AIBU to even consider finding out if I have a whole other family out there?! ...

[wellwhatdoyaknow]

So basically just after some opinions, mum and dad split when I was little (he did the dirty on her) we moved and after a few years she remarried to my dad now (who adopted me with my birth fathers permission) and i never saw him again, I do believe he has more children something in back of mind says he had one before he left completely.

Now I love my family to bits and am an adult with 2 of my own children and I often wonder whether I should try to get in contact or not, Not so much for the birth Father but maybe to see if I do have any more brothers or sisters out there..

I am in 2 minds part of me thinks I am being unreasonable because I have the love of a good family so why would I want to ruin that with what could be nothing and maybe even rejection but then there is a part of me that just thinks can I go the rest of my life not knowing?!

Thanks in advance for taking time to read

Of course not bu, as you said - prepare to be dissaspointed and hope for the best....who knows there may be just one - desperate for a sibling!

Thank you for your reply, I guess the fear of rejection is whats stopping me, also no idea where I would start to find someone. I also worry that if there were siblings and they didn't know how that would work out as well.
A lot to think about!!

If you can afford to pay for a PI or similar, to find out everything from a distance then do, then you can decide how to treat this information, it doesn't have to be very expensive but doing this way safe guards your identity and when/if you decide to start making contact it's on your terms. Good luck, very exciting times for you x

You could start a search using Birth, Marriages & Deaths information on your birth father. Depending on how common his name is you might be able to find out very quickly if he remarried, and if so be able to find siblings.

Its not hard to do, and would cost a lot less than hiring a PI at this stage and you wouldn't be putting yourself in contact with anyone. If you found anything you could make a decision from there.

Its still a pretty big can of worms to open though. Not just for you, but also for any siblings you had - you'd be making the decision for them.

Thank you, will look into it, I just don't think I could go the rest of my life not knowing but then I am not sure I am brave enough to do anything so will have to look into properly. Thank you for your help

I believe the salvation army are supposed to be very good at this sort of thing.

finding people and then talking to them first, so that you don't go in 'cold' as it were.

I got in contact with my father who I hadn't seen since I was a small child last year. There is a thread on here about it somewhere but I don't know how to search/ link to it sorry. It had been on my mind for years - something I always wanted to do but never had the courage for. Then, like you said, after I had children of my own I started to think about it more and more.

I used these people who were very good - www.findermonkey.co.uk/ and not too expensive. I paid about £50 but you only pay if they can find the person - they'll give you an address, telephone number and, if possible, a mobile number. You do need some details - full name, year of birth - just the basics. The person you are looking for won't know they have been searched for, so you it doesn't commit you to anything.

I wrote to my father - a very short letter just saying that I had been thinking for a long time of contacting him and that if he would like to meet up then I would be receptive to that. He didn't reply - that was the hardest thing to deal with as I had been so sure that he MUST have spent as long thinking about me as I had done thinking about him. It was a very difficult time. But, spurred on by my husband, later in the year when I was in the area where I now know he lives I contacted him again - this time by telephone - and arranged to meet him for a coffee.

The meeting was fine - he was nice enough but there was no "spark" between us. If anything I felt quite sorry for him. He said that he'd like to stay in touch, but I have heard nothing from him since. I feel fine about it though - I feel that I have the "closure" that I wanted. Funnily enough I think about him much less now that I have met him.

It's such a personal decision - I don't think anyone who hasn't been in the same stiuation can really understand what it's like. For me taking the plunge and getting in contact has been a positive thing - not in the way I might have imagined when I pictured it beforehand but it has definitely helped me lay some ghosts to rest.

Good luck with whatever you decide....feel free to message me if you want to know anything else.

Please be careful. I had a phone call out of the blue to tell me I had two older half-brothers (my Dad is dead). They had found out via the Salvation Army that he had died and then found me via the phone book (fairly unusual name here). It caused me quite a lot of upset and they were too full on so now we have no contact. Had they been a little more sensitive and accepted that they were strangers to me at first, it may have been possible to have had some kind of relationship.

If you want to do it, you should, but just appreciate that the people you find might be completely oblivious to your existence and haven't had the time to get used to the idea like you have.

The Salvation Army charge.

Everything is online now, it's really quite simple if you go through Ancestry or one of the other geneology sites, 192.com, electoral roles.

No one can hide these days.

Even if he had another family, you may find he didn't actually marry, and there are blank names on siblings birth certificates, so you might find him, but the rest won't be so easy to track down.

I would caution you though, like others have said - who you find may not live up to your expectations.

Again thank you for your input, really are some more things for me to think about.

Confused247, wow good to hear someone who been through similar things and although not the ending you wanted its good you are happy with the closure.

Its easy for me to just say to myself no I am not bothered but I guess it hurts if I being honest because I have children I wonder how anyone can have children and then just not think about them, care about them and everything else so i find myself wondering if he has tried looking for me or if he wondered about me etc etc...

I put it behind me a few years ago and stopped thinking about it as much but we had some family tragedy recently and I am thinking this could be why I am thinking about it so much.. and then I feel guilty for the family I have and how they would feel..

Maybe I just think way to much