Sperm Sisters's Podcast

Ep 5 Spit On That Thang

• Sperm Sisters • Season 1 • Episode 8

Share episode

Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.

0:00 | 32:03

Spit on That Thang | DNA Testing, Ancestry Results & Finding Biological Relatives

In this episode, we explore the world of DNA testing and genetic ancestry - how to take a DNA test, which DNA kits we recommend, and what you can actually learn from your results.

We break down popular consumer DNA tests and share our own real-life experiences, including what happened when we discovered unexpected biological relatives through DNA matching.

This episode covers:

  • How at-home DNA tests work
  • The best DNA testing kits for ancestry and family discovery
  • What your DNA results can reveal about your biological family
  • Our personal donor conception and DNA discovery experiences

Whether you’re curious about your ancestry, considering a DNA test, or navigating donor conception, this episode gives you both the practical information and lived experience behind the science.

Spoiler: we find relatives.

Listen now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and YouTube.

--------------------------------------

Get in touch and share your story with us, we're looking to interview people on upcoming episodes! 

Email us at: spermsisterspod@gmail.com

Follow us on insta: @spermsisterspodcast

Subscribe on YouTube: @SpermSistersPodcast

SPEAKER_06

Do-bi-da-ba-ba-ba- do-da-ba-ba-ba do-da-ba-ba Spam sisters.

SPEAKER_03

This is a story about sisters. Just not the kind that you're expecting.

SPEAKER_05

Three years ago, we were strangers, living separate lives.

SPEAKER_04

Now we know we're biological sisters, connected by the same sperm donor. And that's just the beginning.

SPEAKER_05

This podcast dives headfirst into the how, the why, and the uncomfortable questions no one seems to want

Intro

SPEAKER_05

to answer.

SPEAKER_04

Uncovering secrets the medical world would rather keep buried. How many donor-conceived people are there really? No one can give a straight answer.

SPEAKER_03

Not the clinics, not the system, no one. So, how many siblings could be walking past us every day without a clue? It's messy, it's shocking. At times it's almost impossible to believe.

SPEAKER_04

And somehow, it's also really funny.

SPEAKER_05

Come with us as we dig deeper, ask the uncomfortable questions, and laugh our way through the chaos of discovering who we really are. And just how many of us there might be.

SPEAKER_04

Coming up on this week's episode of Sperm Sisters.

SPEAKER_03

We share who we discovered through our DNA tests. We found some very interesting relatives on there, did we not? Yes, we did, actually. We found our biological grandmother and biological auntie. And we have more difficulties pronouncing places in America.

SPEAKER_02

L-E-H-I. L what L-E-H-I.

SPEAKER_03

La hi. La hai. You say La Hi. I say La He. I say Leh.

SPEAKER_04

Join the sisters on the sofa as Natasha, Jamma, and Helen's caffeine begins to wear off.

SPEAKER_03

Over fat like this. How strange things happen. Are you going round the twist? Okay, should I start again as an alternative? I would, yeah. Honest. Okay. Our episode today is going to be about DNA kits. Now, let's go. We're not flogging anything or whatever. Like, okay, so I'm gonna be mentioning a lot of brands and stuff. I think the influencers say, like, hashtag not an ad or whatever, but like none of this is an ad. We're telling you from our own personal experience of taking these DNA tests and going from there.

SPEAKER_05

So But if any of these companies would like to get in touch with us, feel

Spenny

SPEAKER_05

free.

SPEAKER_03

Fuel is going up. Episode five. We're going to be talking about DNA tests. Uh, because we've all done them. Yeah. We've all done them. And tell the audience why have we done DNA tests? They probably know by now. It's kind of in the title. Why have you guys done a DNA test? Because we are donor conceived. We should put that on t-shirts and walk around the place and that's. Shouldn't we? That's very true. So that's why we all have done DNA tests because we wanted to know where we're from. Let's be honest, we see these kits being flogged all the time, right? There was a sale on when I got mine. That's why I got it. Is there is there ever not a sale with these things in the moment? Who knows? I don't know. But what I wanted to chat about today is DNA tests in general. They seem to be something that people get at Christmas or birthdays as like a panic present, like what you get, someone you've seen an episode of who do you think you are, Stacy Doody, DNA families, whatever. And you know, it you want to find out a little bit more. We talk about DNA

What is DNA?

