Giving up parent responsibility and adoption

[Namechange909]

Long time poster on here so NC for this.

I am pregnant and I’m not 100% sure of the father. Quick backstory is myself and my long term partner split up I slept with someone else then got back together with long term partner and slept with him and this was over the course of say 2 weeks and I conceived over this time frame. In my heart of hearts I think my baby is the other guys.

Anyway, other guy hasn’t been in touch which I’m not upset about at all as my partner has said he will accept the child as his own and we will raise together. Not as simple as that realistically as I still need to speak to other guy to see how the land lies. Kind of hoping he doesn’t want to be there for the baby as he has his own life and a nearly grown up daughter, likes to have his weekends to himself either with his child or out in the pub and it’s been this way for him for many years so I’m hoping that he won’t want to start all over again with dirty nappies and night feeds. He also hasn’t told his own mother about the situation which I’m hoping is another arrow pointing to he doesn’t want to be there. I know this because my father is friends with his mum.

Anyway, been speaking to a friend who has said the best way to go around this is to ask him to sign over his parental responsibility and then have my partner adopt my baby then he can go on my baby’s birth certificate and everything will be above board, rather than just putting my partner on the certificate.

I’ve done some googling but I’m not quite sure on how to get the process started. Do I wait till the baby is here? Should I contact other guy now and advise of my intentions? Do I go straight to a solicitor and have a letter sent to other guy?

Also how do I go about my partner adopting my baby?

[jellycatspyjamas]

The simple answer is that he legally doesn’t have parental rights unless he registers the birth with you, getting a parental rights agreement with you or applying to court or unless you get married. So you could tell him about the child and not have his name on the birth certificate and he’d not have parental rights. You could technically register your partner as the father and he would have parental rights, which could end up in court if the other guy contested. I guess it depends on where that sits with you morally rather than legally?

[Ted27]

You can't do anything unless you establiish paternity.

At the moment you are guessing who the father is, and hoping that the man you think is the father won't want to be involved, so you can raise this child with the man you wish was the father.

You can't ask someone to just sign over parental responsibility if you aren't sure he is actually the parent. What if the other man does want to be involved with the child, if it is indeed him.

You owe it to both these men to establish patenity so that they can make decisions based on the facts.

More importantly, you owe it to the child, that paternity is without doubt, particularly if the child ends up being brought up by someone who is not their biological parent.

If you go on to you local authority website and look up step parent adoption that will explain the process. But its not as simple as you deciding thats what you want to happen.

[jellycatspyjamas]

@ted27 I somehow missed that she didn’t know who the father is - I just thought he didn’t know.

I agree with everything @ted27 said

[donquixotedelamancha]

You owe it to both these men to establish patenity so that they can make decisions based on the facts. More importantly, you owe it to the child, that paternity is without doubt

This. Once you have established the facts you can go from there. Speak to them about what they want to happen.

If this was over 2 weeks it really could be either of them. Please don't bury your head in the sand on this, you would be storing up trouble for yourself and being unfair on everyone.