Discovered half brothers

[trampus]

Would love some advice on this situation.
For some time I have been searching for my father. During my search I discovered that I have two half brothers. I know where they are and contacting them would be easy as they are both on facebook. I had contacted some people with the same name in the area that my father lived. Actually these were peole i suspected of knowing him, bt got no response.The question is should I contact them at all. I have agonsed over this for some time. I was on the cusp of contacting them although I had not managed to contact my father when I found that my father had died some years ago. He had died at the relatively young age of 53. He would have been 70 almost 71 now. Naturally, I wanted to know what he had died of in case it had implications for me or my children. I applied for his death certificate and found that he had committed suicide at his home. I was shocked by this and quite upset as I would never get the chance to meet him. As there is no opportunity of meeting my father I still wonder whether I should contact my half brothers. Of course they may not know of my existence and it could turn there lives upside down. I wouldn't want that. On the other hand they may know of me and would like to know of me. I think what is holding me back is the suicide. I would hate to drag up any bad feeling there may have been as a rwsult of the suicide. How I think about this changes on a day to day basis. One day I reslove to contact them, then I decide to leave well alone. For my self I would love to contact them, but I worry that it would be the last thing they would want. Any advice?

If I do decide to contact them what do you think would be the best approach?

First and foremost, I want to say how very sorry I am that you learned your father had taken his own life only after obtaining a copy of his death certificate as that was undoubtedly a most unwelcome and unexpected shock for you.

Should you decide to make contact with your half-siblings, I've come up with an alternative to the 'I'm the relative you may not have known you have' approach.

Do you share the same surname as your half-brothers? If so, and if your surname is now different to that of your half-siblings, you could make an oblique approach by asking one of them if they know of a 'your christian name/their surname' who you believe may be a relative of and see what response you get before you proceed further.

Alternatively, do you have a friend or other third party that you could entrust to make this enquiry for you?

Given that your father has been deceased for some 20 years I doubt that, even if they are currently unaware of your existence, news of you can in any way turn their lives upside down as it would seem that you are the product of a relationship that your father had back in the day and well before they were conceived.

It may be that one or both of them will be pleased to know as much as you do about their father's life before he met their mother(s) and they will welcome another addition to their biological family.

However, do be prepared for the fact that they may not want to know you or to have any communication with you. In this event, I hope you won't take it as personal rejection and will view it as their having unresolved issues to do with the circumstances of your father's unnatural and premature death.

If this should prove to be the case, simply pass on your contact details and let him/them know that you will always respond to any future communication from them.

There is another possible scenario wherein neither of your siblings are people that you would wish to know and, for this reason, I would suggest that you proceed with caution and don't go overboard if they appear to be wholly welcoming until such time as you are confident that you have more in common than a few pints of shared blood.

I fully understand your hesitancy but I believe that this is one of those occasions where you won't feel at wholly at peace until you've reached out to your half-siblings and, IMO, you have nothing to fear by doing so such a very long time after the death of your father.

I hope it goes well for you and that you'll come back with an update in due course.

Izzy - thank you so much for your response. Your idea of approach is something I hadn't thought of. I think that might be a way forward.
I don't hold any illusions of some wonderful reunion or emotional meeting. I don't know them and they don't know me, but I would like to know something of my fathers family and background. The eldest half brother is 4 yrs younger than me and the younger is 12 years younger than me, so would have been a teenager when he took his life.
To answer your question about names. I was adopted and now have a different name. My birth name is exactly the same as my fathers same first middle and a hyphenated surname. What is really peculiar is that the youngest half brother has exactly the same name also. There could be many reasons for that, but I do wonder. It will also make the my firstname/ their surname approach a little difficult to say the least.
I will let you know what happens.

I think izzy has given wonderfully appropriate advice here.

I am guessing you are male if you have the exact same name as your father and half brother, but if female (unisex name) you could always ask if they know of a female with that name. If you're male, you could ask if they know of someone several years older than them who shares this name.

Good luck.

I am reading this with interest as I have a very similar dilemma, although in my case my half brothers are not on facebook so far as I can see.

I was adopted and for many many years believed I was my birth mothers first child. I always wondered if she had gone on to have more children, but I was very shocked when I did a bit of reseach (unusual first and surnames so reasonably easy to trace up to a point), and discovered that I was actually her 3rd child.. and she had already had 2 sons from a marriage when she was 16.. she left that marriage and walked out on the husband to be with the man who was my biological father.. (it is all so Jeremy Kyle..).. who was married to someone else.. ..

I have no idea if those two older brothers have any idea that I was ever born, and I have sort of tried to find them but not done too much as I am a bit wary for all the reasons that Izzy has highlighted.

hi
I'm adopted too and found out that my birth father had died, relatively young at 60. What I did was contact his sister, my aunt, who was really thrilled to hear from me. I have 3 younger half-siblings. The oldest of these did know about me, as did my birthfather's widow, but the younger two didn't. My birthmother remembered that my bfather was close to his sister... I don't know if it would be possible for you to find out if he hadf any siblings?
So your youngest half-brother has the name you were given at birth?
My letter to my aunt said I was born 'birthname' at.... on... and my birthparents names are.... xxxx and yyyy'.
When I found my birthmother, some time ago now, social services acted as an intermediary. I gave them her name and address and they wrote to her. I don't know if they will still do this but it might be worth contact your local adoption team. Also Norcap is a good organisation.

FWIW I have been very low about my birthfather and the fact that I will never meet him. He often spoke about me but did not know how to go about contacting me. It has hit me more than I realised it would

Do update us

Spangle

There's a lot of it about!
Trampus,I could virtually have written your OP,3 years ago. I knew that my father had died,aged 56,many years ago,and that I possibly had half-siblings.
Like you,I didn't want to cause any upset so I put off tracing them (abroad) until,in a rash moment,I Googled the' unusual' surname,only to find hundreds of the same name in the country that my father emigrated to.
By some fluke,I emailed the first one on my list,and it turned out to be the right one. I just wrote that I was researching my family tree,as my opening line. My half-sister responded,and we took it from there.
I'm so glad that I took the plunge. I have two new sisters! It was incredibly emotional,and yes,it opened a necessary can of worms. My sisters knew nothing of my existence,but their Mother knew everything about my life. She unfortunately died soon after my sisters had broached the subject with her,but at least she had got a dark secret into the open,and was relieved that she had.
I see one of my sisters every time she comes to the UK,and there is a very natural connection. Ironically,until 6 months before I made contact with her,she was living 10 minutes away from me. So much wasted time.
From my experience,I'd say............take a chance!
Good luck

Ok guys I took the plunge. I have contacted one of the brothers. Obviously, I couldn't use the my name/their surname angle that Izzy suggested, because of the other brother having the same name, but it is a variation of a theme, without saying.. "Hey I'm the brother you never knew you had."
Watch this space.