan said.



That moment when she learned that she had a half-sister, Megan felt shocked, and in a heat haze of emotion, she quickly composed a message, asking the question she’d wondered about her whole life.



&#8220;I think I’m your sister,” she said by way of introduction. “If this is too much for you, I understand. But can you tell me if our mom is still alive?&#8221;



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-wrapped-up-in-their-arms">Wrapped Up in Their Arms</h2>



Megan expected the answer was “No.”



She braced herself for that answer and then began to question herself. Did she say the wrong thing? Was it too soon to ask? She didn’t have to wonder too long because her half-sister, Sarah, came back with a loving response.



“She’s alive and well and living in Prescott AZ!” her sister wrote.



Not only does Megan have a half-sister, but a half-brother as well. And they both knew that they had another sister out there somewhere. Their mom had told them about Megan, and they’d all hoped one day they’d find each other. Again stunned, Megan quickly sent her sister her contact information and asked that she pass it on to their mom.



“After tapping send, I dropped my phone and fell to the ground … It was as if my bones and muscles couldn’t hold me up,” she said,



Home alone, she collapsed on the floor. Through her tears she picked up her phone and texted her husband and daughter, who were out hiking. She needed them.



Her daughter responded.



“We’re on our way now.”



When they arrived, her husband and daughter wrapped her up in their arms and the three of them cried together.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-a-familiar-voice">A Familiar Voice</h2>



The emotion of that day drained her to the point of exhaustion. And that night Megan fell into a deep sleep.



But in the morning, all that emotion came roaring back with the realization that her mom was still alive, and mixed in with that were a confusing set of emotions of both joy and fear, excitement and anxiety. Mixed in with all of it was confusion over what it might mean. There was nothing for her to do but wait, so Megan did what she did most days. Dropped her daughter off at school, and then went to the gym. It was there that the call came in from Prescott. She moved to a place where she had some privacy and answered her phone.



“I hear her voice and I swear it’s familiar,” Megan said. “It’s a calm, sweet, loving salve to my heart. We speak for close to an hour and a half. It’s effortless. An instant connection between mother and child.”



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-anxious">Anxious</h2>



Megan had questions, so many questions, but her mom had just one at first. She wanted to know about the baby girl she gave up and asked:



“Did you have a good life?”



She told her about her parents and how wonderful they both were, and her brother, and her husband and daughter. Yes, she had a good life. And then her mom asked her whether or not Megan suffered from anxiety. That question resonated immediately. It was something that Megan struggled with and she didn’t like to share. Her parents were just so solid and giving that she felt that confiding in them about her anxiety was somehow selfish. But when she told her birth mother that yes she did struggle with anxiety. She got a healing response.



&#8220;We all do too,” her mom told her.&nbsp;



“It released in me 48 years of feeling it was all my fault,” Megan said.



It was just something that ran in the family. The call was healing for Megan, and she felt it was healing for her birth mom to learn that she’d made the right decision and that her daughter was loved so strongly by her family. She felt this circle of gratitude inside her for her parents, her birth mom, and the chance to find each other after all these years.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-an-embrace">An Embrace</h2>



It was hard to hang up the phone after that first call, and each day after that, the two texted or phoned. They made plans for her mom to visit and then counted down the days.



“On the day of her arrival, my nerves are on edge,” Megan said.



Waiting at home for her arrival, she had to do something to calm herself.



“I distract myself with a run,” she said. “I make a sign to welcome her. I obsessively crunched on hard candy.”



Then, waiting with her husband and daughter on the front stoop, Megan sees a black town car approaching the corner. It’s a moment she’s imagined all her life, and goosebumps cover her body.



“I can hardly breathe, and my heart is pounding so hard that I can feel it in my toes,” she said. 



As the driver flings open the door, the two run toward each other, and they embrace in the driveway with full-throttle sobs. It was a long, long time before they let go.



“What did we do to get so lucky?” Megan said.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-mother-s-day">Mother’s Day</h2>



After her mom died 13 years ago, Megan simply couldn’t handle Mother’s Day. Her mom had been so amazing and loving, and she missed her deeply. It was easier to let that day pass and not think about it. It took almost five years to get over that.



She still misses her, but over the years, the pain of that loss lessened, and she had a daughter of her own. And then this miracle happened.



