Monday, September 16, 2013

100% Me



In two previous posts I discussed my excitement and disappointment in my Ancestry DNA results. I wasn't looking for the nitty-gritty details with a bunch of letters and numbers that explained my genetic makeup. I wanted a pie chart. Simple, easy to read and diverse.

Initially I was disappointed. This? This is what I get? 92% British Isles and 6% Unknown. Seriously? Really? That's the best you can do? Then came the questions of how can that be? My great grandparents and great great grandparents and great great great grandparents were all born in Germany. How are they not accounted for?

I shrugged and moved on. I toyed with the idea of using another service to get a second opinion but never did. I had read that Ancestry acknowledged they had some work to do on their testing methods and that there would be updates to their process sometime in the future. I didn't know the future would be just six months away!

A blog post by a fellow genealogist tipped me off. He had received his updated results and went through them in detail. Of course, being the skeptic that I am, I didn't imagine I would be one of the lucky ones to be in the first round of the new preview. Much to my surprise, I did have the bright orange button on my DNA page labeled "New Ethnicity Estimate Preview" squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee I was so excited I couldn't click fast enough! I wasn't disappointed either. Yes! I'm not totally vanilla! I have diversity in my family history and there is the connection to my German ancestry.

I understand that Ancestry is still fine-tuning their processes and my mixture could change in the future but this make up makes sense to me. Italy and Greece?? Ok, not sure how far back that is coming into play but I like it. Noticeably absent is any reference, even a trace reference, of Native American. Once again, I will have to tell my family to stop telling the story about how we have a Native American heritage.

Thank you Ancestry, for giving me my diverse pie. I'm no longer Plain Jane Vanilla!

P.S. I created the infographic using my DNA data. The chart from Ancestry.com isn't nearly that cool!