The complicated true story behind “Good American Family”

WArning: This post contains spoilers for Good American family

Good American familyOut on Hulu, is inspired by the dramatic but real story of Natalia Grace, which lives with a rare form of the dwarf coating. In 2012, her adoptive parents said Grace was an adult who had spent a child and legally changed her age. The series examines why the test over Graces has grown age and identity.

In Good American familyPresent Gray’s anatomy‘S Ellen Pompeo plays Kristine Barnett, the woman who adopted a seven -year -old Natalia in 2010. At that time, Barnett was an increasing star on the loudspeaker because of her son Jacob, a physics ziz with autism that made headlines at school to excellent at school when experts doubted his subscription. In the show, Kristine Natalia (Imogen Faith Reid) sees her next project, and her husband Michael (Mark Duplass) is thrilled to finally have a daughter.

In 2012 – both in real life and on the show – the barnets had changed from Natalias age from 8 to 22 and moved to an apartment to live alone. Kristine and Michael Barnett were both accused of neglecting a dependency; Michael was acquitted and the indictment against Kristine was dropped. The real Natalia Grace and Michael Barnett both had to tell their sides of the story in the documentary series The strange case of Natalia graceThe third season, which was just broadcast in January and Natalia landed on the cover of January 13, 2025, the issue of People Magazine.

Here is a look at some of the biggest moments in Good American family And how they agree with what Natalia and the Barnets said in previous interviews.

What happened to Natalia Grace in the Barnets’ house

In the first season of The strange case of Natalia graceMichael Barnett explains why his Natalia family wanted to adopt: “We wanted to help someone who was in danger of never being loved.”

But both Natalia and the Barnets have accused each other of being abusive. The Barnets said that Natalia terrorized her while Natalia claimed that they are impatient with her as someone who lives with chronic pain and trauma.

Initially, the family had a honeymoon period and vacation in Disneyland with Natalia. But when she arrived in her new home, her new parents became suspicious. In the first season of The strange case of Natalia graceMichael said Kristine gave Natalia her first bath in the new house and snapped to air when she saw that Natalia had full pubic hair. He says Natalia admitted to having a time and hiding bloody underwear. About six months after life with the Barnets, he says that Natalia would try to urinate her six-year-old sibling ethane, empty in the car and smear the waste to the younger boy. He also claimed that she would open the door when the car was on the move.

The barnets said Natalia would take her brothers’ toys with them and throw them on the street and even threaten to kill them as they are sleeping. In the documentary series, Jacob Barnett says Natalia has heard knives in her bedroom; Michael said that he held Natalia a knife on his bed’s bed. Natalia confronts Michael about this story in the documentary series and argues: “I can’t bend my fingers to grab a knife at all.” She accuses the Barnets to rebuild a similar scene from the 2009 horror film Orphan. She claims that she was hit by a belt and pepper spray with the barnets during life, so People.

Good American family interweave these stories in the plot. In one of the most dramatic scenes in the series, Kristine Natalia orders the kitchen to clean, and is later surprised when her cup of coffee tastes like cleaning fluid. Natalia is accused of poisoning Kristiner, while Natalia says that she has problems cleaning the kitchen properly due to her short stature.

In the documentary series, Natalia says that Kristine Barnett staged poisoning in real life. At that moment, every trust they had broke, says Jacob Barnett. “I cannot share a drink with someone, it is rooted in this fear that Natalia will come to poison us.” (Kristine Barnett did not take part in the Docu series or responded to the request of production for comment.)

Why does Natalia Grace change?

One of the biggest questions to this day is why the Barnets have changed Natalia’s age.

When the Barnets adopted them in 2010, she was about seven years old, but they believed that she was grown up because she had public hair and teeth. In Good American family, Kristine sets itself the task of proving that Natalia is an adult after noticing a bloody tampon on the floor of her house while taking up a television interview. She gets to work to do doctors to prove that Natalia is a 22-year-old adult, then she gets an apartment and brings her to life alone.

It is true that a court in Indiana changed Natalia Grace’s year of birth from 2003 to 1989 in 2012 after a detective, according to Michael, believed that her birth certificate looked wrong. As in the show, the real Natalia was made to live alone in an apartment. In the Docu series, Natalia opens up how her apartments were never made completely accessible to her, since she could not reach the stove, the shelves or the mailbox and had no telephone with which she could call.

A neighbor named Cynthia Mans took her under her wings and invited her to live in her house with her husband Antwon, a Christian pastor and her 10 children. Natalia moved into them and they took care of them and officially adopted them in 2023. The documentary series shows that Natalia’s date of birth was changed to 2003 after a genetics test that came to the conclusion that it is about 22 years old.

How Good American family ends

The second season of the DOCU series ends with Natalia, who faces her adoptive father Michael Barnett. “I beat myself up because I wasn’t stronger,” he tells her. She says he deserves her forgiveness because he came to the show and apologized.

Good American family ends with a version of this one -on -one discussion between Natalia and Michael. On the show, Natalia appears in Michael’s house immediately after his acquittal and asks why he no longer did to help her. “I was a child,” she says. “You should be my father.” Michael tells her that he “didn’t have the strength”.

Then Kristine and her son Jacob appeared to the house. Michael is unprepared because he and Kristine are divorced. In fact, they separated in real life in 2014. In the show, Kristine says that there was a gas leaf where she stayed and asks Michael whether they can stay with him. Michael says that Jacob, but not Kristine – Natalia makes it clear that he is on her side. Jacob (Aaron Potter) turns to Natalia and apologizes for no longer entering her, and she tells him that it is okay because he was just a child.