Sep 6

Sep 6 Discovering More About My Ancestry By Doing an Ancestry DNA Test Kit

A year or so before my Dad died in 2019, he gave me several copies of a document I would describe as a family tree scroll of my paternal side of my family. Going back three generations, it lays out on about a four-foot stretch of letter-sized paper taped together, the family relations of my grandfather and his father before that. My great-grandfather was born in Sweden in the early 1800s. Dad gave me the scrolls, I think, to start a dialogue and suggest we take a trip back to Sweden soon to visit the family homestead. Unfortunately, we didn't know that he would get diagnosed with cancer shortly after and then die. I mourn the trip that never happened.

I didn't look at the scrolls again until I took an Ancestry DNA kit. My step-mom had taken one a few years ago and said how cool it was to see what her genetics told her about her ancestral heritage. A few of my cousins and my sister have taken one as well. If you aren't familiar with how Ancestry DNA works, you submit a saliva sample for a fee of $99 (or less if you can catch a sale). They analyze it and list the results in a database that can match you up with other people who share your DNA who have also submitted samples. You have to agree to and set various consents and privacy settings, so overall, I feel very comfortable and safe taking a test and having it listed in their database.

I grew up with a small nuclear family. It was just me, my mom and Dad, and my sister. My father was in the Air Force, and relocating a lot is part of the military lifestyle. My parents and sister had already moved a few times before I was born. But because of my health problems, we permanently settled in Washington State until his retirement after 20 years of service. Even though we didn't have to move a lot, we were far away from my extended family, who lived in Minnesota and Oklahoma. I didn't grow up near my grandparents, aunts, uncles, or cousins. I didn't realize it at the time, but I think the reason I spent so many summers and finished college at the University of Minnesota was that I wanted to get to know my family better.

In the little bit of genealogical work I have done since I got my Ancestry results back, I realize I wish I had taken the time to talk to my parents and my grandparents more about our family history. My grandparents and my parents have all passed away. Now that I am older, I am very interested in my family roots. I wish they were here now so I could ask them questions when I'm doing my research. Yes, records can tell you a lot, but they can't put all the pieces of the puzzle together.

For example, in the early census records of my paternal grandmother, her middle name is listed as "Jean," but I had always only known it to be "Jane." It took my aunt to help fill in the gaps of the discrepancy. Those are the details that aren't always captured. Additionally, records are not always accurate. They are only as good as the human handwriting on the document or the person inputting the information into the informational database. And for those whose families immigrated to America from another country, as mine did, there are often language barriers to overcome. I didn't take German or Swedish in high school. Thank goodness for Google translate.

I try not to be too hard on myself. After all, as a kid, you don't think about the future too much. Especially not a future that won't have your parents in it. Nor do you relish engaging your grandparents in stories of the "old days" because, well, frankly, at that age, you find those kinds of stories incredibly dull.

Life is busy for me at the moment, and I don't have the time to dedicate to my family history project as I would like. I want to get back to it next year. There is one huge lesson I have learned the hard way, and that is you can't guarantee "one day you will find the time." You have to make the time because one day may never come. I think if my parents were still alive, they would be just as curious as I am about the narrative of their family trees. I know for myself, the little bit I have learned thus far has helped fill in the blanks of some questions I've long wanted answers to.

I've always been proud of my family heritage. But now I realize what I know, or thought I know, is just the surface of who these people were. I look forward to learning more about the lives of the people who fill the branches of my tree that go back for generations. I need to fact-check what Ancestry tells me about my maternal grandmother's side, but I have possible matches going back to the 1400s. They were people of German descent before Germany even existed! How cool is that?!

Indeed, the modern era of genealogy has had a turbo-boost of advancement with DNA matching, computer access to vital records, and shared databases. It is convenient to access all this information from the comfort of my own home and as my schedule allows. Additionally, and perhaps quite selfishly, I appreciate how it enables me to see how I fit into my family tree beyond just my closer family relationships. It makes me feel connected to something larger than myself. Maybe some people don't feel this calling if they have children because they know a future will live beyond themselves. I hope the work I do to create an accurate record of my maternal and paternal family trees will be of value to someone. Be that my relatives, or anyone looking to find information about my family, as it connects to their trees.

In just the short time I've embarked on this project, I have definitely learned one overall lesson: that we humans don’t appreciate or understand how truly connected we really are— thinking of each other too much like strangers and not like the big giant family we really are. We are much more connected than we are separate and much more the same than we are different.