SPEAKER_03

and everything quite a lot. Guys, can you tell me? What is DNA? What do you two think DNA is? How would you describe it? Would you like to do this? I think you should. Oh I was gonna say it's like a necklace with beads on it. You're all coming from the same sort of necklace, but you're all made up of different beads from the same sort of jewelry group. Christ, that's like almost poetic. That's beautiful. That feeds in beautifully into the scientific reason, backing up your analogy, which I much prefer yours than what I'm about to tell you. Hold on. To be honest, which is a real shame. So DNA is the body's instruction manual. It's like the code that

Codebreakers

SPEAKER_03

forms us. There are four tiny little letters that make up these codes, and they are A, C, G, and T. It's really interesting the fact that 99% of humans share exactly the same coding. But what the DNA tests do is they find the difference, the rest of the tiny that 1% that makes you unique. 99% of the coding is the same. Exactly the same. So only 1%'s different. Not 0.1%. Almost all humans share 99.9% of the same DNA. It's the tiny differences that make you you. Who you are. Whoa. Yeah. Whoa. Whoa. Whoa. Whoa. That's um science. Yeah, right? Yeah. When I did my DNA test, it was like a it was a very emotional, highly charged decision to do it. It wasn't because I got it as a Christmas present where you're like, okay, I'll just do it, whatever. I'm guessing you guys were probably the same, and you felt kind of like, oh, I really want to know. There's like an emotional backup in it. But there are so many companies that we could have gone with. Okay.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah. That's what's wild about this, I think.

SPEAKER_03

And we each met, or we found each other on 23andMe.

unknown

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

Other companies are also available. Open sponsorship. Um 23andMe still exists. It does. Okay. It does, yeah. Does it? Yes. Are you gonna get into it? There are lots of different companies that we could have gone with. Helen, you've also done another one as well, haven't you? Which company did you also go with? Well, I've actually done three DNA tests in total. Have you? I've done 23andMe, I've done Ancestry, and I did one called

Triple Test

SPEAKER_03

the Donor Sibling Link. I think they have had a couple of errors in their testing, or it's maybe not like uh allegedly. Allegedly. Okay, we can freeze over there. And it's in affiliation with King's College London. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

Okay.

SPEAKER_03

Because it was like £90 or something to do. So I know.

SPEAKER_05

Interesting that that one is on the NHS and that one is apparently the one that's had like errors.

SPEAKER_03

It's not on the NHS though, because you have to pay. So it's only King's. It's referred. Yeah. You get referred to this company, I suppose. No, so it's basically King's College London holds the database for the donor sibling link, which you I had to approach my GP and say, I need a blood test for you to send off here with all the paperwork. So did that, and you also give like your a picture of yourself. It's really old school way of doing it. Picture of yourself seems like unnecessary.

SPEAKER_05

But but sh but fine.

SPEAKER_02

Looks a bit like you.

SPEAKER_05

Must be a match.

SPEAKER_03

So we are on that register because I'm on there. Okay, cool. So if anyone does it, because I felt like if people were nervous of some people get nervous about having their DNA on a full big database, such as 23 Me or Ancestry, yeah. Exactly. Whereas this one was is like a privatised GP run thing. Cool. Yeah. Not add anyway. That's interesting there.

SPEAKER_05

Because I didn't know that you had three. So that's new for me.

SPEAKER_03

Let's think about the big players. Who did we consider going to? What names, what household DNA kit names have you heard?

How Many Do You Know?

SPEAKER_03

Honestly, 23 Me and Ancestry UK.

unknown

Okay.

SPEAKER_02

Those are the only two. Okay. Those were also the only two that I knew off the top of my head. Those were the only two. Excuse me. Those are the only two I knew off the top of my head.

SPEAKER_03

Wreck in my day, Smoky McPhee. Only two. Those two. Those are 1920s.

SPEAKER_05

And those were the only two.

SPEAKER_03

Those were the only two. But they are my daughter's wedding. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

But they or my daughter found out. So right, come on.

SPEAKER_03

Right. So there are other companies that we could have gone with. And they are, there are smaller ones. I will list them for you. Living DNA. Have you heard of that one? Oh, I feel like maybe it's come up as like an Instagram ad. Yeah, I feel like I've heard of it. Yeah. I've never heard of that.

SPEAKER_04

Home DNA?

SPEAKER_03

Nope. African ancestry? No. Helix? No. Veritus Genetics? Oh, yes. No. No. Basically, there are lots of other smaller companies. But none of those companies are owned by the larger interest. They're in they're independent ones. Now, the reason why it's quite good in our experience, if you are also looking to find relatives or family, just find out where you're from a little bit. I'm all for supporting small business,

Go Big

SPEAKER_03

but there is a big plus side for going with the big contenders, Ancestry 23andMe. Because the more people that do it, the bigger the database of people. How do they get your DNA? I know you guys have done the test. But for everybody at home who hasn't done one, can you describe now? I actually don't remember quite remember.

