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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Pale mixed race baby raising a few eyebrows......

189 replies

angelz · 05/10/2009 14:28

My ds was born 3 months ago and surprised us all by coming out extremly pale with straight red hair, despite having a black father.

I myself am VERY pale, so found it more amusing than shocking as I know how funny genetics can be.

But lately my partner has said that while he loves our ds he is finding it hard as he cannot see himself, or any of his family in ds.

He has even mentioned a paternity test, and while I know in his heart he knows how ridiculous this is, he says sometimes he can't digest what he sees before his eyes.

Has anyone else had similar experiences?.... will our ds darken, or is it really possible that a mixed race baby can stay this white? Even his little ears have a pinkish hue, and his eyelids are almost see through!

Personally I would never have thought it an issue, but can see why my partner may struggle a little with it, people already have given us a few funny looks when I introduce him as ds's father

OP posts:
PixiNanny · 09/10/2009 10:10

I'm mixed race, Half Iranian half English. My Mum is pale as anything whilst my Dad is dark (for an Iranian). Both my sisters are a good few shades darker than me whereas I inherited my mother's pale skin and burning tendencies pout

Original poster
angelz · 09/10/2009 10:50

Bumerlicioso - it is quite amazing how genetics work out. You never know though, another child could bring you a blued eyed ginger suprise :O)

OP posts:
totalmisfit · 09/10/2009 11:05

i just don't understand why you agreed to the paternity test. you know you were 100% faithful and so there's not a hope in hell your dp isn't the father. if it were me i would have kept banging on about this point till the cows came home. how insulting for you to have to go through this.

totalmisfit · 09/10/2009 11:07

and by having the test isn't it almost like admitting to the doubters that you were unfaithful even though you weren't iyswim? might cause you even more problems in the future as people can always turn around and say 'well if you'd known it was his, you wouldn't have had the test... no smoke without fire, yadayada..'

Original poster
angelz · 09/10/2009 11:09

Totalmisfit......I think in some ways it's because I have someone else to consider now - our little ds in completely innocent in all this and I decided that that is the over riding factor. DP would have believed me without test, but could he honestly say it would not affect how he bonds with son...... not so sure?

It is a messy situation, but one that needs to be resolved quickly before it affects our beautiful, very pale, little boy :O)

OP posts:
coolbeans · 09/10/2009 11:59

It is a difficult situation, but I do sympathise a little bit with your DH. It is ~strange~ when you have a child that looks completely different to you.

I'm black (not mixed race at all) and I've got a very blond, very blue eyed toddler with olive skin. He was even paler as a baby, but he still looks entirely white.

I don't give a flying toss now, and will put people straight without a second thought, BUT I can still remember that it actually used to hurt me when he was a baby and people would coo over him and just automatically assumed I was his nanny or childminder.

And people can be really rude too, lots of incredulous glances or intrusive questions about his parentage. Of course, people can be really sweet too, but it's hard to explain how it can affect you.

I'm sure your DH will adjust/accept - he probably already has, and I doubt the test is anything to do with you, per se, it may be more of a way to reconcile what he sees with who he is.

Ack, I'm not explaining it very well, sorry. I just don't think it's about you or your fidelity at all, despite what it looks like on the surface.

Original poster
angelz · 09/10/2009 12:07

No coolbeans, you articulated it perfectly. To be honest you brought a little tear to my eye because you are the only person I have heard from who has really experienced something similar to my dp.

And for a man I guess it is harder still, at least you knew in your heart toddler is yours, imagine if into the mix you had to cope with jibes about your partner's fidelity.

The further into this thread we get, the less hurt I feel and the more sympathy I have for my dp.

Have you seen in America they have a company that sells t-shirts that say 'I'm his mommy, not his nanny' - makes me realise this situation is much more common than I ever realised!

I just pray my little ds doesn't burn in the sun like I do! poor little thing :O)

OP posts:
Bumperlicioso · 09/10/2009 12:21

Also, to try and understand what the DP is feeling have no mothers ever had that fleeting thought in the early stages of WHAT IF THEY MIXED UP THE BABIES AND GAVE YOU THE WRONG ONE?! Maybe it was just me in my hormaonal state, but as someone else pointed out, as least mothers know who the father is, the father can never be that sure.

coolbeans · 09/10/2009 13:06

I just pray my little ds doesn't burn in the sun like I do! poor little thing :O)

Well, you might be in luck there. My ds may not have inherited my skin colour, but he has inherited my sun tolerance. Never burns and just turns the most perfect golden colour ever

Am tempted to get a T shirt, even now!

I'd put money on the fact that your DP didn't mean to hurt you or question you, irrespective of how it looks. Hope you can put it all behind you & just enjoy your little one.

