To ask for Ancestry DNA help?!

[Jennaveeve]

These are the facts.

DM adopted. Father unknown.

I have a match, 505cM, suggested relationship is first cousin once removed.

My match with her is actually ‘stronger’ than with my Dad’s half sister.

Could my match be my Mothers half sister? Born 10 years apart. Her own Mother born the same year as the man I think is my Mothers real father.

I should add, I know the match comes from my Mum’s paternal side only, due to the other matches we share, so no chance they have the same mother.

What you need is the shared cM project. When you plug in the 505 cM it presents the possible relationships and the probability of each. Taking the age of the person you have matched with into account, the most likely is either half first cousin, or first cousin once removed.

You need to proceed with extreme caution, taking into account that this person you have matched with may have no idea your mother even exists if she was adopted. You don't know the circumstances, you don't know how much she knows about her own family - you don't even know whether she did the DNA test as a Christmas gift 10 years ago and has totally lost interest. She might not even respond to an email. My advice is to send a very neutral message along the lines of "Hi, you're coming up as one of my strongest matches and I'd love to figure out exactly how we're related".

Good luck!

Could my match be my Mothers half sister?

I think that cm was the relationship I found between adult DD & her grandparent's half sibling, actually.

Her own Mother born the same year as the man I think is my Mothers real father.

I didn't understand who the "Her" was in that sentence.

Have you messaged 505 person to ask if they'd like to figure out the connection?

It could be though that's quite a low match for a half aunt.

Check with the DNA painter tool for other suggestions

https://dnapainter.com/tools/sharedcmv4

@YeOldeTrout sorry the ‘her’ was my ancestry match.

@Misthios thank you! She’s the same generation as my Mother, age wise.

She only uploaded her results in March and states she’s looking for her DM’s biological parents.

Not impossible to be a half-aunt but much more likely to be a half-cousin.

you need to message them, I reckon

These dna tests sites can often confuse relationship links. In a very similar situation, found one ‘first half cousins daughter’, but after a chat and research, I’m 99% sure they’re my half cousin and we share a (long lost on my side) grandparent. I have a couple more family links that are absolutely the wrong familial link but the dna percentage between a half sibling or an aunt/uncle is similar. Add in large age gaps can also confuse the sites about what link you are if that makes sense.

As a side note, if you download your raw dna from Ancestry, you can upload it to Genomelink and MyHeritage for more connections.