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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

AIBU to wonder why you would hide your child from your wife's family?!

66 replies

HeirOfSlytherin · 27/11/2021 18:33

This is honestly one of the most baffling things I've ever heard. I was quite incredulous when I found out
Just over a year ago my son (who is now 19) told me that his father's then girlfriend (now wife) family did not know he existed. Questioning further, he explained that his father had told him that he has never told her family about him. For 12 years!!!!
12 years they have been together... 12!!! Today she gave birth to their first child together. A sibling for my son.
How on earth are they going to explain my son away when his sibling starts to talk about him to her family?
I am still in disbelief. My son just took it in his stride. Has anyone else heard of someone hiding a stepchild from their family?
The only thing I can say in their defense is that she was 17 and my ex 26 (and my son 7) at the time they got together. But still....

OP posts:

Cheeseycheeseycheesecheese · 27/11/2021 18:37

Not unreasonable to wonder about at all.
It's very bizarre. Was he not at their wedding? I'd be asking ex how do you manage to keep a whole person a secret for that long?

EmergencyHydrangea · 27/11/2021 18:39

Does she have a good relationship with them?

Original poster

HeirOfSlytherin · 27/11/2021 18:39

No, they went abroad to get married. No family went according to my son.
I've never asked him. My son did mention it to him recently with regards to the baby and according to him, his dad said "I know, I'm on borrowed time" .

OP posts:

Hunderland · 27/11/2021 18:40

I know a couple where the man had had a son and didn't mention it to the new(er) wife - it broke their marriage up when she found out.

Original poster

HeirOfSlytherin · 27/11/2021 18:43

She has never been in a step mum role, probably because of the fact he is only 10 years older than him. I've never spoken to her. My DS has told me various things over the years. The first few years he didn't see her, even when they moved in together she would leave when he stayed (which by then was probably once every other week but only ever mid week). He said she doesn't speak much to him. Again to be fair, I don't speak that much to him either. He's a teenage boy with very different interests to me .

OP posts:

CagneyNYPD1 · 27/11/2021 18:44

I think you hit the nail on the head with the age situation. She was 17, he was 26. They probably didn't want her parents going apeshit over the fact that not only was he 26, but he was 26 with a child. 26 with big responsibilities. And once you start lying, you can't go back.

Did your ds not go to their wedding?

Toohardtofindaproperusername · 27/11/2021 18:45

borrowed time? thats an understatemetn .. your son may seem relaxed about it, but i can't imagine he felt it over the last x years. And if she was 17 when they met, she was only a child herself, which i guess is why he kept it secret...
i wouldn't be happy about that.. he is not a shameful secret .. he was a grown man with a son, and acted like a child. What a mess

BourbonScreams · 27/11/2021 18:49

Omg I thought you were saying the girlfriend didn't know about your son! Then I reread, it's still really weird. Not to mention how young she was when they got together... (not envy)

CagneyNYPD1 · 27/11/2021 18:51

X post.

Ah, so they kept him a secret and now it will eventually vlcone back to bite them on their backsides.

Or maybe not. Maybe they will just keep forgetting to tell her family. I wonder if he will pretend that this is the first time he has done the newborn baby phase, sleepless nights etc. Very, very strange indeed. Your poor son, having to put up with this crap.

Original poster

HeirOfSlytherin · 27/11/2021 18:55

Her mother died last year, never knowing he existed. His father's family are all complicit in keeping the secret for him too. I'm not sure if he keeps the two families separate, or what. I can only assume so given the wedding arrangements!

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KylieKoKo · 27/11/2021 18:56

That is very odd. I imagine that her family would probably have highly disapproved of her taking on a man's child at only 17 years old so I can see why, at that age, she might have decided to hide it. Then I guess it's hard to come clean.

Original poster

HeirOfSlytherin · 27/11/2021 18:57

I feel so mean posting this here, given she has literally given birth today. But it just keeps going round and round my head at how crazy the whole thing is. I think because I want my son to have a good relationship with his sibling, and have the worry that he will be kept at arms length. Maybe I should have not posted it right now .

OP posts:

HogDogKetchup · 27/11/2021 18:58

I know of a similar story. The woman’s parents wouldn’t have tolerated him had they known about his divorce and children. The woman vacates the marital home EOWend.

shampooing · 27/11/2021 18:58

Your ex sounds vile, that's a disgusting way to treat his child, and he was also pretty disgusting to get with a 17 year old. Grim.

If your son goes on to have his own children this could hit him quite hard when realisation dawns that his own father denied his existence.

Original poster

HeirOfSlytherin · 27/11/2021 19:02

Believe it or not, he seems to have a pretty decent relationship with his dad! Not sure how... but there you go!

OP posts:

KylieKoKo · 27/11/2021 19:17

@shampooing

Your ex sounds vile, that's a disgusting way to treat his child, and he was also pretty disgusting to get with a 17 year old. Grim.

If your son goes on to have his own children this could hit him quite hard when realisation dawns that his own father denied his existence.

To be fair technically the boy isn't anything to do with the wife's family. Maybe your son doesn't care because they are nothing to him. My dsds aren't particularly bothered about my family. Why would they be?

Hereticetta · 27/11/2021 19:20

Your ex sounds like a bit of a creep, to be honest. 17 yr old girlfriend + hiding his own child = not one of the good guys.

Jibberjabberhutt · 27/11/2021 19:23

Eww, so he hooked up with a girl who wasn’t even old enough to vote or drink, having left his former partner and seven year old son?

Original poster

HeirOfSlytherin · 27/11/2021 19:25

My ex isn't particularly bad to be honest, I wouldn't say he was a bad person. I don't dislike him, we just grew apart with little in common, given I was 16 and him 18 when we started dating.
I don't know who started the lie obviously, but I suspect she wanted it secret and he went along with it, foolishly.

OP posts:

AnneElliott · 27/11/2021 19:25

I can see why her parents might have been even more against him knowing he had a child as well as being significantly older. But completely madness to try and keep it from them!

JosephineDeBeauharnais · 27/11/2021 19:28

My ex hid the existence of our DS from his DD by his second wife until that DD was 26 and DS was 21. She was only told then because another family member said that if he didn’t tell her, they would.
He also hid the fact of his marriage to me from his employer while we were still married. That came out because I called him at work to try to force progress with the divorce, his colleague answered the phone and was literally dumbstruck when I said who I was.
Bizarre.

Ozanj · 27/11/2021 19:28

It’s because they are scum. Soon when your DS starts his own family he’ll realise it too & then your ex and his wife won’t be involved at all. Poor boy.

JosephineDeBeauharnais · 27/11/2021 19:28

Typo - the DD was 16 and DS 21.

DriftingBlue · 27/11/2021 19:34

I can certainly understand why he hid his son. He was already in an inappropriate, possibly predatory relationship with a 17 year old girl. Her parents would have already been furious. Add a child to the mix and they likely would have found a way to intervene to protect their daughter.

Mumoftwoinprimary · 27/11/2021 19:47

Did the family know his true age? I suspect he also said he was 21 / 22 rather than 26. (And a 7 year old would be hard to explain if you are 21.)

I know someone who started going out with a 17 / 18 year old when he was 22/23. He told her he was 20 and came up with a complicated lie about being moved up a year at school and being the school year below all his friends.

The really daft thing was that they had loads of mutual friends who all knew exactly how old he was (we all played a sport together at fairly high level and had grown up together and so knew each other’s DOBs at it impacted which age group you competed in). The girlfriend played the sport but only socially. We kept telling her and she wouldn’t believe us!

They have been married for years now so presumably he admitted it at some point. Or maybe not…..

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