A man was left stunned to discover he had a whole swathe of unknown cousins and another family after taking a DNA test for fun.
The man took to social media to share how the gobsmacking discovery ultimately forced his grandmother to reveal her darkest secret after over 40 years.
The user said his family was no stranger to family secrets but the DNA results completely changed his life and his mother’s.
Writing on Reddit, he said: “We had family secrets – my grandfather had been married before and had a child, my great aunt had a child who she had adopted.
“As far as we knew all those secrets were now known. After I did my DNA, I glanced at the results and matches but my tree is quite boring really and I focused more on helping my friend.
“One day I got a message from a woman saying she couldn’t figure out how we were matched and I looked and realised there was a group of matches that didn’t make sense.”
The Reddit user said he ultimately used a DNA painter – a tool that helps people understand DNA tests but still struggled to make sense of the results.
He said he started asking other family members if they maybe knew information about his great-grandfathers to shed some light on the mystery.
The man continued: “It took quite a while to do and by this point, I thought one of my grandparents’ fathers wasn’t who we thought. I ask my parents but no one seemed any the wiser.
“One day DNA painter just clicked and I realised my mum’s dad wasn’t the person we thought it was. My grandmother is still alive, nearly 90. I spoke to her and told her I knew. She has dementia but her memory of these events is crystal clear.
“She spoke to my mum and the whole truth came out, her actual father was a holiday romance. He knew about my mum, wanted to marry my nana but my nan didn’t love him.”
He said the admission left his mother in tears and struggling to reconcile a new wave of emotions towards her mother, biological father and dad.
The Reddit user admitted the man he believed to be his grandfather had a difficult relationship with his mum since she was young and treated her differently from her siblings.
While his biological grandfather had died years before the family secret was discovered, the man said he appeared to have been a “lovely man” after talking with his whole new family.
He added: “Her biological dad died 50 years ago and didn’t have any more children but we have new cousins who have sent us photos and been able to tell us what they knew of him through their own parents. He seems to have been a lovely man.
“I am so glad this came out whilst my nan was alive. She was able to tell us a lot of detail we would never have known.
“In all honesty, it’s brought a lot of peace to my mum and it’s worked out well but it was still a huge shock which I couldn’t have predicted.”
Other users admitted the user was not alone in learning about family secrets after having fun with at-home DNA tests.
One user wrote: “You are so lucky! My stunner was that my dad, born in 1925 was the product of an affair. Anyone who knew is dead.
“No one living had heard any whispers. A mystery cousin from DNA match sent me beautiful photos of the man and his family.”
Another said: “I totally feel this. Through DNA we discovered my grandpa had an illegitimate child who had been put up for adoption. It was quite a lot of detective work to figure out.
“He showed up as a match equivalent to a cousin or half-sibling to my dad one day on Ancestry but we had no idea who he was. My grandpa had already passed by that point, as had the mother. We would never ever had known about him if it hadn’t been for DNA.”
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