Genealogy Testing

 I'm thinking about doing a DNA kit/genealogy test. Whatever they are called. Some of my kids just sent theirs off. I have seen just enough crazy stuff on Netflix and the internet to make me a little bit leery. What if I find siblings I didn't want to know I had? I have one child that I'm a little concerned about that she'll find out she has 98 siblings. 

My aunt is heavy into genealogy and there's a part of me that thinks it's a waste of money to send off for one of these tests when my aunt Karen has all the family genealogy mapped out for as far back as she can possibly go. She knows about my Suderman ancestry, Loewen ancestry, Wall Ancestry, Hagen ancestry. And I'm sure much more. These are the surnames I know. 

I do think I'll pull the trigger on this in the future. I would be curious to know what is out there and who I'm related to that I do know about and who I don't know about. It's not some mysterious thing like if I were adopted and don't really know where I came from. 

What are your experiences with this? Have you done it? Was it helpful and informative? I know it's a real thing that people's lives have been ruined through this kind of testing. Life used to be simpler in the fact that if you didn't want the world (or more specifically.... your family) to know your secrets, you could likely bury them deep enough that people wouldn't be able to overturn the soil and expose them. It is both empowering and intimidating to think about the weight of this and devastation that can be reigned down when people have carefully orchestrated fictional pasts. 

I am looking forward to learning about what my daughter's learn. Then I'll decide if I should invest in this for myself and my other two daughters. Happy hunting kids!