Support Resources: Adoptees and DNA Surprises – NPE
Here at Your DNA Guide, we teach you skills to find your birth family using DNA—but that’s only part of the help you may need.
If you discover a surprise in your DNA results, it’s important to take your time to process and understand what the situation is. It’s impossible to take back words, so you want to be sure you have come to the right conclusion before you contact anyone or share what you’ve found. You may have heard “DNA doesn’t lie” but it can be misinterpreted and on very rare occasions, something can go wrong in the testing and results reporting process. Be respectful to everyone involved, and their choices, to engage in a relationship or to not engage. Support is available for people who learn something unexpected about themselves, their close family, or about someone else’s family.
We are grateful for the experts and communities who provide emotional support for adoptees and others who are searching for birth relatives. Here are some resources we know about.
For DNA surprises such as an NPE (not parent expected)
For adoptees and other birth parent searches
Support groups and organizations
Podcasts
For donor-conceived children
We wish you the best on your DNA discovery journey, wherever it takes you. If you don’t already have it, please download our free guide to using DNA to explore your birth roots.
Thanks to Troy Olson from DiscoverFamily.net for contributing to this list.