To think our mother knows more about our fathers than she let's on

[Whoarewe00]

NC.

I grew up in a single parent family. My mother (who is extraordinarily selfish) only ever gave vague details about my father and claimed to not know where he lived, what he did for a living, what other family he had. Whenever I mentioned wanting to know about him she'd get frustrated with me and say he was "cunning and crafty" and she doesn't know anything to tell me so I need to drop it.

When I was in my 20's I discovered, by complete chance, that I have an older brother who was given up for adoption at birth.

He, like me, wanted to know who his father was but our mother claimed she doesn't know anything about him and can't even remember his name. We know we don't share the same father as me and our mother are Caucasian but my brother is not.

At first she said she met his father when she was working at a certain place, then later changed her story completely as though she'd forgotten what she'd said, as she then said he worked somewhere completely different.

AIBU to think she is deliberately withholding information she must have, from the pair of us?

How realistic do you think it is that she got pregnant to two completely different men she knew nothing about?

Not necessarily.

Lots of full siblings look absolutely nothing alike.

It's also very useful for tracking down people who have fled domestic abuse or other very real threats.

Which is why it's a shitty thing to do.

@Whoarewe00
I think the 2nd cousin your brother matched with is on his Dad's side so no surprise she didn't know of your mother.
He should investigate this match further as it may lead to his father.

I've done a few things over the years to look for my father.

I called every local person in the yellow pages with the name I was given. I posted on a couple of Facebook groups related to the area. I put something on a site for people searching for family members which comes up at the top of Google results when you type in my name. I sent messages to people on Facebook with the name I was given.

Back when I had a better relationship with our mum I showed her a few of these people's Facebook profile pictures and asked could this person or that person be him. She said "yeah it might be" about two completely different people.

One of the men I came across never replied to my message (the rest did) so I, perhaps selfishly, sent a message to his brother (linked on his profile) and asked whether his brother might be the person I was looking for. It turned out that the man who didn't respond had actually died, unbeknownst to me, and then his poor family were getting messages like that.

His brother was very kind about it all and managed to eliminate him from the pool of possibilities.

Our mum will never understand the problems something like this can cause, not only to us but to other people who get caught up in the cross fire as we go searching with such limited information.

Ancestry DNA is absolutely the way ahead I think. You can also upload the ancestry dna results to other genealogy platforms such as 23andMe to get a wider database to draw on

If you join some of the DNA detective Facebook groups there are lots of people who are willing to help untangle your results and they are very aware that it doesn't always end in happy family reunions.

Lol - how old do you think OP is!!!!

The most recent census published is 1921

Nothing alike, sure, but people who are half indian generally look it!

Because you aren't supposed to be able to have all that info on living people.

There will be a birth certificate somewhere, and he could get a copy of it from the GRO /via post adoption support However if your mother never named the father, that info won't be on there. But there will be an address of where he was born etc and it's possible they may still have records (though again, if your mother's lips were sealed there may still be nothing on the father )

Not always, no. I even know a blonde haired green eyed half Indian, and vice versa a pale Indian mum who had a very dark skinned.son.

Good luck with the search OP, I hope you both have success whatever you find. It could be worthwhile for your brother to look up possible school friends from her original area, they may have stayed in touch until she moved. The second cousin may also be able to help if she knows anyone in the family who lived in that town, it really depends how big her family is whether that's possible or not. For you the DNA test seems like a logical next step.

OP your grandparents would have moved away to hide the shame of their unmarried daughter being pregnant. From the neighbours and locals probably. I know someone who had a baby out of wedlock who was born in the early 1990s who was sent away so the neighbours wouldn’t know. After the baby was born, she was immediately put up for adoption. It sounds incredible now but I imagine it still happens to this day.

Is your brother older or younger ? Your grandparents would likely not have been supportive of your mother and two ‘scandalous’ pregnancies.

Have you returned to where your mother lived at the time? Do you look like her? If you ask around to find somebody involved in the local community eg church warden - you may be able to find out some information?

I watched an episode of LLF recently where the mother had two children outside marriage. She then married, converted faith and had another family. It didn’t appear to end well. The children who were searching for her found her but she seemed disinterested and perhaps not in her right mind. At the end of the programme they still hadn’t visited her. But they found each other and were happy that way at least.

I knew two full brothers who were mixed race, Caucasian dad and Indian mum. Older brother looked very Caucasian and younger one looked very Indian.

Definitely think joining “local “ fb groups to where your mum used to live and posting any names you’ve been given of a potential father is the way to go.

years ago there was a similar thread on here an the poster had been trying to trace her dad for years after not seeing him since she was a toddler. She mentioned the area which was very close to me and I helped suggest some Facebook grouos/pages, she’d found him 12 hours later. She did have a definite name though.

I think your mother has deliberately given you a false name because she doesn't want you to find out who your father is. So I would discount using anything she tells you to search.

Would there be any family friends that might know something that you could reach out to?

Doing an ancestry DNA test is probably your best bet of finding out anything.

I would certainly do the Ancestry DNA test. I did the test that my late mum had bought and never got round to using. Turns out a lady I had worked with for 15 years was a second cousin!
I am also classed as an adopted child but my late mum was my actual birth mother. Back in 1974 when she married my step dad, in order for him to adopt me I was put up for adoption they adopted me as a married couple! I only have a adoption certificate.
Reminds me to go and see if I have any more relatives ……

Have you tried asking on those local Facebook groups for people who knew your mother, rather than your possible father? How old was she when she had your brother? It sounds like her parents upped sticks to avoid judgement of an unmarried daughter being pregnant.

It's possible either her old friends / neighbours / acquaintances remember her being close to someone around the relevant time.

I've spent some time on ancestry this evening updating my tree and reviewing some hints. I'm definitely going to take the DNA test. There is a lady on the previous page who is going to help me to unpick it all once I have the results.

My brother dug out his old adoption file today to see whether he'd missed anything, there's definitely no mention of his father's identity but something that did come up was that our mother had a termination in 1973 or thereabouts.

We think, as it looks that way, that mum was put under pressure by our grandparents (likely our grandfather) to have my brother adopted as soon as he was born and they relocated her during her pregnancy to keep it a secret from other relatives.

We've gone over some other stuff about the family that shows our mother was controlled quite alot.

So I'm now wondering whether she was strong armed into the termination aswell as whenever the topic of terminations came up, which it has over the years, she expressed being against it.

I feel that I'm probably only here where I am because she finally stood up for herself and said enough is enough.

I'm feeling quite sad for our mother tonight. It's no wonder she has her issues.

We're still wanting to know where we came from but I'm not going to push anything with her, she has suffered enough.

We have a similar issue in our family, one of my DM's sisters had two children "out of wedlock" in 1950s Ireland, Aunty B told her son who his father was but would never tell her daughter. My granny was progressive back then and just added the children to her own brood, which was akin to my father's experience as he found out when he was a teenager that his eldest sister was in fact his mother, it affected him for all of his life and marred his relationship with his own children.

As a group of cousins, we concurred that she probably did not know as she was quite wild growing up. My mother as the eldest, would often get a message from my granny to go and look for her and bring her home.

I know that this has been very challenging for my cousin over the years, but she does have a very big family (her DM was one of 12) who support her, yet I can understand her longing to know.