To wonder at genetics

I knew someone like your DD. He had an Indian ancestor 2 or 3 generations back.

I'm an adoptee so yes I do often wonder about my genetics.

My siblings all have the tall gene, missed me sadly! Separately, we don't look alike but when together, there are some subtle similarities. I'm dark haired, blue eyes, small and petite, my brothers are stocky and well over 6 feet. My sisters are fair, tall and willowy. We can't see where the tall gene came from. We had a family photo taken at Christmas and the difference is height between me and my siblings is striking!

I've been researching our family history for years and all the military records say the men in our family were around 5"4". I guess this was normal height back then.

All my nieces and nephews are tall too.

Our Dad was short. Mum was 5'9".

My DC don't really look alike. Both tall though. One blue eyed and fair, other dark brown eyes and dark, almost black hair.

DGC - I can see lots of family members in them going back generations. Fascinating stuff.

One thing we all have in common though is being left handed.

I have a cat that catnip does not effect.

I've had cats before and I used to foster cats and she is the fist to just look at it as if to say,"What's that?"

Why should it be impossible? The genetics of eye colour are very complex.

My 2 kids look nothing like each other of their parents.

My son is the double of my mother's brother. My baby granddaughter and I at one year old could be the same person.

My siblings look nothing a like - but they both look like me.

My kids eveyone recognised them as siblings they look so a like - even stangers passing them on the street will ask if they are related to sibling they know.

I don't think food tastes can be genetic?

Partly I think - super tatsers are a know thing having higher density of taste buds on the tongue and opposite poor tasters also have genetic compnemets - sometime with taste buds sometimes with smell issues.

Only a section of the population can famoulsy smell cyanide - it's a common plot point in histrocial murder plots - and even in cats I think 20% don't react to cat nip.

However food is complex - it's partly what we've learnt and also childhood associations so memory in there.

My daughter is good friends with a set of twin girls who look absolutely NOTHING alike. Truly completely different - one has darker Asian skin and eye colouring and thick black wavy hair, the other has much paler skin colour with light brown straight fine hair. Honestly, if you saw them together you wouldn't even think they are related, but they are actually twin sisters.

School eye colour lessons are very over simpified.

Genetics of Eye Color

What blows my mind is how I may not be gentically related to ancestors beyond I think grandparents as it's random which bits you get so it's possible to get nothing from an ancestor.

I think it's unlikely to not have some greatgrandparent DNA but possible and further back nothing at all gets more common. I know that why they look at Y and X chromosomes for ancestor DNA but it still blows my mind.

On my mother's side, there's a really strong set of genes that's come down from my great-grandmother. Out of about 30-40 descendents, only one or two don't strongly resemble that female line with a few token features of the fathers.

My son is the dead spit of me. His dad's features are his toes, his fingernails and the shape of his back.

My friends comment on how they've never seen a stronger mum-son resemblance, but in my family it's totally standard.

My parents both have quite an olive skin tone - tan very easily and very evenly. My brother and I both have extremely pale white skin than burns rather than tans 😭

Wow your daughter's eyes are a gorgeous colour!

Recessive genes. Two brown eyed right handed parents here with two blue eyed left handed children
DS2 looks like his great-great-uncle and like absolutely noone else in the extended or historic family.

I'm tall. Nobody in my family is tall. Not my parents, grandparents (when they were alive), siblings. Even my own children aren't tall (they're adults), even though me and their dad were. I don't understand it at all. I wish I was shorter, I hate it!

Thank you. Yeah it would be interesting to know if there is anything in it. It might be hard to say how much is nature v nurture. As in some families might not give their kids access to a wide range of healthy foods or some might ban sugar and upf entirely.

That’s interesting, thank you, but equally and unfortunately I can’t know either - I knew the father who didn’t strike me that way but not well enough to know really and child ditto.

It was just so marked it stuck with me - I’m also adopted so have a general interest and have seen a geneticist when in my 50s due to family history I was told then - so all very interesting but don’t know or follow it all up much.

I have I think heard of tastes/diets being studied for obesity links but again I didn’t follow it up, but maybe this too could be linked to differing types of brain rather than specifically taste.

That strikes me as being ND related (a very restrictive diet) and the child having the same ND as the adult so also having very restricted diet rather than it being taste that is genetic but obviously I have no idea if this is the case here.

I’m not a geneticist or scientist but this situation where a child very obviously had their father’s food tastes really struck me and has made me wonder about it - I don’t think it’s important particularly to be checked/verified, but it also made me consider how much of ‘us’ is defined by heredity rather than ‘self’.

It may I think be a part of more important genes that feed into obesity though - taste preferences or reasons for wanting/needing high sugar, or high fat - maybe I’ll find out via any research on this whether it’s a thing or was coincidence.

I've just never heard anyone say they were before. The food my great grandparents liked would be different to what I like because they only had seasonal foods and McDonald's etc hadn't been invented. So I don't see how you would know if it was genetic or not?

That doesn't show that food tastes arent genetic as we don't inherit all of our parents genetic characteristics.

I don't think food tastes can be genetic? My dad was the fussiest eater ever, and my mum will eat absolutely anything. I don't think I'm that fussy.

I absolutely despise raw tomatoes and she adores them. In fact I dislike or am not bothered with most of the foods my mum loves.

My Nan, Mum, sister, niece (from my other sister) and cousin are literally copy and paste of each other - it’s so bizarre. We had a picture of my Nan at a wedding when she was younger and my daughter said can Aunty time travel.

I have a friend who parents are Dad Chinese and Mum white-British - the son is the image of his Dad and my friend is her Mum double - you wouldn’t know she was mixed.

Genetics are so amazing. I’m technically mixed race as I have a white great grandparent, you can’t tell with me I look pure Gilgit, but a sibling looks white you wouldn’t think they were part Asian.

Our children are mixed race, we know one of their ethnicities, one looks very much like ethnicity one, the other looks more South Asian. It will be interesting if their second ethnicity appears more as they get older. If either of them ever decide to do an ancestry test that will be very interesting.

My husbands Swedish and South African Dutch, he is the spitting image of his Swedish great grandfather, the only person in the family who looks like him at all, you wouldn’t even know he is related to his parents from looks. He is very pale skinned, blonde and blue eyed, his little brother is dark skinned white, curly black hair and brown eyes, like the majority of the family. If it wasn’t for great grandad you’d be wondering if he was an affair baby. It would be really interesting to see what our dna would look like combined.

Genetics are fascinating. My now ex and I used to joke when the DC were small that we had "his and hers" babies. DS1 has my colouring, and DS2 his dads. Only now they are adults DS1 is the spitting image of his father, albeit with my colouring. And DS2 looks so much like me that the computer often thinks we're the same person. But his hair is closer in colour to his Dad.

Actually, the genes on their Dad's side of the family are so strong that you can tell all the cousins are related. Other than DS2 that is. If I wasn't 10000000% certain that his Dad really is his Dad I'd question his parentage tbh!