This is a story of how a son found out that his mom cheated after doing a DNA test, and has decided to keep it a secret from the family so as not to break his parents up.
I’m sure everyone has seen the ancestry DNA kit making waves a few years ago. You had to buy the kit online, send back a saliva sample and a few weeks later you would receive the results. Well, my two sisters and myself got intrigued with it as we’re all nerds about history and we’ve heard plenty of stories from our grandparents and granduncles. My dad’s side is very mixed – everything from Indian, Chinese, Malay, Dutch, Portuguese – we have all of the ancestry of every colonizer that stepped foot in Malaysia.
When we bought the ancestry kit, it was for dual reasons. First was to see our history, but also for the health benefits as the DNA results could give you indications of how to improve your lifestyle. This is important to understand how I got away with no one finding out.
The results arrived
The day the results were announced on the app, my youngest sister took a screenshot of our heritage page and shared it in our groupchat, citing the fact it was surprising we were 3% East African, to which my middle sister also shared in the surprise and made some stupid joke. I kept refreshing my page, but it didn’t show the same results as them. My percentage scores were different and thats when I saw the Paternal tab. I clicked on it and my heart sank. I saw 100% Ancestral South Indian.
That’s when I knew there was no way my dad was my actual biological father as I’ve seen my grandparents and they are definitely not 100% Indian. There’s some mix in there for sure, but 100% was not possible.
My mom cheated on my dad. I let that sink in for a moment. I didn’t want to make any rash conclusions without asking my mom.
When my sister asked to share my results – I just shared the screenshot of the “Health” tab, citing that we have the same parents, thus the same results for the “Ancestry” tab. She bought it without a doubt.
Confronting my mother
My mom and I have always had a very special relationship. She’s a biologically Chinese woman, adopted into an Indian family. Her adopted parents raised her since she was a kid, ever since her biological parents died in a car accident when she was just a few months old.
From the time I was young, I kind of knew my mom and I were much closer than she was with my sisters – as I could get away with a lot more. During my teenage years, my sisters used to ask me to get permission for them to go out, because they knew my mom was more likely to approve!
I knew I had to confront my mom with the results of the DNA test, as I would not be able to have a relationship with her with this knowledge hanging above me. I took her out one evening for dinner, and carefully approached the topic. I told her that my siblings and I did a DNA test and we got our results back. As I was telling her, I could see her face slowly changing. I asked her if there’s anything she needs to tell me.
She broke down, started crying, telling me exactly what I had suspected. She said when she first got married to my dad, she was still in love with her ex-boyfriend. He was forced to get engaged to an Indian woman as his parents did not agree with my mom being Chinese – even though she was raised by Indians. They broke up and each got married but apparently was still very much in love. They had one last night together, before he moved away to the UK for a job he got.
That was the night I was conceived. It was about a year or so after my mom had got married to my dad.
She said she was sorry but she was glad to have me as a reminder of the man she loved. She said she fell in love with my dad during her pregnancy with me. When she saw what a good father and husband he was – how he took care of her, and later me, she knew that she married the right man. She begged me not to tell my father, saying that it would break him after all these years. She told me she regrets it, but she doesn’t regret having me.
Keeping my mother’s secret
For a while I battled with my conscience, trying to figure out what was the right thing to do. I was torn between telling the truth or keeping it within me for the sake of the family. In the end, I knew that if this news were to come to light, it would not only break my dad’s heart, it would split the family. My sisters would take my dad’s side and would shame and hold it against my mother.
I foresaw my family in ruins and decided this would be a secret I took to my grave, for my mother. I decided I would never go and try to find my biological father as this would bring the secret to light, potentially ruining his life as well.
So for now, no one knows, besides my mother and I.
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