Since her birth mom’s visit, during which they spent a week together talking, cooking, and hiking, the two have slid seamlessly into each other’s lives. They continue to text and call and have seen each other three times. Megan has met her half-sister, whom she loves. Mother’s Day has taken on a new relevance for Megan.



“We always talk on Mother’s Day! After my amazing (adopted) mom died, I didn’t celebrate Mother’s Day for almost 5 years,” Megan said. “It was too painful. But now, since finding my birth Mom, it’s a full celebration again. “



If not for the pandemic, the family would be together this Mother’s Day, too. But it will only be a matter of time before they can visit together again, Megan said.



Among the many blessings from this whole experience, were the words Megan heard from her father, who best summed up her story.



“The two of you no longer walk with holes in your hearts,” he told her. “They are now fully healed and filled with love.”



<figure class="wp-block-embed aligncenter is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<iframe loading="lazy" title="Megan McCarthy Meets Her Mom" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Z0sGhs-6fok?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
</div></figure>

Mother’s Day Miracle

When it comes to her health, there is no bliss in ignorance for Kelly Anderson.
&#8220;For me, I&#8217;ve always wanted to know. I&#8217;ve always wanted to know what&#8217;s happening or what&#8217;s coming, so I can plan,&#8221; Kelly said. &#8220;I&#8217;m a planner.&#8221;
It&#8217;s what made receiving 23andMe <a href="https://www.23andme.com/dna-health-ancestry">Health + Ancestry Service</a> for her birthday such a perfect gift, she said. It offered her a chance to explore how genetics might affect her health, she said. 
&nbsp;

 <figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="769" height="1024" src="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Kelly-A-2-769x1024.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-28844" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Kelly-A-2-769x1024.jpg 769w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Kelly-A-2-225x300.jpg 225w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Kelly-A-2-768x1022.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Kelly-A-2-661x880.jpg 661w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Kelly-A-2-887x1180.jpg 887w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Kelly-A-2.jpg 1160w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 769px) 100vw, 769px" /></figure>
 
<h6>Wanting to Know </h6>
Kelly&#8217;s reports indicated that she had genetic variants that put her at a slightly increased risk for age-related macular degeneration (AMD).* AMD is the most common cause of irreversible vision loss in older adults. The disease causes damage to the central part of the retina, or the macula, impairing vision needed for reading, driving, or even recognizing faces.
23andMe&#8217;s report looks at two of the most common variants associated with increased risk for AMD. Kelly learned she had two copies of one of those variants.
&#8220;After I saw my report, I began reading more … and talking to my family,&#8221; she said.
<h6>Being Diligent</h6>
Kelly learned of a few relatives who had AMD. During her next check-up, she talked to her doctor, who suggested she discuss it in more depth with her optometrist. When she met with her optometrist, he told her it was good to know about this kind of risk early. 
&#8220;He added the information to my eye chart,&#8221; she said.
Her optometrist told her that he will regularly check for any early signs and symptoms. 
&#8220;I also plan to continue reading up on discoveries about AMD so I can remain informed,&#8221; she said.
For Kelly learning about the risk and then being able to act upon that information felt empowering. Giving her a clear-eyed view on managing her health. She plans to keep reading up on AMD and to be diligent about her annual check-ups.
&#8220;If there&#8217;s something I can do … I want to know,&#8221; she said. 
<hr />
*The 23andMe PGS test uses qualitative genotyping to detect select clinically relevant variants in the genomic DNA of adults from saliva for the purpose of reporting and interpreting genetic health risks. It is not intended to diagnose any disease. Your ethnicity may affect the relevance of each report and how your genetic health risk results are interpreted. Each genetic health risk report describes if a person has variants associated with a higher risk of developing a disease, but does not describe a person&#8217;s overall risk of developing the disease. The test is not intended to tell you anything about your current state of health, or to be used to make medical decisions, including whether or not you should take a medication, how much of a medication you should take, or determine any treatment. The Age-Related Macular Degeneration (AMD) genetic health risk report is indicated for reporting of the Y402H variant in the CFH gene, and the A69S in the ARMS2 gene and describes if a person has variants associated with an increased risk of developing AMD. The variants included in this report are common in many ethnicities but are best studied in people of European descent.

