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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

AIBU to want to know your Family secrets (light hearted) or not

188 replies

99pokerface · 01/04/2015 19:20

Four years ago we found out my uncle was not my grandads

Nana was having a op and was dosed up to the eye balls she very old any way and just kept repeating the baby's not his you know he looks nothing like him I was 4 months gone before we were wed

My uncle is the first and their has always been hushed coversations and dark clouds surrounding uncles birth
Tbh were all very dark looking and my uncle looks more mixed raced than black

OP posts:

sparechange · 02/04/2015 13:35

Not my family, but my ex always knew he was adopted, and his parents told him that after having 2 bio daughters, his dad wanted a son so they went to the local orphanage and adopted him.

He didn't ever really have much desire to trace his biological parents, and all he knew was that his mother was unmarried and very young so had to give him up.
His dad died when he was in his teens, and his last words were 'I'm so glad you are my son', so he always said it would have been disrespectful to his dad's memory to search for them.

Anyway, fast forward a few decades to his mum's funeral. He is thanking people for coming as they leave the wake when his godmother comes over, slightly drunk, gives him a huge hug and tells him that a day hasn't gone by without her thinking about him. Then adds 'because that is the role of a godmother'. Then comes back over an hour later, and confesses that she was actually his mum, and she was 15 and about to give him up for adoption when his parents offered to raise him instead, then gets really upset and leaves.

But, he was always slightly suspicious of how his parents knew this girl, and put two and two together with what his dad had said on deathbed and suspected his adopted dad was actually his biological dad. He started looking into it but cold feet and didn't. I am still to this dad curious as to whether his hunch was correct...

squizita · 02/04/2015 14:16

A male relative has a second family overseas. His uk family doesn't know but LOADS of the extended family do as he brings them to occasions sometimes! In the Facebook age I am amazed this is still a secret - one photo tag and some common sense ...

squizita · 02/04/2015 14:19

GreatAunt Another relative who was supposedly Mediterranean (to the racist neighbours in the 60s-80s) clearly wasn't. Not really a family secret, as we obviously knew.
Quite sad indictment of the times as they were...

StockingFullOfCoal · 02/04/2015 14:54

My Uncle is actually my bio Dad. He's a shitbag who had an affair with his brothers wife. My Dad stayed with my Mum for 6 years after that. My Mum is an abusive alcohol narc toxic bitch who I have been NC with for the better part of 12 years. I am incredibly close to my Dad, lived with him for a few years as a teenager. My mother blurted it out in a drunken rage in an attempt to damage my relationship with my Dad. I did some investigating and I'm 90% sure its right. She doesn't remember saying it. And it just made me think my Dad was a braver, stronger man than I'd ever realised. He has loved me like his own my whole life. When I mentioned it to him, he said he'd always known I'd find out one day and that if I wanted a DNA test he'd fully support me and that no matter what it said I'd always be his first born daughter. And thats pretty much why I've never bothered doing one. My Grandparents are wonderful and finding this out would kill them. So I stay quiet. But now I have a half brother who is a few weeks older than my eldest daughter. And I'm not allowed to say anything and I just have to snatch a few hours with him over Xmas.

SoonToBeMrsB · 02/04/2015 15:00

My gran had my mum's eldest brother at 18 and he was raised by my great granny. I found out a few years ago when I finally noticed that he called my granny and grandad by their first names - he was raised to believe that his mum was his sister.

Cariad007 · 02/04/2015 15:03

It's sad to see how common the "my sister turned out to be my mum" story is isn't it?

Sugarfreeriot · 02/04/2015 15:10

My sisters dp has a child from another relationship that nobody outside our initial family (mum, dad and siblings) knows about, she hid it from everyone because he cheated on her and got the other woman pregnant (and his it from my sister) and she didn't want my nan to know
My grandad isn't my grandad, he doesn't know and neither does his sister, my late father knew though.

Sugarfreeriot · 02/04/2015 15:11

Neither does his *

OneEyedWilly · 02/04/2015 15:11

My gran was engaged 4 times before my grandad. She died 4 years ago and he still doesn't know.

My mum had another child before my eldest sister was born but she and my gran arranged a private adoption and never saw or heard from the baby again. My mum admitted this to me in the throes of a psychotic episode. I don't even know if the baby was a boy or a girl. She went on to have 6 more kids with my dad so I still don't understand why she did it.

HalleLouja · 02/04/2015 15:11

My brother (in his mid twenties) has just found out that his dad (my ex Step dad) has another child he wasn't told about. His sister is nearly 4 and the same age as my DD. He hasn't talked to his dad is a few years but my other brother and I had seen ex-Step dad.

ConkerGame · 02/04/2015 15:11

My dad's cousin, who he was very close to, got married and had a son. She and her husband got divorced when their son was 18 and we sort of lost contact with her at that point. 5 years later we saw her again at her father's funeral and she brought a female companion along with her, who she introduced as her new partner! Apparently she'd always known she was gay but knew her father wouldn't approve so waited until he'd died to announce it to the family.

We had to pretend to my granny that it was an old school friend of her niece to prevent her having a heart attack and she still has no idea that they are more than just friends!

