If you discovered your child was not your child....

[Orangejuicemarathoner]

How would it affect you as a mother?

I'm asking, because of the recent experience of a (male) cousin - just having been informed by his ex that he is not the biological father of his daughter.- confirmed by DNA

He is now expected to turn his back and walk away from the child he has thought was is own for 8 years.

He isn't going to do that, and is still fighting for joint custody.

I know it is so much more unlikely for a mother to be told that, but not completely impossible, particularly with the wrong egg/fertility treatment scenario

But I've always thought it would be upsetting, of course, and leave a lot of questions that needed answering, but would not fundamentally change anything in our relationship.

I would not love my child any less, they would still be the child I had loved and raised for years.

Surely most women would feel that, so why is the expectation different for men?

YANBU- finding out I am not the biological parent of my child would not change my love for them

YABU- finding out I am not the biological parent of my child would change my love for them

I would treat the child exactly the same and love them. I wouldn’t want to swap back if there had been a mistake made after birth and would have instead endeavoured to create a bond with my biological child and my child with their biological parents.

@steppemum
I had ivf. Having the wrong embryo implanted was my nightmare. Dd is deffo ours as she resembles both dh and me etc. She never left our sight, consequently no possibility to swap her.

@Oodles54
Your bil is vile. I’m not surprised you no longer talk to him. Poor girl.

There was an episode of SVU that dealt with this but from the biological Mother who's embryos had been used without permission in other women. Her daughter had died and it was a really heartbreaking episode.

Birthright (2004)

The investigation into the attempted kidnapping of a six-year-old girl uncovers a fertility doctor's scheme to steal embryos, and prompts a custody battle between the child's biological and birth mothers.

If anyone is interested.

@Pinkandwhitewafer

my cousin got with a girl in high school, they got pregnant in their late teens and had DD1. first grandchild, adored by everyone, all 4 grandparents heavily involved in raising her so cousin and his GF could finish their education. They got married, had decent careers, bought a house and then had DD2 & DD3 when they were late 20s. They split when the younger 2 were toddlers and cousins wife told the then-15 year old that my cousin wasnt even her real dad anyway. DD1 told my cousin. Turns out it was true. He fought in court to see the younger 2, won 50/50 split. Older daughter he just never sees anymore. Nobody mentions her. At his request his parents cut her off. Its like she never existed. I'm unsure what DD to him and if this is her choice (as he literally doesnt acknowledge her existence) but he will tell you he only has 2 children and refers to her as "Xs daughter". Very odd when he raised her and was a fantastic dad for 15 years.

That is a very sad story.

My auntie was swapped in the hospital but only for a few hours. When a baby was brought to my nanna to be fed she insisted it wasn't her baby. Staff told her she was confused etc. She was addament and walked off round the maternity home until she found the right baby! The other mother said she was totally relieved as she knew she had the wrong baby but no one would listen to her.

The South African case is actually a sad one as the more wealthy mother ended up with both of the sons and neither of the sons has much of a relationship with the other mother.

The case I found fascinating with this was Rebecca Chittum Conley & Callie Johnson where it was not found out until the girls were 3 or 4

I watched recently too and found it interesting (its not 60 mins long)

For me, I wouldn't want to give up the child I had raised. I would want to know my biological child.

@Standrewsschool

If think if my child was stopped at birth, I’d want to keep both children, the bio and non-bio child!

But so might the other parents !

It wouldn't make any difference to me. If DS was swapped at birth then of course I would feel something for the child I gave birth to, but it wouldn't make me love DS any less.

@Ozanj

UK law protects mothers who give birth. Even if they used the wrong egg for my son, because I gave birth to him I am considered his mother. Nobody can overturn this unless I decide to forgo my rights as a mother.

Where things get complicated is if the wrong sperm is used.

I didn't know that @Ozanj !

