Meet My Sister Renee – Plus, Important DNA Information – Jim Weaver’s DNA Stuff
It's been a crazy couple of weeks since my last DNA update but this one has some very interesting things to point out that we have learned about DNA testing and a surprise at the end.
Meet my sister Renee! Do you think we look alike at all? I can see some resemblance in face structure, around the eyes and such. I know, the bags under my eyes need luggage tags but other than that...
My sister and I are continuing to get acquainted which is just awesome. There's a lot of ground to cover after meeting your sister 55 years after you were born.
While that develops, let's get some interesting information about 23andMe.com that we did not know before:
If you are ordering a DNA package, and one of your interests is finding out your Native American heritage… good luck with that! My wife found there are only five Native American tribes in the 23andMe database, and of those, only ONE tribe - the Pima of Arizona - is a North American tribe.
Surprise! That's not the surprise I was telling you about earlier, keep reading.
You might be able to find that "lack of Native American" information before you order the kit, but we did not, and that was something we were both very interested in. Another friend of mine just found out the same thing about Ancestry.com. What my wife has learned doing her research into this is that Native Americans are not interested in giving their DNA to these services. Not sure why, but there you go.
The point is, I could still have a significant amount of Native American blood running through my veins, but 23and Me has no way of knowing it. My wife's father, who unfortunately is no longer with us, is believed to have been full-blooded Native American, she just doesn't know which tribe, yet in her DNA test, she showed no Native American ancestry. We already know that's not right.
So again, if that's what you're looking for, these two services do not appear to be the way to go, at least not at this time. If anyone knows of a DNA registry that does have Native American DNA data, I would love to know which one it is.
Now for my promised surprise:
Guess who sent me a friend request on Facebook?
Birth Mother.
Stay tuned.
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