Clear-Eyed About A Risk for AMD

April is Parkinson’s Awareness Month. It also marks the 12th anniversary of 23andMe’s groundbreaking Parkinson’s Research community, which is now the largest <a href="https://www.23andme.com/research/">genetic research</a> cohort for Parkinson’s disease in the world.
But the power of that research engine wouldn’t be possible without Anne Bossman and thousands of other people like her who have consented to participate in 23andMe research. Anne, a 62-year-old personal trainer living in Colorado, was diagnosed with Parkinson’s two and a half years ago.
<div id="attachment_28836" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignright"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-28836" class="wp-image-28836 size-medium" src="http://35.88.189.111/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/IMG_5405-300x300.jpg" alt="A photo of Anne Bossman near her home in Colorado." width="300" height="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/IMG_5405-300x300.jpg 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/IMG_5405-1024x1024.jpg 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/IMG_5405-150x150.jpg 150w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/IMG_5405-768x768.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/IMG_5405-880x880.jpg 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/IMG_5405-1180x1180.jpg 1180w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/IMG_5405-271x271.jpg 271w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/IMG_5405-372x372.jpg 372w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/IMG_5405-574x574.jpg 574w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/IMG_5405-980x980.jpg 980w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/IMG_5405.jpg 1705w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />Anne Bossman near her home in Colorado. </div>
<h2>Participating in Research</h2>
It hit her hard.
“After my diagnosis, I cried,” she said.
But it wasn’t for long.
“I knew Parkinson’s was not going anywhere, and the sooner I accepted this and plowed forward, the sooner I could have good days,” Anne said.
First, she learned as much as she could about the disease. She used the vast resources of the Michael J. Fox Foundation, and then she was introduced to 23andMe and joined our Parkinson’s Research community.
“I was very happy for the opportunity to participate,” Anne said.
Her participation and the participation of thousands of others in 23andMe’s Parkinson’s Research community have helped fuel insights published in 17 papers, <a href="https://research.23andme.com/publications/#publications">four of them</a> last year alone. That research has always been about using genetic insights to search for better ways to diagnose and treat Parkinson’s disease and possibly make discoveries that could help lead to a cure.
<h2>Staying Active</h2>
For Anne, the most important thing is to stay active.
“(Parkinson’s disease) is known but not understood by almost everybody until it touches their lives directly,” Anne said.
Being active is vital for Anne, and she feels fortunate to have always been an athlete and outdoorsy. Her symptoms include stiffness, but she can overcome some of that by keeping moving, exercising, riding horses, balancing exercise, and lifting weights.
“I feel better the more exercise I get,” Anne said.
She hopes to be able to show others a way through her example.
“It’s not how often I get down,” she said. “But how quickly I can pick myself back up.”
You can learn more about 23andMe’s Parkinson’s Research program <a href="https://www.23andme.com/pd/">here</a> or view another 23andMe Parkinson’s research participant <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1gjNUzABAY">Claudia’s story</a> about participating in the program.

Raising Awareness of Parkinson’s Disease

Jordan Carroll, a social worker and patient advocate in San Diego, has a simple answer for why he’s participating in 23andMe’s <a href="https://blog.23andme.com/23andme-research/black-representation-in-research/">Black Representation in Genetic Research</a> study:&nbsp;
“I was happy to … I mean why not?” said Jordan, who has been contributing to 23andMe research since the launch of the company’s<a href="https://www.23andme.com/roots-study/"> Roots into the Future</a> initiative in 2011.
Jordan is no stranger to us here at 23andMe, having shared a healing<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akc6tbW8aOg&amp;feature=emb_logo"> personal story</a> many years ago. Using 23andMe helped him discover a connection to a plantation in the south, and led him to connect with a white cousin.&nbsp;
But Jordan’s interest runs deeper than that. Wrapped up in his curiosity about himself and his family’s southern and African roots, is his lifelong interest in science, healthcare, and, most importantly, racial equity.
“My inspiration for giving my DNA to this research was to benefit marginalized Black Americans,” he said.
&nbsp;

 <figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="768" height="1024" src="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/IMG_1984-768x1024.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-28784" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/IMG_1984-768x1024.jpg 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/IMG_1984-225x300.jpg 225w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/IMG_1984-660x880.jpg 660w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/IMG_1984-885x1180.jpg 885w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/IMG_1984.jpg 1536w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 768px) 100vw, 768px" /></figure>
 