My ExH and I had to have icsi IVF.
Just after our Ds was born he got this notion that the clinic might have mixed up the embryos and he struggled to bond with DS (actually he was just struggling with the fact it was MF infertility).
In the end I told him to be quiet or arrange a DNA test. He didn't.
Ds is the spit of him, in every way.

I would happily have adopted. But I am very lucky to have given birth twice (though at some cost). However, if there had been a clinic mix up, I would still love them just as much. I'd need to know if 'my' genetic child was okay though... (if at all possible)

I’ve had IVF and the thought has crossed my mind. I read about an IVF embryo mix-up that happened few years ago in the UK, which resulted in a white woman (whose husband was also white), giving birth to black twins. It made me wonder if other embryo mix-ups have happened, but gone undetected.

I believe that in this case, both couples wanted to keep the twins, which I understand. If I found out my child wasn’t genetically mine, I’d definitely still want to keep her. She’s my baby and she sees me as her mummy.

If I found out that my genetic child was out there somewhere, I’d like to raise them too, but presumably the other family would also want both children! In that case, I’d want to keep DD in my care and see the other family regularly.

I remember reading a newspaper article about two girls that were swapped at birth- one set of parents wanted to swap back and the others didn’t. I always thought how utterly devastating that would be for the child that nobody wanted

Surely most women would feel that, so why is the expectation different for men?

Because men don't give birth, they aren't usually the primary carers, they haven't sacrificed in the same way, and they are far, far, far more likely to abandon their children when a relationship ends than women are. Men on the whole seem perfectly ok with seeing their kids EOW in a way that most women simply wouldn't dream of.

It is different for men, as a class*. Let's not pretend otherwise.

(* don't start a deluge of Not All Men, we all know that)

Tricky. If swapped at birth, I would want to know where my biological child was.

I think (as a mother) there are two stages to parenthood.

First is chemical and driven by hormones and an innate, animalistic desire to protect ones young.
Second is when you actually fall in love with your child. That is the real love you feel for them. It’s for this reason that I think adoptive parents can and do love their children just as much as natural parents (and sometimes more)

So far that reason, me finding out my son is not mine (impossible as I actually gave birth to him - but hypothetically) would not change how I feel about him.

So I’m not surprised your friend doesn’t want to walk away.

I suppose unless you're in that situation you can't really say for sure. Though as it stands I have an emotional bond with my daughter, not because she's my blood, but because we've grown together. I couldn't give that up. I also wouldn't expect the other parents to want to give up the child that they've raised. I would be curious and want to know that my biological child was okay though.

@PeppermintMocha

No children here so I can't really imagine. I'd guess I'd want to keep the one that I'd raised, much as I'd be saddened that I couldn't have my biological child.

But all those who say that they'd have to have both children - surely if you loved the child you raised and he had that bond with you, and you wouldn't think it would be in his best interest to go back to his biological parents, you would assume that your biological child was also equally attached to their new parents and it wouldn't be in their interest to come back to you. And if you really wanted the best for them, you would accept that they had to stay with the new family. I can totally see why someone would want both children, but at the same time, there's a sort of arrogance to it, that they think that they are better parents that either child would be better off with them.

Exactly. Though I'd want to know for sure the other child was ok. You never know they night have been orphaned or ended up in care or whatever !. If they were ok and happy I'd leave them where they were but try to keep the families in some sort of contact over the years .

I don't know how anyone could contemplate swapping or severing contact with a child they had raised but found out wasn't theirs. You'd be all that child knew as a mother/father! How traumatic for a child of any age to lose their parent in this way.

OP I think what your cousin's partner has done is awful. She's punishing your cousin at the expense of her own child, who loses the only dad they've ever known in the process.

No. In practical terms it's not fair to try to draw parallels between men and women in this situation.

A woman knows she has given birth to her child, so aside from very rare hospital mix up stories, which are tragic, this just wouldn't apply.

Every man knows there is a chance he may not be the father of a child his partner gives birth too.

It just isn't comparable.

