First Post - My Story and a few notes about Internet Safety

Hi, everyone! My name is Kelly. Three years ago, I learned that although I was raised by an amazing man who I will always consider my father, I was conceived using an anonymous sperm donor. The clinic my parents used has sealed all information about its donors, even non-identifying information, so half of me was a complete genetic mystery. Since then, I have worked to discover as much as I can about the paternal side of my family

This blog will focus primarily on highlighting the advantages and disadvantages of methods anyone, but specifically donor-conceived people, can use to find their biological family, including parts of my own story.

What I've Learned:

• I have at least one biological half-sister through my sperm donor!

• I have met her in-person and we have physical features and a lot of other unexpected things in common, such as taste in music (That's her on the left, and that's me on the right. I'm showing my teeth and she isn't).
• I am of 1/8th unspecified Middle Eastern descent (this is not through my donor because I do not share it with my sister). Surprisingly, it comes through my mother. I discovered this through FamilyTreeDNA.com.
• I was able to get health information from 23andme.com before the FDA had the feature removed.
• Through a combination of 23andme.com and Ancestry.com, I was able to determine the hometown of my donor's ancestors and have established mutually-desired contact with paternal family members from both websites

A few notes on Internet safety:

• DO NOT meet anyone you do not know alone. 
• DO NOT give out personal or identifying information.
• DO NOT use pictures on any website that can be tracked to personal websites, such as pictures from your Facebook page. They can be used to track you using a reverse Google image search.
• DO NOT use the same email address that you use for your personal accounts. I made an email address specifically for genetic websites and registries and I use this email only for this blog. 
• USE DISCRETION AT ALL TIMES. You are vulnerable and searching. Due to the highly unregulated fertility industry, anyone can pose as donors or donor offspring, even predators. Keep this in mind when talking to strangers. Do as much as you can to verify that a person is who they say they are and that they are safe before you initiate communication with them. 
• BE CAREFUL WITH YOUR MONEY. If you are worried about hacking or internet scams, you may purchase a temporary credit gift card from any store or your bank that you can buy once and have separate from your bank accounts. I always used this method so no one would have access to my real accounts. 
• This blog is intended for use to help people establish MUTUALLY-DESIRED CONTACT ONLY.