StealthPolarBear · 09/10/2009 13:18

Actually I've rethought my previous post which was her DP should just tell the doubters to F off.
He may (and hopefully does) trust her 100%. But in saying that to other people (colleagues etc) they might be smiling and nodding and thinking "Mug", and he knows this. So the bit of paper is to prove to THEM that he is right and they are wrong.
Yes it shouldn't matter what they think but it would be quite hard to have everyone around you thinking you're a blind idiot.

twelveyeargap · 09/10/2009 13:25

My children aren't mixed race, but neither of them look AT ALL like me. I have been asked more than once if they are mine/ am I their nanny and so on. Sometimes it's a bit upsetting when your children don't look like you. If it was my husband they didn't take after, I'd be royally miffed if he wanted a paternity test, but that's another matter.

All I can imagine, is that your DP's sensibilities have taken a bit of a bashing with the ribbing about his baby not looking like him. Maybe he's not thinking straight. Hopefully after the test shows he really is the father, then he will relax a bit and learn to enjoy fatherhood. It's often difficult for men to bond with their babies, even if they DO look like them, so if you don't even feel a genetic link, maybe it's harder again. There is an evolutionary reason that children look more like their fathers at birth than their mothers. It's so that they will be accepted and what's happening with your DP is sort of proving mother nature/ evolution right iyswim. Men often do need the visual assurance of their children looking similar to them to accept them. There was an article in Nature magazine some time ago about it. NY Times article about it here.

Blu · 09/10/2009 13:25

What I don't get about these stupid people is that they may well, in other circumstances, be taunting someone who ISN'T the biological father of the child. A man who has decided that fatherood is more than genes, and has decided to be a real Dad to a child who may have been born from a previous partner or even infidelity.

Why do they think it is OK to do this? The issue is with their behaviour, not the target of their behaviour.

AvrilH · 09/10/2009 13:26

If my DH got a paternity test done I would be even more upset if he told everyone about it.

I think anger is the right response to anyone who is rude enough to pass remarks.

StealthPolarBear · 09/10/2009 13:27

yes Blu - good point
I think the answer is for him to open the results letter in front of the doubters - therefore proving his trust in the OP. Bit Jeremy Kyle though

Original poster
angelz · 09/10/2009 13:33

coolbean -

www.swirlsyndicate.com/About.html

OP posts:
bunjies · 09/10/2009 13:56

Indeed Blu - and what if the child is adopted? People can be so bloody rude FGS. It's none of their bloody business.

womma · 09/10/2009 14:04

My dh is mixed race and I have fair hair and green eyes - our daughter looks nothing like me, dark hair, olive skin, brown eyes.

I'd like to give your dp a clip round the ear and tell him to get a grip!

onagar · 09/10/2009 14:16

This probably won't help right now with DS being so young, but there is more to paternity than color. I looked nothing like the rest of my family in coloring, but later I realised that I had my dad's features in an unmistakable way (once you stopped looking at the color). Trouble is at that age he probably won't look like anyone yet and you need to sort it out now.

I don't know what I'd advise. I do think those saying it will make matters worse to agree to a test have a point. But can also see why you might want to try and put the matter to rest.

On the other hand none of my children were biologically mine. It made no difference to me and shouldn't to anyone IMO.

womma · 09/10/2009 14:21

Angelz - I should have read all the way through before posting.

I'm so sorry you and your partner are having such a rotten time over this, hopefully by agreeing to the DNA test his mind will be put at rest and you can move on.

We with the mixed race kids just have to live with the daft comments from other people -a girl in Mothercare on saturday told me that my DD wouldn't have to go on sunbeds when she was older, I told her that was why I'd had a baby with a black man, to save money on sunbeds...totally lost on her

chubbleigh · 09/10/2009 14:39

I live and work in an area with a very high proportion of children that are mixed race and one thing I can say is that you just cannot tell who is the parent of which child when they walk through the door to collect from nursery or school. Genetics is a sort of blind lottery with a winner every time. My DS is not at all like his dad in eyes/hair/skin but he really really has his temperament, so there is more than one way to be like your dad!

duchesse · 09/10/2009 16:08

at womma and the sunbeds

Original poster
angelz · 09/10/2009 17:27

It's funny - this thread started off with me feeling really lost and down and now I am actually really enjoying reading all the posts, it is actually a very positive trail through everyone's experiences :O) Thank you.

OP posts:
duchesse · 09/10/2009 17:34

good good angelz

CheerfulYank · 09/10/2009 18:21

at Womma's comment. Sunbeds are nasty anyway.

CheerfulYank · 09/10/2009 18:22

Erm, not at Womma's comment, at the person who said it.

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