@Standrewsschool

If think if my child was stopped at birth, I’d want to keep both children, the bio and non-bio child!

Even if your bio child had been raised from birth by a loving family? As someone adopted I can't understand why you'd want to take them away from the family they know who love them just as much as you love your children, with whom you share DNA.

@steppemum

There is a fmaily at my dd's primary school. The wrong embryo was implanted. They are very open about it. Their oldest son is not biologically theirs. I have no idea when they found, but certainly at birth as the boy is different ethnicity to rest of family.

I always wondered about the 'other' embryo. And the 'real' mother?
Non of my business, but bloody hell, what a lot to deal with.

Birth mother, not 'real' mother would be much better language to use. The whole 'real' wording is so harmful to children who are adopted as it others them and makes out their parents aren't as legitimately as loving and valid as those who share DNA with their children. I know you won't have meant it in a harmful or hurtful way but language is so important so I feel it's important to flag that.

@Pinkandwhitewafer

my cousin got with a girl in high school, they got pregnant in their late teens and had DD1. first grandchild, adored by everyone, all 4 grandparents heavily involved in raising her so cousin and his GF could finish their education. They got married, had decent careers, bought a house and then had DD2 & DD3 when they were late 20s. They split when the younger 2 were toddlers and cousins wife told the then-15 year old that my cousin wasnt even her real dad anyway. DD1 told my cousin. Turns out it was true. He fought in court to see the younger 2, won 50/50 split. Older daughter he just never sees anymore. Nobody mentions her. At his request his parents cut her off. Its like she never existed. I'm unsure what DD to him and if this is her choice (as he literally doesnt acknowledge her existence) but he will tell you he only has 2 children and refers to her as "Xs daughter". Very odd when he raised her and was a fantastic dad for 15 years.

I'm not sure I could ever look the same way at someone who did this to a 15 year old whom they raised and loved. It isn't even as if he could just exit her life and never be seen again - presumably she sees him picking up her siblings etc.

What the girlfriend/wife did in concealing the real father and then telling her 15 year old was awful but cutting her off ... and his parents cutting her off too.

In the hypothetical situation you propose, I think I'd like to know my biological child and have some kind of relationship with them, a bit like an open adoption or something. It would matter to me that they were doing well and that they knew who I was. But my love for my child has grown as I raised her, and is so enmeshed in our experiences rather than our biology: I am her person, her secure base, the framing of her whole world. That has nothing to do with biology. I owe it to her never to walk away from being her parent.

So in the situation OP describes, my god, it's not really even about the parents is it?! There's a child who's definition of 'dad' is that man. He is her father, he has fathered her for 8 years. As long as this isn't a drip feed and he's actually a terrible human being and parent, to sever that relationship is going to do an absolute number on the kid's mental health. It's an absolutely foul thing to even consider. The interests of the adults in this scenario definitely shouldn't take precedence, and this woman can't pick and choose when she wants her ex to be 'dad'. He either is or he isn't. And he is, and that's that.

My DC are 100% mine and there is literally zero chance they could be anyone else’s. So it’s not something I’d considered.

I think I would feel just the same. I don’t love them just because I gave birth to them, I love them as people.

But it’s impossible for my DC, thankfully.

My child is the child I raised.

Your male cousin needs to get a good solicitor and fight for his daughter. He is her father from her perspective and that is all that matters.

It is a curious mixture of genetics and bonding through care.

I remember reading a story about a woman who was convinced her child had been swapped at the hospital. It was not provable before DNA testing, but she kept in close touch with the other mother who did not know. Eventually, she was proved correct. I wish I could remember what the consequences were - it may not have been covered as I think it was more about the system where babies were kept in nurseries and brought back for feeding, and fathers were not at the birth. For mothers who had difficult births and surgery, bonding was difficult.

My mother said that she was given a baby boy one day, but knew it wasn't me

There's a Spanish swapped at birth story in the news at the moment. A 20 year old found out recently and is suing.