SPEAKER_05

I feel like it was ages ago that I did this. But would we have to spit in a did we spit in a thick, a little test tube thing, or was it a a tongue swab? It was it both. I think it was, wasn't it?

SPEAKER_03

Yes. Yeah. Yeah. I think they were slightly different. 23andMe was a little bit different to Ancestry. Was it swab 23andMe? Ancestry was spitting in a cup. I'm gonna say this out. I have a real it. I can't, I'm bad with spit and saliva. So unfortunately, Helen and I decided we would do our tests at the same time, and it was so disgusting. Because you get this tiny little pot and you have to fill it up to the line. Yeah, different

Spit, Spit, Spit!

SPEAKER_03

companies do a slightly have a slightly different method with how they get the DNA samples, whether that's cells from your cheek or from your saliva. But the idea is that you spit into the cup and then um it takes a genetic profile. Once you spit into your little pot, you've gone, I worked spit on that thing. Mandy's gonna listen to this. You're gonna have to tell her what that is. That's fine. Oh shit. When you did your little spit sample and you're giving away your DNA, you're gonna right. Where did your spit sample go? Now we met on 23andMe. So let's do 23andMe first. If you are in the UK and you do a 23andMe spit sample, where in the world is that spit sample going? The USA. Correct. Yeah, I'd have said sort of California. Oh my god! Did you guys go with your spit samples? No, I just know. The reason I'm saying that is because I swear YouTube always promoted 23andMe. And that's like techie America, isn't it? That's quite an interesting way of piecing it together. Yeah, I wouldn't have pieced it together like that. Oh, well. But you're gonna try to make it. 23andMe send all of their samples to a test lab in California. Ancestry send them to labs mostly

Where in the World?

SPEAKER_03

in Utah. Oh, so that's still going to America. It's still going to America. Interesting. The main lab is in oh Christ, here we go again. We've got another place in America we can't pronounce. Lehi.

SPEAKER_02

Lahi. L-E-H-I. L what L E H I.

SPEAKER_03

La hi. La hai. You say La Hi. I say Lahi. I say Lehi. There we go. It goes out wow. In Utah. Funny enough, that's how they got the spit sample. It's probably what you gotta say. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Should I just do a quick fact check of how to pronounce it? Go for it. Yeah, ask Google.

SPEAKER_02

Excuse me.

SPEAKER_03

How do you pronounce this is probably the most American sounding town. Lee Hi. It's not. I swear upon my life. Lee Lehi, as we were saying, is pronounced Lee High. It's commonly pronounced with a long E sound followed by Hi. Crumbs. Lee! Lee Ha!

SPEAKER_06

Lee Ha!

SPEAKER_03

I didn't think, now I'm gonna admit, when I did my spit samples to try and get my my results, I didn't think where in the world it was being sent to. No, it didn't even cross my mind.

Strugglebus

SPEAKER_03

Do you think we should have thought about that, or is it pretty well?

SPEAKER_05

I think it should have crossed our minds.

SPEAKER_03

It's just bizarre, isn't it? Just the notion of sending a spit sample back, but it goes across halfway across the world to Lehigh and California and the rest. There's there are other kits um that that mainly also send it back to the States because that is the world's biggest hub of DNA testing. Just trying to get all of the samples. It's supposed to be. How many people have done a 23andMe DNA test in the world? In the world. Ooh.

SPEAKER_02

Like a week. In the millions. Yeah. I'd say 12 million.

SPEAKER_03

I'm gonna go like 7.2. 14 to 15 million people have done a 23andMe DNA test. Wow. So that's 14 to 15 million people who are on 23andMe's database, which means that if you do one of these DNA tests, you are very likely going to find relatives, even if they're like four, fifth, sixth cousins once, twice removed, because that is so many people. It is a lot of people, but just being a bit of a downer, if you think just

That's a Lot of People

SPEAKER_03

of the population of the UK, what's that? Like 80 plus million? It's actually not that many. Wow, let me hit you with this next fact, Ellen. How many DNA kits had ancestry DNA sold, do you think? It will be more, I reckon, than 23 a million. Um, so are we looking at like 50 million? No, not quite that high. It could be. They aren't too sure because they have so many different packages now. Do you know? So whereas it's just um, so you can do just the health side or you can do traits and things as well. The wider ancestry platform has over 30 million users in its DNA plus family history because there's different types of kits that you can get now. So let's say 30 plus million. Well, around the world. So some people choose to do just 23andme, just Ancestry, both, like we've done both hells, haven't we? You just did it 23andme. Yeah. Why did you go for 23andme over Ancestry?

