Secret children

[Bloodyhellfirewhatdoido]

I’ve been dating a man for six months, it hasn’t been easy as he is very wary of being hurt and guarded.

I stupidly looked up his ex wife on social media who he married at only 18. It turns out she has two daughters now both late twenties ,one born a few months before they married and one conceived immediately afterwards. In the photos they are both his double. They both have his surname. The marriage broke down within a year and she left him for another man. I don’t think he is in touch with the daughters or has been involved in their upbringing.

I can’t say anything to him, it’s his past. I only looked at her Facebook because I wondered what sort of woman he fancied and instead a lot of things slotted into place about how he behaves towards me.

What are you asking?

On the face of it, he sounds hard work. I’m not personally interested in trying to coax someone along after a previous bad experience and I certainly wouldn’t be interested in someone who hadn’t mentioned children or hadn’t seen their children.

He possibly has children and you haven’t mentioned it?? Why are you even in this relationship if you can’t even ask him a simple question?

There is a good reason he is so guarded I am willing to bet.

Six months... .it should be easy.

I'd ask him outright "do you have children?"

If he lied I'd leave.

Hard work so early on? Forget it.

He has talked about the marriage and I know it devastated him as he was young and naive. He has three more children (young) who he is very involved with and to his credit is a wonderful involved father. But I know that the oldest woman is definitely his daughter (that was why he married) and as the second girl was conceived months after then getting married, it is likely he is her father too. I don’t think he would have walked away willingly from them, I know he left with nothing and his wife kept their house, belongings etc.

I don’t understand why he hasn’t mentioned them, I have no problem with the situation but would support him. It took four months before he told me he had even been married. It has made so much fall into place in terms of his trust issues.

I can’t say that I’ve looked her up, I genuinely only did it as I was curious as to his ‘type’. I double checked everything carefully including birth and marriage registers (I work in this area) to be sure I wasn’t jumping to conclusions. I’m assuming he’d be down as the father to th second child regardless because they were married when she was born. The first child was registered in her name turn re registered with his surname weeks later.

My head is spinning with it all. I’m thinking to say nothing for now. As it stood before I found all this out, I wasn’t sure if we’d have a future because of him being so difficult to read. I will bide my time for now.

OP - may I just say - looking up Exes from 20+ years ago to ‘get his type’ - sounds like a made up excuse.
And looking up birth certificates, checking and timing conception dates - is borderline stalkerish.
Is anyone did that to me and my children - i’d be gone in a second.

You’ve known him for 6mo.
You know about his younger children.
His history with other, grown up children - and when he was a different man - is his own to tell.
And not for your to dig up.

You seem like a person with potential controlling iasues. And certainly with no respect for personal space and privacy.

Stop checking on him and let the relationship develop in its normal pace.

I think you checked up on him because you knew there was more to it. And lo and behold!

I would not waste time with someone who made me the subject of his ‘trust issues’.

Sorry but I think it's perfectly understandable to check someone out online that you're dating. If more people did this in advance there would be fewer threads on here where people are negotiating their way around bombshells that have been dropped or finding out that they're the other woman, etc.!

Six months in... and it hasn't been easy? Don't know, then. Being with someone 'wary' of being hurt shouldn't translate as 'having a bloody miserable time walking on eggshells or trying to prise normal interaction out of a drama llama/twat/selfish arse' (delete as appropriate).

It may not be like that of course. But it is AMAZING how often on here you see twatty, selfish behaviour explained away as the man being 'afraid of being hurt again' 'so damaged by his previous relationships' etc.

No, sorry. Having those experiences doesn't stop you being a normal considerate kind person, or it shouldn't. A twat is a twat.

I'd back off I think.

My oldest child is from a relationship I stupidly got involved with at 18 - with a then-19 year old who was hideously abusive in all senses (I had to pay his supposed rent to his parents when I got my first job, because he was unemployed... he verbally abused me, telling me that I was "thick" purely because I hadn't taken a language for GCSE... he was physically and sexually abusive...). I literally ran from him, two months before I discovered that I was pregnant with my daughter - who considers my ex as her father, seeing as she's known him her entire life. Her biological father has never been involved in her life.

However, I do know that he's now married with three other children.

I know this because his wife and her sister did to me, and my daughter, exactly what you have done to your partner's ex-wife and daughters. My daughter - who knows a little of what went on - and I have both been left feeling absolutely violated. It feels, for me, as though he stepped into the life I have sacrificed and striven to build for my daughter and myself, and... chipped away at its foundations in some way. Even though, to the best of my knowledge, he knew nothing about his wife and sister-in-law's actions. For my daughter to discover that she has younger half-siblings, other than her adored little brother...? Almost crippled her. She still asks, from time to time, if they're all being abused, too, and maybe that's why they sought us out on social media.

