Was Natalia Grace’s age changed back? Update after Good American Family ending

By the end of Good American Family, you’ll know how old Natalia Grace really is, even if the courts aren’t on her side. But has that age been legally restored in real life?

It’s a debate that’s been running since 2010, when Michael and Kristine Barnett adopted Natalia: how old is she? In 2012, the couple had Natalia’s legal age changed from eight to 22 years old before moving her into an apartment alone. 

Here, she met Cynthia and Antwon Mans, and so began a legal battle that went on for a decade. Good American Family details these events, starting with the Barnetts’ allegations before depicting Natalia’s truth. 

The final episode of the Hulu series aired this week, finishing with the end of Michael Barnett’s trial, at which point Natalia’s legal birth year remained at 1989 (despite the mountain of evidence to suggest otherwise).

Was Natalia Grace’s age changed back?

ID

Thanks to DNA testing and documentation from her biological mother, Anna Gava, it’s now clear that Natalia was born on September 4, 2003. Her legal age has been restored, with her passport and other records updated accordingly.

This was revealed in Season 3 of ID’s The Curious Case of Natalia Grace, The Final Chapter, which dropped in January 2025. In the docu-series, abuse allegations against her new adoptive parents, Cynthia and Antwon Mans, had surfaced. 

Vince and Nicole DePaul and their daughter Mackenzie – a supportive family of little people who originally wanted to adopt Natalia – helped rescue her from the Mans’ in December 2023.

They brought her from Tennessee to upstate New York, where she’s currently reported to be living, only to discover she didn’t even have a passport. With the DePauls’ help and support, she was finally able to obtain a passport, which lists her date of birth as September 4, 2003.

Before this, in Season 2, extensive DNA testing proved that Natalia was born around this date. This means that Natalia was around six years old when the Barnetts adopted her, and between eight or nine years old when they moved her into an apartment alone. 

A lot has happened since then, but Good American Family Episode 8 finishes with the outcome of Michael’s trial. Showrunners Katie Robbins and Sarah Sutherland have opened up about why they chose to end the series at this stage in the case.

Has Good American Family ended?

Hulu

Yes, the Hulu series ended with Episode 8, ‘Blood On Her Hands’, with Robbins and Sutherland explaining that they hoped it would spark introspection and highlight changes that need to be made in the justice system. 

When asked by Deadline about why they chose to end the story here, Robbins said, “It’s twofold. I mean, one is that the story just continues. So, as with any kind of story based on real events, you do have to pick a place to end it. 

“But I think even more than that… is this idea that, in a show that deals with some tropes of horror, like these moments of a girl at the foot of a bed with a knife and poison… the thing that is the scariest and that we really want to leave our audience with is that this is a case that actually had some empirical facts. 

“The empirical facts around Natalia’s genetic age, and that, at the end of the day, did not matter in the court of law, is something that is terrifying and should concern us all in terms of our justice system. 

“So the place where we ended, having that land so fully on Natalia and the people who care about her, felt like the way to drive that home in the most impactful way.”

Hulu

Sutherland added, “We agree that it is very frustrating and it’s part of the challenge of writing, how to land the story without making something up that’s not true. The real question we all want to know is, why did this happen? 

“We’re never going to get a clear cut answer to that, but I do think, in the end, it feels clear. One answer that feels really clear is that this [would have] never happened if it had not been for Natalia’s disability. 

“We talked a lot about wanting to really land the role of bias here, both from the Barnetts, but also the system and the press and most of us watching… We are, together, guilty of, at some point, believing that Natalia was an adult in a way that never would have believed if it had not been for her disability and her otherness. 

“The US passport has confirmed her age. That was an empirical fact. She was a child. There was an empirical fact before the trials took place, but because of the fact that the Barnetts had re-aged her, she was not able to be treated as a child in court.

“I just think it’s really fascinating, just how devastating it was, not only that they couldn’t bring up the fact that she was a child, but because she was legally an adult, there were statute of limitations on what time period they could even be looking at the crime.”

“There’s a ton of story wrapped up in Episodes 7 and 8, but [we wanted to] really land that notion that at the end of the day, this would never have happened had it not been for Natalia’s disability and for the kind of intense discrimination that is true for people with disabilities in this country,” Sutherland finished. 

Good American Family is streaming on Hulu now, while The Curious Case of Natalia Grace can be watched on Max. You can also check out the new documentaries dropping this month and the TV shows coming to streaming.