Natalia Grace is a name that most households are familiar with. Natalia was a girl from Ukraine who was adopted by Kristene and Micheal Barnett back in 2010. Natalia has a special form of dwarfism which led to several complications with her spine and hip. The Barnetts adopted Natalia from an adoption center called “Gateway Woods” which specialized in international adoptions. After bringing Natalia home she started to show signs of aggression towards Kristene and her three other children. It is shown in the Hulu series “Good American Family.” that Natalia would cut her brother’s toys, steal knives from the kitchen drawers and even leave thumbtacks on the ground for an unsuspecting family member to step on. Natalia was very attached to Micheal (her adoptive father), after Micheal lost his job in 2010 he spent all of his days caring for Natalia and watching her. Natalia would say and do certain things that bothered Kristene leaving a wedge between Kristene and Michaels relationship.
Allegedly one day, Kristene entered Natalia’s room to put laundry away, as she opened the closet door and saw socks covered in blood on the floor. This led Kristene to believe that Natalia was hiding her menstrual cycle. Another big sign that Kristene saw was Natalia had all of her adult teeth and a fully grown skull. Kristene started to believe that the little girl she had adopted was not so little after all. Kirstene filed for Natalia’s birth certificate and other private information online, when they were sent, she realized the picture on the birth certificate picture looked nothing like her adopted daughter. After about a year and a half of trying to convince her husband that their child was lying about her age, Micheal finally gave in to Kristene and in 2012 they officially passed a petition to change her birth year from 2003 to 1989. Now that Natalia had been deemed by the court as 22, The Barnetts had Natalia moved into her own apartment before they themselves took the rest of their family and fled to Canada. The Barnetts were later arrested on six counts of child neglect.
The documentary then switches perspectives from the Barnetts to Nalalia. It is shown that Natalia confides in a woman she meets on the street and the woman ends up taking her in as one of her own children. They show her bloody socks that were first believed to be used as pads were from her blistered, cut open foot. Natalia has starred in her own netflix documentary called “The curious case of Natalia Grace.” Where a DNA test proves that she was truly 8 when they moved her into her own apartment. Natalia wishes with this new Netflix Documentary that all the rumors will be put to an end and she can start her life again with a clean slate. Overall the Hulu documentary does a good job showing both the Barnetts and Natalia’s point of view but, we’ll never truly be sure what happened behind closed doors.