Welcome Katajha! What a amazing journey you have been on. I can't imagine the experience of connecting with your birth parents at your age. Congratulations on finding them. I'd love to hear more about that if you ever want to share.
Many of us are struggling with how (or if) to get our children to care about their potentially risky genetics. My son learned of his status at a very young age; 18 years old by my sloppy revelation of my own status. I was so devastated to learn I was a 4/4 that I failed to comprehend that sharing that information was an unethical revelation of
his status. He's 24 now. The knowledge has ultimately been positive. He'd been Dxed with CFS and multiple severe GI issues as a child. By the time he was ready to begin actively optimizing his health based upon his 3/4 status, he already had multiple biomarkers out-of-whack: very low Vitamin D, high homocysteine, etc. I'm not sure that he'd have had the opportunity to address that early had he not known of his ApoE status.
Coming to terms with genetic risk is a process. My son (like your children) didn't chose this journey. We must give them space to navigate this in their own way. My husband and I have come to the realization that the best thing we can do to influence him is to role model very healthy lifestyle choices. He's chosen to follow his father's career path and is building credentials to become a commercial airline pilot. We love that he MUST keep his FAA physical in order to fly
He's now forced to take his health seriously. He's finally at the point where he occasionally wants to talk about diet, exercise, etc. Give your kids time and space to navigate this. Be the best role model that you can be in terms of your own health. My guess is that they'll come around to caring when they're ready.
. I have told them, but they do not understand yet what it means, and luckily think I over react a lot, so have not researched it on their own yet. . I do not know how to proceed. I do not want to devistate them, scare them, or in the case of my youngest make her angry thinking I am over reacting. HELP please. Also means I have 5 grandkids who are at least heterozygous. ugh.
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