DENVER — People who were adopted as children and want to find their biological parents have many more options than they did just a few years ago. Online DNA testing sites like Ancestry.com and 23andMe can make immediate connections to family members in their data bases.
The connection was quite a surprise for Colorado woman Albreanna Watson. She was adopted at birth and her adoptive mother died when Watson was 17. “I had a closed adoption,” she said. “I knew nothing.”
But that all changed when she took an online DNA test to find out her ethnic background. Two years later, she was contacted after her half-brother took the same test and made a match.
Watson discovered she has two half-brothers and one half-sister. She used FaceTime to call them all, and then decided to meet them in Atlanta and surprise her biological mother.
“I’m so nervous right now,” she said in a video from that day. “What if she doesn’t accept me? What if she does?”
Cell phone video shows the moment her mother sees her and bursts into tears. It was an instant connection. “It’s something I’ve been wanting for so long,” Watson said.
She posted video documenting her journey on Twitter, and it struck a chord. The video had 15 million views in a matter of days.
Watson says DNA tests have changed everything for people who were adopted. She now wants to help other people who are looking for their biological families. She knows some people don’t want to be found, but said she wonders if there is any way to guarantee anonymity with today’s DNA technology.