SPEAKER_05

Honestly, because my um brother-in-law decided to do one. Right. And used 23andMe. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

Um and and when and that's actually what prompted me to to do it as well. Right. Yeah. Because I thought, oh, if if that sounds like quite a cool thing to do, yeah, I'm gonna do it. So when you got your results back, how long did you have to wait for your results to come back? Do you remember?

How Long Did You Wait?

SPEAKER_03

Eight weeks.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, I think I was they mine were on time. I know that yours weren't. Mine were a week late, but that sums me up as a person. Sometimes yeah, I think mine was eight weeks. Yeah, two months pretty much.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah, yeah. And you kind of put it to the back of your head a bit, and then you get an email that pops up and is like, oh results, results are in, and it's like you get your A-level results back, and you know, when you're like, oh my god, oh my god, what am I, what am I, kind of thing.

SPEAKER_05

Yeah, that's a good description of what it felt like actually. It was a bit like, oh my god.

SPEAKER_03

But do you want to know really interesting facts? There are, so if you do your DNA, for example, Helsinki and I have done it on Ancestry and we've done it on 23andme, of course, we're gonna get the similar results back to say, for example, just throwing it out there, 25% Welsh, 25% Irish, whatever. But depending on the database that these companies have, those numbers could be slightly different because they get the average of DNA results from the people on their database. So the 30 million people on Ancestry, they try and match you up to these people and they work out where they're from, and it's like a constantly evolving algorithm, really. So it's always updating. So if you have done a test, it's quite nice to go back every six, seven months because your figures have probably changed a bit. There's sometimes an overlap with places like Northern Ireland and Scotland. There's there's a very similar DNA match with those two places. So it's just quite interesting. Say, for example, if the advertising focuses more on certain countries like in America, 23andMe is probably advertised and promoted more than it is here. We get more ancestry UK,

Go Back and Check Results

SPEAKER_03

it's gonna be slightly out because it's a different market. It's literally coming down to marketing, it's there or thereabouts. We're talking about one or two percent, it doesn't make a massive difference, but I just think that's really fascinating. Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_05

And I would like wouldn't have actually thought of um going back into my results. Yeah, I wonder if I went back now if anything could change. Yeah, probably, probably.

SPEAKER_03

I mean it's the world we're living in. Can you go back on yours though, or did you delete it? I just deleted it. Did you delete yours? No, tracer! I meant to. Do you want to go into why you did why you decided to delete it?

SPEAKER_05

Now, I found out that it was being sold to quite a large company, and I didn't feel comfortable with uh sitting with that knowing that they then had my data. Yeah, so that prompted me to um delete it.

SPEAKER_02

But if I remember correctly in our group chat, we all said that we would delete it.

SPEAKER_03

I think we were supposed to, and I'll be on for gosh, I just didn't get around to it. But my thought process here is my data is on so many different websites. If someone is gonna clone me, they're gonna clone me.

SPEAKER_05

The saddest thing for me about no longer having it is I don't have the first message that you sent to me anymore. And that's what's that's that makes me sad because I don't have that anymore. So if either of you have that, I'll mean to forward it to you.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05

So yes, please do forward it to me because I want to see it now.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah. I've got all of I've got all of my messages that I sent you. So you should do that. Why I that's why I haven't deleted it because I can't. Get rid of your messages.

SPEAKER_05

No, well I'm a we'll need to share with the listeners what those first exchanges of messages were because yeah, well, we wouldn't be here today if it hadn't been for that initial message that you sent

Sentimental 🫶🏼

SPEAKER_05

me. Oh God.

SPEAKER_03

Oh God. Yeah. So that's a whole other episode. That's another episode. But that's why you felt like you wanted to delete it. And and that's yeah, I I don't blame you. There's also that massive data breach when it got hacked into and it again, and since then, these companies have now set up a two-step verification, which they didn't have before. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05

Um, it said yeah, 23Me data breach in October 2023 specifically targeted and exposed the personal information of nearly one million users with Ashkenazi Jewish ancestry. And the terrifying thing about this is that hackers compiled and sold that data on the dark word, the dark web, which included names, locations, and genetic insights, obviously causing significant security concerns for the Jewish community.

