How Old Natalia Grace Really Was When She Was Adopted & If Her Parents Were Right to Believe She Was Actually an Adult
If you’re catching up with the Natalia Grace case with Hulu’s Good American Family, you might be wondering about this specific fact that’s been pretty confusing. And that is Natalia Grace’s real age when she was adopted and how old she is now.
Natalia Grace, a Ukrainian-born girl with a rare form of dwarfism, was adopted by Kristine Barnett and her husband Michael in 2010, but the couple soon came to believe that instead of being a child, she was actually an adult with intent to harm them.
The couple abandoned Natalia Grace in an apartment by herself in 2013 after they believed she wasn’t her actual age. They also successfully petitioned the court to change her birth date from 2003 to 1989. However in 2019, prosecutors found evidence on Natalia Grace’s actual age.
How old was Natalia Grace when she was adopted?
Natalia Grace was 7 years old when she was adopted in 2010. The Barnetts claimed that she was over 20 years old when they adopted her, but DNA evidence and her birth records from Ukraine confirm her birthday was in August 2003.
“This one little piece of paper throws every single lie that the Barnetts has said right into the trash with a match,” she said in The Curious Case of Natalia Grace while holding the results. “This is so big. Because literally, this has been 13 years of just two people lying their butts off. They ruined a kid’s life. They painted [me] as some big monster.”
How old is Natalia Grace and where is she now?
As of 2025, Natalia Grace is 22 years old and lives in upstate New York with Nicole and Vince DePaul, who attempted to adopt Natalia in 2009 and have a form of dwarfism. Natalia left her previous family the Mans, after she accused them of abuse.
At the end of The Curious Case of Natalia Grace: Natalia Speaks, Natalia’s second family, the Mans, accuse Natalia of becoming the “enemy of the house.” Documentary producers found that several of the Manses neighbors claimed that they saw Natalia being abused. The tensions were exacerbated after Natalia started an online relationship with a man named Neil from the U.K.
“At first it was bumpy because the Mans were still involved. They were calling Natalia constantly and trying to wheel her back in,” Nicole told People about the transition between families. “It was just this constant thing where we were walking a fine line of not doing too much. See, she just came from this house that basically was ruled by a dictator, so I didn’t want to tell her what to do.”
Natalia is also trying to get her GED, her driver’s license and is aiming to start a family. “I’m a girl who loves kids and wants to get married and have children,” she said. “But one of my biggest things is not making promises I can’t keep. I’ve had too many promises that have been broken. I’m just ready to move on.”