I don't think that they are. I hope that they're not. I hope that he changed, that he grew up, that he realised why I ran and why he wasn't allowed within a 10 foot radius of my precious baby. He tormented me throughout the pregnancy, and then his mother made the first few months of my daughter's life an absolute misery. My daughter had a relationship with her biologically paternal grandparents for a few years until she (my daughter) also chose to run from them. I don't, to this day, know why. She claims not to, either, but as she has MH issues which no one understands the trigger for... perhaps they did something to her. They stalked her relentlessly through college, which didn't help.

Leave this well-alone. But be aware that there will be a reason as to why your partner doesn't have a relationship with his oldest daughters. And you might not like to actually discover what that reason is...

I would end it for a number of reasons.
You have only been together six months , this isn't a relationship, this is early dating and if you already have problems because of his issues then he has no business becoming involved until they are sorted.

You sound like he has blamed his being guarded on his relationship with this women but from the times you stated this ended over 19 years ago, if he hasn't dealt with his feelings over that all this time later he isn't going to. That's wallowing in self pity in my book.

Caring and being involved with his most recent 3 children doesn't make him a great father, he has two children he doesn't see and doessnt/hasn't contributed to, I have no interest in men who walk away from their children using the breakdown of a relationship as a reason.

Thirdly he's happy to talk about very personal things to him such as his past hurt over failed marriages but decided to omit the existence of 2 of his children, I would wonder why that is, but in any case it honest IMO.

Finally, for whatever reason you decided to investigate him online. I get that it's proactive to check out certain aspects of their lives online. But to me actively looking up way way old ex's screams insecurities or gut instincts that something isn't right. This coupled with the fact that you can't talk to him about it doesn't scream open and adult relationship.

In any case it ISNT honest is what I meant.

Thank you. I looked up his ex wife because I was curious. I knew there was something in his past that didn't add up but couldn't put my finger on it. The first post was her and her daughters celebrating a particular birthday, that's when it clicked that he had children looking at the ages. I haven't gone looking at certificates etc, just the simple registry to check surname and month/year born. Everything tied up.

I appreciate it is snooping. But I never expected to find two adult children omitted from his life and I wanted to be sure of my facts. I looked her up purely to see who he made a commitment to all those years ago as he is so commitment shy now. I would have no issue with him saying he became a father at a young age and didn't see the girls after the marriage broke up. I can't see a future if he feels it's OK to make two adult children disappear from his history.

Sorry, how do you know he got married because of the first pregnancy and that the second one was within months of the marriage if he hasn't told you this himself? And if he has told that that's why he got married then and what happened shortly afterwards, then he has told you he has children with his ex wife.

I’m guessing he married her because of the first pregnancy. He was only 18. He said he felt trapped into marriage and he didn’t think it through but has never mentioned a baby. He told me when they got married even down to the date of their wedding (Same date as my birthday which is how he causally brought it up). I’m thinking that he did what he thought was the right thing at the time and married her because she had his baby.That coupled with a second baby born ten months after the wedding makes it clear he is likely to be the father to both girls. They’re now in their late twenties.

He has told me a lot about the marriage and what happened to break them up but has never mentioned having two adult children.

OP - no matter how you try to explain to justify yourself - it won’t make you look any better.

20+ ago commitment has nothing to do with his commitments now.
And you trying to pretend to make any conclusions from that and apply them to his life today is deluded.

You simply have no right to intrude and investigate him this way. Only makes you appear unhinged, especially given that it’s only been 6mo.
And it’s not the same if you snooped to check that he wasn’t a criminal, etc.

You have no idea about what went on with those children and that relationship.

You don’t sound unhinged op.

I can only assume you know that the second daughter was born 10 months after the wedding day if you've also been snooping the children on social media in order to see their DOB. Not cool. Even if they are adults now, it's creepy to think that their estranged father's brand new girlfriend is looking at their lives online.

I wanted to give a more balanced response but I'm not actually too sure what you're asking. Personally I'd ask him face to face but that would mean admitting to your online stalking of his ex wife and children. It's possible you now know more about their current lives than he does! If neither of you can be honest I don't see much future for the relationship. Sorry OP.

Ah, fair enough, that also makes sense. Sorry for assuming otherwise.

Have you decided yet what you'll do about this? It's a big secret for him to keep from a long term partner but also not something you'd expect to discuss on a first date. You're somewhere in between the two. If he did tell you about his daughters, would you be able to believe that you now knew everything and that he didn't have any other secrets, given his careful, hard to read, demeanor?

Zesty, I do feel bad about reading up. I don’t think the relationship will progesss without some changes from him as he is very commitment phobic and has openly told me this. I’ve decided to say nothing for the time being. Either things will fizzle out and there will be no need to tell him or things will progress and at that point I will try to give him the opportunity to tell me about his daughters by asking about his marriage, early life etc. If he doesn’t tell me he has five children, not three at that stage, then i really don’t know what the answer is.

The answer is to finish it. Off this is how he is now be sure about one thong, there will be more secrets to come.
As I said I wouldn't go any further based on the fact he is only a father to 3 of his children rather than all five (let alone denying their existence) but after personal experiences that is one of my deal breakers not everyones.
Out of interest op if he's such a commitment phone because of what happened before/during/after his first marriage how does he explain getting married again and having another 3 children.