TW: Child abuse - Not sure whether I should look into this more or not.

[Newnameforthissubject]

Hi all. I’ve posted here before under different usernames about my childhood and my upbringing and got a lot of good advice, thank you all for that. I’ve recently learned something else that may or may not be true, but is significant and I honestly don’t know what to do with this information.

Im going to try and ‘nutshell’ this -

my mum was very young when she had me. She told me very often that she deliberately got pregnant with me so my dad would marry her and she could move out. Religious family background (her, not me) abortion was never an option, if you got pregnant you married the father and that was that. I was told, often, that my mum got pregnant intentionally so that my dad would marry her and she could leave her childhood home. That childhood home consisted of a lot of sexual abuse from her father, he regularly raped her and some of her siblings (not all of them)

Ive recently learned from an older relative that apparently my mum was already pregnant by her own father at the time and he made her marry my dad to cover his own tracks.

I’m at a complete loss tbh. I don’t know what to think, how to feel and I can’t stop throwing up.

Are all parties still alive OP? Do you speak to your "grandad"? Apologies, I haven't seen your other threads
I think you need to speak to you your mum. I wouldn't be able to just sit on this information

No, ‘grandad’ is dead and I am no longer in contact with my mum. This tracks completely with my childhood and how I was treated by my mum and dad and makes a lot of sense out of it. My mum hated me, resented me, had meltdowns on my birthday every year and my dad was basically there but untouchable for me. I have younger siblings and they had a ‘proper’ mum and dad.

I think that rather than speaking to the relatives, a conversation with the GP might be more pressing. If you aren't comfortable saying the specific allegations, saying that you've been told your parents might have been related, so you're concerned about it being a consanguinous relationship could get testing arranged. If it then shows a far closer relationship than cousins, you can go from there at least knowing the likelihood of this being the case.

So sorry op. I would look into incest support groups as this is quite niche.

I would leave it. Everything is second hand information.

As for your mum, if she was that young she would have had a child’s perception of things which combined with potential abuse and a controlling family put her in a situation most of us will be lucky enough to never understand.

I do have really good relationships with my husband and my own children. I have largely isolated from everyone else. I have a lot of MH issues but am diagnosed with adhd and autism which may account for some of that. I have a MH team and go to CBT weekly to combat some of the issues I already have. I am spiralling a bit at these latest disclosures.

I don’t want to go into too much detail but I was also abused by this man as a child and one further attempt was made when I was 19. I didn’t know any of the background at that point and I was told by my then partner that he’s probably senile and didn’t know what he was doing so I didn’t report it. I wish to god that I had. That fucker died without ever facing any of his crimes.

I don’t mean to sound obtuse, but do you honestly think that you could do that? This isn’t a small thing.

I'm so sorry OP, that must be unimaginably hard to deal with.

In the immediate term, is there anyone who can support you today like your husband / partner?

I would make a drs appointment first thing Monday - as another poster has said, I would raise concerns that your parents may have been closely related and you're worried about your health.

If you have a crisis number from your current therapy / counselling, can you call that today and give them similar information? They may be able to direct you to someone specialist who can help you work through this.

You really need specialist support for this, what a terrible thing to find out. I would want know the truth, you already suspect the worst so it’s not like you have any peace of mind by not knowing. There are a number of charities that can help you.

I’m not sure all the posters are understanding what you’re saying - if I’m right you’re now suspecting your maternal grandfather is also your biological father. Of course that’s a huge thing and no one would be able to just forget about it.

You need to establish the facts and thanks to DNA this should be fairly simple. I’d speak to your GP as previous posters suggested and in the meanwhile get help from your MH support team.

The main thing I guess to remember is that this won’t materially change your life either way. You already unfortunately know about the abuse in your family and you’ve done amazingly well to make your own happy family away from that horrible context. Yes if it’s true there will be a lot to work through emotionally, but you will be ok xx

He was the first person I told. He was as shocked as I am but doesn’t have any kind of experience to draw from to help me with this. I don’t think anyone I am close to does. It’s not exactly an everyday thing.

Are you in contact with your dad? Could you speak to him about this OP?

No I couldn't just put this aside either OP.

I'd be looking at testing to clear it up. This could just be a rumour and if that's the case you will save a lot of stress and worry finding out as soon as possible. If it is true the result will be difficult but possibly no more difficult than spending the rest of your life wondering.

Oh OP I'm so sorry thats a really tough one to go through. Is your Dad aware? Would he be willing to do a DNA test to put your mind at ease regarding this one thing? Do you speak to any of your siblings who may be willing to do a DNA test to see if you are full siblings or not to help you decide if you need to take it to the GP or not? If no to all of that approach your GP let them know that you've been told that your "grandad" is actually your biological father and some of the ways your parents treated you vs your siblings makes you believe there could be truth to it they should be able to sort a test to see how closely your biological parents are related I should think.

We have vague contact. We are not close. If I spoke to him and said I had some emotional stuff to talk about and work through, he wouldn’t respond. If I spoke to him and said I need some shelves put up he would come asap and do it as long as I make him a sandwich and a cup of tea. That’s the extent of our relationship.

What, she should just ignore it then?! Sweep it under the rug and not think about it? Pretend she never heard it?🤯

I would not leave this and I would look into dna testing. It’s the truth and you need to deal in truths and facts.
Then you will know.

whatever the reality of your conception, YOU have done nothing wrong. You are not diminished. Your life remains your own.