Discovering My DNA...

Discovering My DNA...

Posted by Rachel Parcell on

^^ Some of my results!!

...

Happy Friday, everyone!! A couple months ago my sister Emily and I were introduced to a really cool company called 23andMe, a personal genetic service created to help people understand their DNA. The name ‘23andMe’ comes from the fact that human DNA is organized into 23 pairs of chromosomes. When 23andMe reached out my assistant wrote me and said "you probably want to pass on this one since it's not fashion or beauty related." But I wrote her back and said "no, no I want to do it!!"

I remembered hearing my aunt and my mom talking about DNA and genetic testing last year. My grandma spent some of her life in an orphanage as a little girl and still doesn't know much about her father's side of the family. She also has a sister somewhere that she's never met and has tried to find but hasn't been successful. My aunt decided to do DNA and ancestry testing about a year ago and she said the results were so interesting and she was so glad she did it.

I always get people asking about my family, where we are from, where our ancestors are from, why some of my sisters are blonde and why I have such dark hair. I never really know what to say because I don't know a lot about where we're from other than asking my parents about it when I was little and had to give an ancestor report on one side of my family and especially because my grandma doesn't know much about her father. When we were in Italy everyone asked if I was Italian or had Italian ancestry, people ask if I'm Spanish, or Mexican, people ask if I'm Welsh or Middle-Eastern. I was so anxious to get the the ancestry composition reports back! It would be exciting to finally know once and for all the different cultures that are a part of me and all my ancestry!

Once I received the report, I was really surprised to learn that my DNA is made up of 88% European with British and Irish being the top. I for sure thought there was some sort of Spaniard in me! And Emily tested similarly too! We both did the Health + Ancestry Service Kit which tells you more about how your genetics might impact your health and wellness, in addition to ancestry information. One report that I found particularly interesting was the Genetic Weight report. It tells you whether your genes predispose you to weigh more or less than average.

My favorite part about this report was that it shared healthy habits specific to my genetics, and my top two habits were to avoid fast food and exercise. You all know I've gotten super into fitness and healthy eating since last May, so I was excited to learn that these two habits ranked high in making the biggest difference in people’s weight who have similar genetics as me (see more above).

If you are interested in ordering your own 23andMe Health + Ancestry Service kit, click here! And you can save $30 on the same service that we did until January 31st!

Brought to you by 23andMe.

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