<h6></h6>
<h6>A Family&#8217;s Commitment 
</h6>
Jordan, 34, hopes that including more people like him in research, offers hope that new discoveries from that research will mean that, “the Black community will have access to better healthcare and treatment.”&nbsp;&nbsp;
He and his family have been working for that kind of equity for a long time.
Both of his paternal grandparents were doctors. His grandmother,<a href="https://www.uncrownedcommunitybuilders.com/person/juanita-carroll-pitts"> Dr. Juanita Pitts</a>, was the first Black female doctor in Rochester New York. Dr. Pitts and her husband, Dr. Julian O. Carroll, opened a family practice in the city in the 1950s. Over the decades while raising seven children and running the family practice, Dr. Pitts also worked on community health screening for sickle cell anemia and did genetic counseling. She started a program to screen African Americans in the community for hypertension and cardiovascular disease. Her strong commitment to serving the community and alleviating racial inequities in healthcare came from witnessing those inequities. In a recorded oral history, she told of once seeing a Black man die while waiting for a hospital bed that had been prioritized for white patients.&nbsp;
Dr. Pitts instilled in her grandson an interest in science and equity, and Jordan’s early years spent in her home left a lasting impression on him. Whether it was learning to take his own blood pressure at 10, or simply understanding that African Americans didn’t always benefit from the amazing medical breakthroughs he’s seen in his lifetime. His upbringing is what both piqued his interest in medicine but also attuned him to helping underserved populations.
He sees those disparities every day at work among underserved Latino and Black families in Southern California — who have been disproportionately affected by COVID-19. Part of his work is to ensure access to vaccination programs and testing. But some of it also involves simple education in an effort to overcome long-held mistrust.
“I see it as my job to educate and dissipate the mistrust and skepticism of the American medical establishment within the Black community,” he said. “These feelings are rampant, and rightly so, due to historic and contemporary mistreatment at the hands of the medical establishment, namely the Tuskegee Experiments, which is still within living memory.”
<h6>Empowerment through Participation</h6>
He doesn’t see his job to push anything, but to simply answer questions, to be transparent about any risks, and help people have access to care if they want it.
But beyond his work, Jordan feels he can help his community by participating in research. He knows — because he likes to read about health studies — that most genetic research is done in populations that are almost entirely of European descent.
When he’s reading about a new study that has uncovered genetic associations for certain diseases, Jordan often asks himself:
“Does this actually apply to me?” he said. “I have European ancestry, but it’s only about one-third of my <a href="https://www.23andme.com/dna-ancestry">genetic ancestry</a>, the rest, 60 percent of African, so I ask myself, ‘Is this applicable to me and people who are genetically similar to me, or not?’”
Oftentimes the answer is “no.”
Knowing that can leave one feeling unable to do anything to change it, Jordan said.
“Feeling powerless is a common sentiment when you read reports, studies, and hear of racial disparities and maltreatment within the American medical establishment,” he said. “You hear of communities having unequal access to health and medical care all around the country. Although your frustration burns, you fall into despair since you realize that you cannot go in and assist every community at once.”
But, for Jordan, there is something he can do. He can participate in research, he said.
“The ability to potentially save lives is a privilege, and something that I feel is my duty as a human being,” he said. “If I can do this with something as simple as having my DNA tested, all the better.&#8221;

