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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To wonder about Adult Adoptees

191 replies

JJ17 · 17/02/2011 22:49

Ok

Phew - whoever pulled it - thank you.

My "problem" is that my Dad is really shaken.

Yes, he had a shag, yes people have to take responsibilties for shags but she was adopted out and therefore my Dad did not know. The b-Mum did know and did not let Dad know.

OP posts:
cory · 17/02/2011 22:53

Well, it is not the daughter's fault, is it? And since you keep suggesting that there is nothing to be ashamed of in having had a shag as a young man- why is it so dreadful if people know? It is not as if he intentionally abandoned his daughter, he never knew of her existence. So why do you feel the need to cover this up? Would your mum be that shocked by the thought that he was not a virgin?

Original poster
JJ17 · 17/02/2011 22:56

No - it is not her fault. But my Mum was a virgin when they married and they were engaged for several years before they married cos Dad was in the Navy and refused to marry whilst he was in the Navy so to know that he had impregnated someone whilst they were engaged would be bad. This is all 55 years ago and different times.

OP posts:
Original poster
JJ17 · 17/02/2011 22:58

I know this is Dad's fault but he is old now and I now find myself wiping his mouth and washing grit out of his eyes so that he can continue to work (he likes it).

My parents are not up to this.

OP posts:
LaWeasel · 17/02/2011 22:59

It's bad anyway, he slept with someone else, and cheated on her.

No he didn't know about the child, but that child still deserves to be known, and your mum will find out the truth one day anyway.

LoopyLoopsHulaHoops · 17/02/2011 23:00

Tough. You make your bed.

Her feelings are more important than his, hers or yours in this. She is/was the child.

LoopyLoopsHulaHoops · 17/02/2011 23:01

Plus, she may well find out soon anyway, as colleagues know, and journalists may well come poking around too. Much better coming from him, I imagine.

Original poster
JJ17 · 17/02/2011 23:03

Difficult if she says no idea what youre talking about and so does he as adoption records are sealed.

OP posts:
cory · 17/02/2011 23:05

I was engaged to dh for 10 years before I was able to move to his country and marry him. I would be devastated to hear that he had engendered a child during that time. But I would be a damn sight more devastated to learn that there was a child, that this child had finally found out and contacted him, and that he had then rejected her.

Rhadegunde · 17/02/2011 23:07

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

grippingon · 17/02/2011 23:07

Hello JJ17, if you found out recently you were adopted having just lost your mother (I was reading the previous thread when it got pulled), wouldn't you contact your birth father? I would. And what you might see as harassment, is probably someone trying to grieve and grasping at the comfort that there is a living breathing parent who has emailed her back. That said, I can also understand you feel protective of your elderly parents, but this lady deserves compassion, imho, as do all adult adoptees - it wasn't their fault.

Original poster
JJ17 · 17/02/2011 23:08

My father is 78, his daughter is in her 50s, it was a different age. Think more of if it were your father than your partner.

OP posts:
LoopyLoopsHulaHoops · 17/02/2011 23:09

People were still human in the 1950s.

BoysAreLikeDogs · 17/02/2011 23:10

the ages are immaterial

you cannot blame the daughter for her existence, nor for wanting contact

LaWeasel · 17/02/2011 23:11

It was not a 'different age' people had affairs, and maybe they weren't publically acknowledged straight away but if they weren't the shit still came back and hit the fan.

CrispyCakeHead · 17/02/2011 23:12

I'm sure your mum isn't naive enough to think that there is absolutely no truth in the rumour of a "girl in every port"?

and if the first contact was made as noted on the other thread, and work colleagues know, then it's surely only a matter of time before your mum finds out (and surely contacting him as she does is completely against her request for secrecy?)

I'm sure you're only trying to protect your mum, but surely it's better for her to find out now, from your Dad, than to hear gossip from your employees and have to confront him to get at the truth?

Original poster
JJ17 · 17/02/2011 23:13

grippingon - I have the utmost compassion for her, I really do. She said that her life was pulled apart and that she wished she could "put the genie back in the bottle". She was devastated to learn that she was adopted and she is a nice woman.

I shouldn't have used the word "harrassment" that was a mistake. But she just didn't take any care in announcing herself, bearing in mind that she was adopted and my Dad knew nothing of her existence.

He shakes a lot anyway but was tearful and extra shaky all week and that made me angry because I want to protect him.

OP posts:
cory · 17/02/2011 23:13

JJ17, my mother would judge as I do- and she was 78 on her last birthday. Shocked if she found out my father had been unfaithful, devastated if she found he had rejected his own offspring. And my MIL would judge the same- she's 84.

sayithowitis · 17/02/2011 23:14

Regardless of your Dad's state of health now, he is still the person who cheated on your mother whilst engaged to her. It does not matter whether he knew about the child that resulted from his casual fling, he still put himself in a position that made it possible. His child did not choose to be the result of such a casual and presumably meanwhiles affair and whilst she may have been somewhat clumsy in her approach, she is entitled to try to find out about her biological parents and yes, even to contact them if she so wishes. Given the situation you described previously, I suspect it took a lot of courage on her part, after all, she has/had no way of knowing that any of you would respect her wishes for privacy, did she? I cannot begin to imagine how it must feel, to discover that you are adopted at her age. Everything she believed about her family has been swept away. And, she doesn't even have the consolation of knowing that she was the result of a teenage romance or that she was a wanted baby. Given the age, I am sure it must have crossed her mind that not only was she the result of a 'quick shag', but also, that she probably was not wanted at all and in more recent times may well have been aborted.
Just as a matter of interest, how did she track your father down? His name was clearly not on her birth certificate. I also find it hard to imagine that someone in her position had never had cause to need her birth certificate, how did she not know she was adopted earlier?

LoopyLoopsHulaHoops · 17/02/2011 23:15

Your sister is the one who needs your sympathy and support in this, and your mother too.

Of course he was upset. HE was shocked and upset because many years ago he made a mistake that he has to face now. You can't protect him from his own mistakes.

Dylthan · 17/02/2011 23:15

This still makes me really sad.

Does your dad really want nothing to do with her or is it more that he is frightened of your mother finding out?

MummieHunnie · 17/02/2011 23:15

She probably wanted to be accepted and not to be denied. poor d/12s.

scotsgirl23 · 17/02/2011 23:16

Maybe she thought that emailing was private, and that it would be gentler than say a face to face approach? It could well be that she just typed an email and hit send before she had a chance to talk herself out of it?

I can understand that this must be horrible for your dad to face, but she will be struggling to come to terms with this and whilst your dad is old it isn't fair to simply expect her to forget about this.

MummieHunnie · 17/02/2011 23:18

OP, why did you mention things about her on a public forum? Was it to get revenge on her for 10 people at your dad's work having access to emails, that she had no clue they would have access to? to get revenge on her?

Rhadegunde · 17/02/2011 23:18

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

grippingon · 17/02/2011 23:19

JJ17 I feel for you in the middle of this, we can all I am sure understand feeling protective of elderly parents, and it must be a hell of a headfuck for him to find out now, over 50 years on that he has another daughter, I do get it. (Ed Miliband stylee).. Maybe you should leave your parents to sort it out, and just be there to support your parents as they come to terms with this? It seems like your mum is likely to find out and there is a danger that the adopted lady will become the enemy in all this, when clearly she isn't, she's just trying to make sense of her life.

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