One of the many strange things I did whilst under the influence of heavy medication for pain relief last year was to purchase a DNA research kit. Well several months later and a heck of a lot of alegebraic codes and emails full of words that hardly resemble English I now have a pretty incredible DNA map of the roads my genes have taken.

All of us at one time or another have had an interest in our family trees and most I'm sure would probably have details to the emigrants who got on a boat to the colonies, but few would have details beyond that except for their ethnic group of their ancestors, be that, German, Italian, Welsh or Scottish. However often (as is the case today) there are breakups, naughty midnightmeetups, unwanted advances and assumed identities which all lead to alternate family trees that don't actually reflect who we are. DNA mapping does in fact give you your real past and it goes all the way back to Africa.

That did shock my mum a little, the fact that I told her our DNA actually leads back to Africa, her initial thought was 'on my side or your fathers'? her face did get a little puzzled when I said 'both' and explained how a mere 45,000 years ago my Graham family ancestors the R1a1  left Africa on a journey that would take them through the Middle East and on to Central Asia then through modern day Poland about and Scandinavia about 10,000 years ago then finally to Scotland and Ireland with shared genetics in Iceland Norway, Germany and England. Through out the way there are genetic mutations called markers it is these markers that geneticists have been able to trace back and work out our lineages and which path my paternal ancestors took. Interestingly although my mother thought she was of English Heritage my Mitochondrial DNA suggests like my male lines Y-Haplotree  left Africa earlier, about 50,000 years ago but rather than going north East in central Asia like my fathers ancestors my maternal line headed up through present day Israel to the Black sea then skirter southern Europe getting to modern day France whilst Neanderthals were in the last days of occupation. Finally her female ancestors the ended up in Ireland leaving markers in Israel, UK, Morocco and Spain.

As time goes by and people will fill the gaps with their own family trees with names, soon enough, many of the worlds people will find how close we all are, especially those from the British Isles where records have been kept for over a thousand years.

Whilst I was a bit confused as too why in my sedated state I had organised my DNA to be tested and put on a map, I am so glad I did as each time I check the site I see more and more relatives popping and making me very aware that we are all connected in a way and that our ancestors have been continually on the move to ensure that we are here today.