Secret half siblings?

[Wehttam]

Long story short, recently discovered my Dad was engaged before he met my mum years ago and that he had other children with his then fiancé. This was a story never told to me before so it came as quite a shock especially the idea of having half siblings elsewhere. My mum passed away recently so I’m unable to ask her any questions.

DS plans to ask Dad about it but I wanted to know if anyone else has experience in similar situations. I’m torn between wanting to know who they are or just carrying on my life without ever finding out. The story goes that dad was cut off from his first children by the ex fiancé. What I can not fathom is why we weren’t told. Thoughts? Would you go looking for them?

Oh, and I’m glad she found us, but I’d not have gone looking.
She’s a lovely woman, and we are blood related. But she’s not my sister. If that makes sense.

DH has a son from when he was 17. When DSS turned 13 and got Facebook he friended the 1st son. I wrote a big letter to the first son's mother and then DSS got a girlfriend and made no more contact. I really felt bad for the 1st son but I didn't really know what to do from there.

My DH's family are complicated. He has 2 half siblings on his Mums side that he has never met. He didn't find out about them until he was 18. He also found out that his brother was actually his nephew.
A couple of years ago he found out about another half brother on his dads side - from an affair he'd had.
He has no interest in meeting any of them btw.
I'm glad out family is simple - mum, dad and 3 full sibling kids.

I have a much older half sister from my father's first marriage I found out as a teen about both the marriage and the daughter.
I was too emotional as a teenager to deal with this and to meet her like she wanted. Now years later I have no interest tbh I have family I don't need more connections with strangers. I'm sure we'll meet at my father's funeral one day and that will be suitably awkward.
I don't have a number for her, I don't know if anyone but my father does or even if he's still in contact so I worry a bit about if he gets ill how we'd contact her.

fenellavelour is it because of the age difference? How does she get on with your parents now?

She gets on well with my parents, though it must be weird for her as her adoptive father was not a nice man (he’s dead now) and her upbringing was definitely not as nice as ours was, which must be a bitter pill to swallow.

I don’t feel that she’s truly a sister as I was in my 30s before I even knew she existed, my mum only told me when she got drunk one day, a couple of years before my sister got in touch. My entire identity all my life has been of the oldest child in a family of four, and I can’t shift that really. Yes, she’s biologically my sister, but she’s had a totally separate life for many years, and I don’t think either of us are wanting to create a full on sister relationship now.