Participating for Better Equity in Research

People who know Maurice Hayes know he&#8217;s passionate about science, healthcare, and prevention. It&#8217;s personal for him.<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-32741" src="http://35.88.189.111/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Maurice-Hayes-219x300.jpg" alt="" width="219" height="300" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Maurice-Hayes-219x300.jpg 219w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Maurice-Hayes.jpg 373w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 219px) 100vw, 219px" />
For three decades, he&#8217;s worked as an MRI technician in Atlanta, and almost every day, he sees people from all walks of life, all ages, and all ethnicities, who are there for one reason. They&#8217;re sick. And being a compassionate person, he can&#8217;t help but wonder:
&#8220;Why can&#8217;t we do more to find out how this could have been prevented?&#8221; Maurice asked.
Of course, lifestyle also plays a role, he said.
&#8220;I&#8217;m a big proponent of preventative medicine,&#8221; he said. &#8220;Some things could be dealt with through diet and exercise.&#8221;
But that&#8217;s not the whole story.
Part of staying healthy involves also knowing what your risks are for disease. Knowing that early gives you time to figure out &#8220;the best way to anticipate what is coming and have a plan,&#8221; Maurice said.
And that&#8217;s where science and research come in, he said. He believes that genetic research offers hope for finding the causes and cures for disease. That&#8217;s what attracted him to 23andMe, learning more about his ancestral roots, particularly his genetic connections to Africa.
There&#8217;s a lot of genetic research out there to be excited about already. And Maurice, who follows some of those developments, can see the potential. But he also knows that those breakthroughs don&#8217;t benefit everyone, mainly if you are Black. This is partly because most <a href="https://www.23andme.com/research/">genetic health research</a> is done in people of European descent.
&#8220;So when the studies are going on, most of these studies don&#8217;t include Black people,&#8221; Maurice said. &#8220;That means the data is just not there.&#8221;
The irony is that it is often people within the Black community who are hit the hardest by certain conditions. Yet, they are usually not well represented in studies of those conditions. So, of course, it&#8217;s personal. Maurice has had family members who&#8217;ve dealt with heart disease, lung disease, and cancer. Most recently, he had two close relatives die from COVID-related illnesses.
That&#8217;s why he&#8217;s participating in research, not just through 23andMe and its <a href="https://blog.23andme.com/23andme-research/black-representation-in-research/">Black Representation in Genomic Research</a> study — which aims to understand the biology connecting genetic variants to diseases — but also in the <a href="https://allofus.nih.gov/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">National Institutes of Health&#8217;s All of Us</a> study.
&#8220;There are not a lot of 50-something-year-old Black men who want to sign up to have their DNA checked because they&#8217;re too afraid of how that could be used in a bad way,&#8221; he said.
And there&#8217;s a reason for that. There&#8217;s some history. Still fresh in some people&#8217;s minds is the notorious <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/tuskegee/timeline.htm">Tuskegee Syphilis Study</a>. In the 40-year-long study, African American men with syphilis were left untreated for their illness so that researchers could watch the disease&#8217;s progression.
&#8220;When you say &#8216;Research&#8217; and &#8216;African Americans,&#8217; everybody puts in the horror stories,&#8221; Maurice said. &#8220;(That) is one reason they&#8217;re not doing well with vaccinations. (It&#8217;s) because there is a lack of trust.&#8221;
Winning back trust will be difficult, but it&#8217;s essential for the Black community to benefit from research, which is why he&#8217;s participating in it.
&#8220;I want to ensure that the data was more inclusive,&#8221; Maurice said. &#8220;It&#8217;s also personal to me because of my family history and some of the diseases that we have, and I wish there was more research in that area.&#8221;
But it&#8217;s not just about him and his family. Seeing sick people day in and day out who might benefit from new genetic research motivates his interest in participating in research.
&#8220;I wanted to inspire other minorities to get to know themselves better. Let&#8217;s seek out those points of intersection. Together, we create a beautiful tapestry to be celebrated for all its diversity. Let&#8217;s begin anew.&#8221;

