Between myself and my DS we'd done the geneology research on both sides and had quite a bit of info verified with census,birth, etc going back to 1600's in some cases. So my Ancestry DNA testing didn't really present any surprises. Did connect with a 3rd cousin that I hadn't seen since I was about 5yrs. He was very appreciative as he had not family history info and my sis able to send him loads of it. I did mine because I was wondering about possible Native ancestry based on a couple of family stories and some ancestral features--nothing came up on it. My DH had his done and he actually found 2nd & 3rd cousins that he never had met on his dad's side--so it was great for him.

Iceblossom's last 4 words really sums it up..."nothing is written down". I waited too long to "get the bug" so to speak. My DH's grandmother had quite an extensive history collected, but hardly anything on my side was written down. Memories faded, or stories were passed on that lost pieces in the retelling. That's one of the reasons I'm determined to find all the info I can. I didn't know about the 23 & Me health screening. Sounds interesting!

I thought about doing this although I am doing genealogy research until I read the fine print. Most companies have the right to do what they want with the results. That bothered me. The health screening would have been beneficial at one time because my blood workup did not match parents or others in my immediate family but it makes little difference to me at this stage.

If I were adopted or perhaps the result of Fertility treatments, that I may be interested, but as far as I know I am the natural child of both my parents.

There have been so many cases of scientist using data collected for one thing for quite another and truth be told I do not trust that the data will be kept private. There have been so many data breaches over the years, that I am not going to give a company my DNA.

I also find it creepy that a company would 'connect' me with others saying they were long lost relatives. Is that something you opt into?

I'm on the "NO" side as well. I don't want any of my DNA showing up in a Asian petri dish growing a genetically altered human baby, like they are already doing!

Many of us have skeletons in our closets & have no knowledge of them. If your ancestry was not legally written down & recorded, the word of mouth you assume to be truth can be false. They kept deep secrets back in the day, to prevent shame to the family. Women had babies out of wedlock, got married later to a different man & the child automatically assumed the mans name. There were no legal adoptions as we know them today. Many born before the early 1900's up to & including the late 1930's have no legal recorded birth certificates. If they went to church, the church kept track of marriages, births & deaths. If they did not attend a church, or moved about a lot, then no legal records were made.

Such is the case in my family. No knowledge of a close relatives father, no name, nothing. All who may have known who he was are gone. So true genes can only be researched if you have legally recorded names to go buy. Many also changed their names when they immigrated, to prevent persecution. I do have some family history, but only a couple generations back on the maternal side, as the rest is lost. More info was recorded on the paternal side. I am Italian, English, Irish, German & Native America. What a mix!

A new family member arrived at my husband's family reunion, with a few of their family in tow. The reunion was posted on FB. They turned out to be the sort of people most of us would not care to associate with. So just because they may be related some how doesn't mean you may ever want to find them or associate with them.

Agree...

and no to trying to disrupt other peoples’ lives and privacy, no discovering family secrets, ( birth mothers and birth fathers, for example...leave them alone!) I believe this crazy is the government logging DNA with willing, paying volunteers. Nope....I know who I beling too. I look into my mirror and se my parents. Chasing dead people is not my idea of fun.

I have long been intrigued by the whole DNA testing thing but I had a lot of reservations when I found out that part of the testing agreement meant giving the company all rights and access to your DNA and it could be used by industry. As it turns out that has already happened as GlaxoSmithKline, the huge pharmaceutical company just bought rights to all the DNA database of 23 and me for 4 years. Here is a link to the news article. https://www.nbcnews.com/health/healt...3andme-n894531

There is a lot of family history I don't know and would love to but I won't find out via DNA testing. Maybe someday I will dig into genealogy history. There was some talk of some of my dad's ancestors being part of the Mormon settlers and recently my cousin, who my brother and I had lost contact with, found us. She sent me a bunch of old photos of my dad and even some old old photos that look to be from the late 1800's and one of them has an imprint from Salt Lake City photographer.

As far as Native American DNA, some tribes are vehemently against it and won't submit samples. Many will not recognize someone as being part of the tribe solely on DNA tests. I read an article recently (now I can't find it) where these particular tribes stated only the family ties and knowledge of family history along with ties to a particular tribal community are what matter and DNA samples are considered part of the person and sacred so they won't participate. Other tribes were taken advantage of with DNA. One tribe in Arizona, the Havasupai, participated in a study of their DNA by University of Arizona to try to determine why there were such high rates of diabetes among members. Later they found out their DNA was being used for other purposes. They closed their borders to all ASU researchers and sued the university for both monetary damages and return of all their samples.

My daughter did Ancestry and all was as expected except that she is 2% Middle Eastern thru the Italian strain. At first I thought someone must have a fling, but on 2nd thought, some poor woman back 3 or 4 generations was probably raped by marauding forces. We will never know and it really doesn't matter. I wouldn't have chosen to do the testing myself. But my daug. certainly had the right to do it. That does put all of us connected to her in the system which is kind of creepy to me.

No, for all the reasons stated, mainly I don't want any records of my DNA out there. If you haven't read about Henrietta Lacks (someone else mentioned her in this thread), then you might be in for an eye-opening surprise about the medicos in this country. There is enough invasion of my privacy as it is. I know enough geneology to be a member of the DAR and my husband's to be a member of the Mayflower Society. Sounds high-falutin' right? Sure, and I buy my groceries just as you do and have bills, and just don't need to know any more. We did warn our son that alcoholism is on the maternal side of my family and the paternal side of his family. Plus his family had a schizophrenic adult who lived on the streets in CA until his three daughters banded together, found him, and took him to their homes. I don't need more grief in my life. Some things are better left alone.
Edited to add: To those who enjoy it and are happy with what they are finding out...go for it. Enjoy the process!

I had mine done but didn't find out too much I didn't already know. On my father's side I'm mostly English with some Scottish and Irish. I'm having trouble finding out much on my mother's side of the family.

My DH always thought his ancestry was German but the test showed his as English and Irish mostly.