Sugarfreeriot · 02/04/2015 15:12

*his daughter
toddler kicked phone out of hand

Ketchuphidestheburntbits · 02/04/2015 15:26

My great grandfather was a bigamist. He had a wife and several children in his country of birth (not UK) then moved to a new country (on a different continent) where he married someone else and had more children without divorcing his first wife. The descendants of both wives are in regular contact and have travelled to meet up with each other several times.

sweetheart · 02/04/2015 15:27

My df was adopted by his aunt when he was born - he only found out his mother was in fact his aunt when he went for open heart surgery when he was 16 and got asked for a family history that couldn't be provided.

Also my aunt has several children, they all think they are proper siblings but most of the family know that the eldest child is actually only a half sibling.

1944girl · 02/04/2015 15:39

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

ScotsWhaHae · 02/04/2015 16:19

My grandfather worked as a groundkeeper in a house that's now a tourist attraction but was a family home (all earls, dukes etc).

Just before WW2 he was having a relationship of sorts with the daughter of the family. They were both around 19. She fell pregnant and the child was given up for adoption. Her pregnancy was kept secret and Grandfather had no say in what happened, he was quite upset by the thought of his child being adopted. He was prepared to do the right thing but he was the paid help, not worthy of the family.

Strangely enough he wasn't ostracised and went back to work for the family after the war but at that point the girl was married and living elsewhere.

NynaevesSister · 02/04/2015 16:33

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

WineIsFineAtNine · 02/04/2015 16:52

My mum's sister ran off to Iran shortly after the revolution (we're not Iranian nor Muslim) and married a seriously wealthy Iranian. She told family she was working as a waitress in Italy . We didn't hear from her for years, then in the early 1990s (I was about 15), she turned up at my Grandparent's house with 3 stunning half Iranian children and a lot of plastic surgery later! She still lives in Iran, is now a grandmother and never regrets leaving the UK. She visits the UK once a year and last year we all had a big holiday in Malta, where we met her husband and grandchildren. Weird how we didn't see her for years though.

My dad has a daughter living in Germany, from his affair when I was 7 years old.

geekymommy · 02/04/2015 17:05

My dad is 1/16 Cherokee (Native American). My parents didn't tell me this until just before I got married. It's possible that they could have been unable to marry in some states because of this (they got married in 1963, our Supreme Court ruled in 1967 that states can't ban interracial marriage). I find it rather amusing that they felt they had to keep this a secret (though I know times and attitudes have changed). I plan to tell DD and DS that they are part Cherokee as soon as they are old enough to understand and care (DD's 2.5, I'm 24 weeks pregnant with DS, so I don't think they care yet).

rallytog1 · 02/04/2015 17:32

My great grandad was a bigamist and had a whole other family. Everyone in my family knew about it except my grandad (his son), who went to his grave not knowing he had a whole load of half-siblings.

KitCat26 · 02/04/2015 17:40

A family member (older generation, now dead) killed a man in a road accident, then ran away abroad. He also attempted to rape his sister. Amongst other things. He was a thoroughly nasty piece of work. Champagne was opened when he died.

Redhead11 · 02/04/2015 18:48

My DM worked abroad for 3 years in the 50s and married an English guy in Persia (now Iran). He was killed a few months later and she returned to the UK pregnant and widowed. Turns out that the marriage never took place. I tried to trace it and despite knowing the town where the marriage supposedly took place, there was no record of it. I later heard that DM had 'married' this man and when he died, she discovered she was not the widow. She lied for the rest of her life about it. It wouldn't have bothered me if I had learned about it when i was a child. I would love to know more, but there it is.

DF's family is a bit strange. DM and his mother were friendly until DM and DF started going out. They married and his family didn't attend at all. When I was a kid, I was told his mother had died before i was born. It didn't occur to DF that i could read as i got older and saw I was 3 or 4 when she died. She had wanted nothing to do with me, and yet he told me, right up until his death, that she would have loved to have known me.

YouCanButImNot · 02/04/2015 19:43

MMeGuillotine.... Exactly the same for me too but I was 16 when the epic row happened and I found out!

MmeGuillotine · 02/04/2015 19:56

Didn't someone find out via a row in Eastenders once too?

'YOU'RE NOT MY MUVVA!'
'YES, I BLOODY WELL AM.'

In my case it was more 'YOU'RE NOT OURS ANYWAY. THAT'S YOUR MOTHER THERE AND SHE'S FUCKING WELCOME TO YOU.'

StockingFullOfCoal · 02/04/2015 20:01

Re: Eastenders - no idea, never watched it!

I was 12. She was hammered, as usual, and I was being a PITA, you know, because I'd not put my 4 younger siblings to bed yet, considering they were 10 7 and twins aged 2... So she just threw it out there.

My Grandmas Dads Mother - so her Grandma - lost her first husband and first baby to a disease (I cant remember which) and then her second husband - a police man - was murdered. She threw herself and her 3 boys into a river. Passersby got the boys out (the younger being my Grandmas Dad) but she died. Chucked in a paupers grave, such were the times.

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