SPEAKER_03

That's terrifying. That is terrifying. Um yeah. So Hackerscott into 23andMe's database, all these people who have done the DNA tests found out who has a percentage of Ashkenazi. Did I say that word right? You have to you have to correct me if I said that. What Ashkenazi? Ashkenazi, because it's one of those words where you're just like, I don't say it enough in day-to-day life. People get nervous on the games. I think maybe do a little bit of research into who you're doing the DNA test with. Do we have any recommendations? Ancestry. I second that. I mean, you can go with it if you want to, but you can you can log it to ours if you like. The reason I think Ancestry is good is because once you've paid for your Ancestry DNA kit, you can upload the raw data onto another um one called My Heritage. God, she's good. Helen's right. So this is what we did. Have we told you this yet? I'm not sure. Have you heard of My Heritage?

My Heritage

SPEAKER_03

Yes. Yes. So Helen and I decided doing lots and lots of these DNA tests kind of starts to add up a bit, doesn't it? But a good little hack, an insider's hack that we have found from doing all of this research, is that there are companies like MyHeritage that allow you to upload the data file that Ancestry gives you. You can get it in your settings, you can just download it, it's really easy. You can upload your raw DNA file that you get from some of these DNA testing sites, which is what we did. We uploaded our Ancestry file to MyHeritage, which combines lots of other people's. So, say for example, if they've used Living DNA or one of these smaller companies, they can also upload their data file onto MyHeritage. So it's just like another way of creating a database and finding people, which for donor can see people, or if you're looking for long-lost family, even that's a it's a great tool. And let's be honest, maybe we said maybe now's the right time we say we found some very interesting relatives on there, did we not? Yes, we did actually. Who did we find, Helen?

Relative Discovery

SPEAKER_03

We found our biological grandmother.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

And biological auntie and two cousins as well. And when we say biological, we mean from the donor side. We found the donor's mum, the donor sister, and the donor's nieces. Yeah. Maybe to be continued. Because we decided to upload that raw DNA data file to this other company, which then broadens the search, it meant that it started to whittle down the people that kept coming up on these different lists, and it did come up with paternal grandmother. And then from that, because we got her name, we could start to do a little bit of finding out and digging and stuff. So we need to show you this. I love my heritage because when people use it properly, you can upload lots of photos, and it's like it's kind of the interface looks like a family album. That's really lovely. It is, and it's just like it's it's a lovely way of um sharing snippets of your family history in life with people who want to know.

SPEAKER_05

It feels a little bit more like who do you think you are? Yeah, whereas like 23andMe is very it it's it's like DNA-based, like this is who you are, this is where you're from, this is what makes up you done. Yes. Whereas like this sounds a lot more, you know, if people are interested in finding their family trees, for instance, like that's a really popular thing at the moment. Lots of people are doing that. This sounds like a great way to do that.

SPEAKER_03

Yeah. Ancestry do allow you to upload photos too. Um, they also allow you oh, the good thing about Ancestry is that they allow you to upload links to obituaries and photos of articles, and obviously you get a wider search with Ancestry. If you wanted to find birth certificates, or if you wanted to look a little bit deeper into where someone got married, you can start piecing those puzzles together. So it's quite nice using

Piece the Puzzle Together

SPEAKER_03

Ancestry. I like I like it quite a lot. It's also really good for deciding what you want to share with people as you build your family tree and work out your family history before making it public. Right. So you can do it privately, you don't even have to share anything with other people, you can just do this for your own personal project.

SPEAKER_05

Was that the same as 23andMe or not? I don't think it was. Was it? It was like, no, you you automatically went live, essentially. Yes.

SPEAKER_03

Like anybody could see who you were and I think as soon as your results were in, they were published for all to see.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03

The last the last bit I want to touch on is how accurate do you think these tests are? What issues do you think might come up with the accuracy of the results? Like what the grey areas might there be? Well, I would hope that the accuracy for DNA matches would be a hundred percent, but I could see how there would be scope for some small percentage error on like the specific region that your family have originated from. Right. Geograph I think there's room for slight, very slight geographical mistakes, but there should be no room for mistakes on matches. Well yeah. I've said it. Yeah, I totally agree. Yeah, you're right. So there's an underrepresentation of some cultures and backgrounds. So the percentage on some ethnicities isn't as accurate as others. It's slightly unfair for some people to do the DNA test when the algorithm, the more people that take it from these regions, the better the results are gonna be. Yeah. So it's just, you know, it comes down to you can't force people to take a DNA test, but it's just whether there's the interest, whether there's perhaps a cultural interest in doing it, or you know, just more research just being done into those regions, there needs to be a better representation in some areas.

Hey Sis

SPEAKER_03

The results heavily depend on that nation's preference of who they do their DNA test with. So, as we say, 23andMe, very popular in the States. And seeing as we are sharing who we find, maybe we leave it on this note. We found each other on 23andme, but we've also found someone else on 23andme.

SPEAKER_01

And on that note, it's been a lovely chat and G spam sisters.