Inspiring Others to Participate in Research

It started with bad sinus infections, then regular bouts of bronchitis, a seasonal cycle that gradually worsened over three decades.
About ten years ago, this cycle evolved into <a href="https://blog.23andme.com/articles/study-on-pneumonia">pneumonia</a>, putting Claudia, now a 67-year-old mother and grandmother in Seattle, in the ICU for a few days.
&#8220;I understand the signs now, but the first time it happened, I had this pain around the chest, a bad cough and cold,&#8221; she said. &#8220;I felt uncomfortable.&#8221;
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-29777" src="http://35.88.189.111/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Claudia-and-Vern-Feature-Image.png" alt="" width="1853" height="1806" srcset="https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Claudia-and-Vern-Feature-Image.png 1853w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Claudia-and-Vern-Feature-Image-300x292.png 300w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Claudia-and-Vern-Feature-Image-768x749.png 768w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Claudia-and-Vern-Feature-Image-1024x998.png 1024w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Claudia-and-Vern-Feature-Image-880x858.png 880w, https://blogcms.23andme.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Claudia-and-Vern-Feature-Image-1180x1150.png 1180w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1853px) 100vw, 1853px" />
<h2>A Medical Mystery</h2>
Doctors thought she might be having a heart attack, but X-rays of her lungs indicated pneumonia. That was about ten years ago, and now Claudia can discern the pattern as the illness comes on, which often starts with cold symptoms.
But even after that, she simply didn&#8217;t know why it was happening to her. Why was she so susceptible to sinus infections, bronchitis, and, worst of all, pneumonia? Why did she have trouble breathing sometimes? And neither did her doctors.
In her 30s, when she first started having difficulty catching her breath, she went to a pulmonary specialist who did a battery of tests. One of her doctors suggested that she had exercise-induced asthma. He gave her an inhaler. But the inhaler never seemed to help. Another doctor said that perhaps Claudia wasn&#8217;t doing enough exercise. She felt some of those treating her but thought it was all in her head. Although she has exercised regularly since her early 20s, she was told that perhaps she wasn’t exercising enough.
But not long ago, Claudia and her doctor solved the decades-long medical mystery with a bit of help from her 23andMe results.
&#8220;So, I&#8217;ve probably had this all along,&#8221; she said. &#8220;But if it hadn&#8217;t been for 23andMe, I would still be floundering.&#8221;
<h2>An Alpha</h2>
Claudia is an &#8220;Alpha,&#8221; as people with her condition sometimes call themselves. She has<a href="https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health-topics/alpha-1-antitrypsin-deficiency"> alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency</a> (AATD), a genetic disease that affects an estimated<a href="https://www.alphanet.org/what-is-alpha-1/"> 120,000 Americans</a>, but only about six percent of those with AATD are correctly diagnosed. The condition decreases levels of the alpha-1 antitrypsin protein, leading to damage to the lungs and liver.
23andMe&#8217;s Alpha-1 Antitrypsin Deficiency Genetic Health Risk Report* looks at the two most common variants linked to this deficiency, the PI*Z and PI*S variants of the SERPINA1 gene. Claudia saw in her report that she had two copies of the PI*Z variant, which put her at an increased risk of developing the lung and liver disease associated with AATD.
But when she first saw this, it didn&#8217;t register. She&#8217;d never heard of the condition before, and even though she saw that it could impact a person&#8217;s lungs, she thought that if it were an issue, her doctor would have noted it.
Meanwhile, various doctors tried to figure out what was going on. She had taken the nurse&#8217;s advice during another pneumonia treatment. The nurse told her there was likely something causing this recurrent condition. She went through several tests and consulted with a pulmonologist, who couldn&#8217;t pinpoint what was wrong.
<h2>23andMe’s Report</h2>
During this period of frustration, she thought back on the 23andMe report. The report noted that one of her symptoms, shortness of breath, was included in the list of symptoms associated with AATD. She showed her doctor the report and asked if he could test her for the condition. The test results came back that she did indeed have AATD. After all those years of not knowing, now she understood.
&#8220;Although there is no cure, I now know why I get out of breath and bouts of pneumonia,&#8221; Claudia said.
<h2>Taking Action</h2>
Beyond the respiratory symptoms, AATD can also damage the liver. Claudia learned from her doctor that her liver levels were high. It surprised her, so now her liver function is regularly checked.
She&#8217;s under the care of a liver specialist and a pulmonologist at the University of Washington. They are monitoring her levels. Claudia takes vitamins to keep her immune system up. Doctors also prescribe medication to help prevent infections in her lungs and bronchial tubes. She takes care of herself.
Using resources from the Alpha-1 Foundation, she has identified two AATD specialists, one in Portland. She found another in Sacramento. Claudia is also trying to get her kids and grandkids tested. She wants to help potentially save them from the years of struggling she had to endure.
But for her 23andMe report, she said, &#8220;I would never have discovered this.&#8221;
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*The 23andMe PGS test uses qualitative genotyping to detect select clinically relevant variants in the genomic DNA of adults from saliva to report and interpret <a href="https://www.23andme.com/dna-health-ancestry">genetic health risks</a>. It is not intended to diagnose any disease. Your ethnicity may affect the relevance of each report and how your genetic health risk results are interpreted. Each genetic health risk report describes if a person has variants associated with a higher risk of developing a disease but does not describe a person’s overall risk of developing the disease. The test is not intended to tell you anything about your current state of health or to be used to make medical decisions, including whether or not you should take a medication, how much of a medication you should take, or determine any treatment. The Alpha-1 Antitrypsin (AAT) Deficiency genetic health risk report is indicated for reporting the PI*Z and PI*S variants in the SERPINA1 gene and describes if a person has variants associated with AAT deficiency and a higher risk for lung and liver disease. The variants included in this report are most common and best studied in people of European descent.

Stories — Page 5