An Undisclosed Child - WTAF?!!!!!!!

[MrsRichardDeVere]

I’ve NC to try not to out myself.

Been dating and starting a relationship with a man for 4 months. Met through online dating. Have taken things steadily and everything going well. Seemed honest, normal, self-deprecating, considerate and lots of other good things.

He said he’s been single since he & his ex split 6 years ago, with 2 boys he sees every 2nd weekend. Seems like a good dad, doing the usual, normal stuff you’d expect.

He’s on Linkedn but not other forms of social media, so I haven’t been able to do background digging. Anyhow found his ex-wife (after he said her first name rather than just referring to her as ‘the-ex’) and to my horror there are 3 kids, with a girl appearing in age between the boys. Definitely a sibling. I know ive got the right family, as I’ve seen plenty of photos of the boys.

I suspect this is curtains on our relationship, as this seems like a shocking omission to me, but can anyone throw any light on what the fuck might be going on?! I’m seeing him in a few days and will be asking him but could do with some MN insight.

fabulousfrumpyfeet

Gemini, I think he is not allowed access to his daughter

aahh christ sorry.. I never considered this ... thank you

I'm so sorry OP... credit to you for recognising something wasn't just right..

I’m sure I’m being dense, but I can’t begin to work out how he isn’t allowed to see one child, but is allowed to see the other two?

In reality - the OP - and everyone else on this sight still have no idea of what his story is.
Clearly - he isn’t a criminal or a danger to anyone given that he regularly sees his other two children.

Clearly - there is a complex story, and probably a sad one - involving a girl who - doesn’t see her father. It can be many things. But nothing that makes this man a danger.

For whatever his personal reasons may be (sadness, shame, unhappiness came to mind as options) - he hasn’t shared that part of his life with the new person he just started dating.
Maybe he wasn’t yet comfortable with the relationship yet, or could he anything.
And - good for him, I say.

Difficult personal stories can only be shared when the person is ready and trust is established.
That can’t be forced by a discovery and interrogation session.

By all means - do background checks - safeguarding, child abusers registry, criminal records - if you are so inclined.

But - this - wasn’t that. This was snooping, and an invasion of privacy, and jumping to conclusions, and, frankly - weirdness.
The fact that another man in another life cheated on you - doesn’t justify this.

That post turns the world on its head, MMmomDD. You have no grounds at all to say that 'nothing makes this man a danger' because you just don't know the full story. None of us do, including MrsRDV

As for not looking up someone's internet footprint if you're considering a relationship with them - trust in God but tie your camel up first.

If the damn police can't always detect conmen, then neither can normal people. You're a fool if you don't do some basic groundwork and worse, you're not taking reasonable precautions to ensure that any children you have are safe.

Invasion of someone's privacy? Come off it.
It was a public Facebook profile ffs.
She didn't break into her house and rake through her knicker drawer.
If people don't want other people looking at their stuff don't display it to the public.

For all the people.

While we have no idea about the person the OP was dating and what he did or didn't do, there are abusers that only target victims of one sex and of a specific age range, ethnicity or class.

This applies to muggers, con artists, sex offenders, burglars and many other patterns of criminality.

*By all means - do background checks - safeguarding, child abusers registry, criminal records - if you are so inclined.

But - this - wasn’t that. This was snooping, and an invasion of privacy, and jumping to conclusions, and, frankly - weirdness.
The fact that another man in another life cheated on you - doesn’t justify this*

What’s the difference between “background checks” -asking about protected data such as criminal records, and looking at open source data that is on the internet with the subjects permission?

If you put something on open source, or grant people access to stuff, then you have given your permission for it to be looked at.

You do realise that police and employers “background checks” include social media, don’t you?

You put it out there in the full knowledge anyone can look at it. If you think that invades your privacy, use your privacy settings.

There could be several reasons a little girl appears to be in the family pics but hasn't been mentioned and we don't know how many pics she is in or the period over which the photos are taken. For example, perhaps she's a cousin/neice who spends a lot of time with them for some reason. Maybe something awful has happened and she is no longer here but your boyfriend can't articulate that (something happening to a child often causes breakup). Her mum may have had her with another guy, the boyfriend decided to forgive and they had another kid but it just didn't work out. There's several reasons but please don't automatically think he is untrustworthy and worse.

Try reading the full thread perhaps BlueJava. The OP has updated.

So what did he admit then just that he doesnt see her now. Maybe when they split she just didnt want to leave her mum and see him anymore and so he left out mentioning her as it hurts him. I have seen many posts on here where one kid doesnt want to go to contact anymore. That seems more likely when he still sees the boys than abuse of any kind.

I agree. Any hint of abuse and that would surely impact access to his sons.

BlueJava..... after 311 posts.....RTFT!!!! 🤬🤬🤬

OP I hate to ask this but do you have any daughters? Has he met your daughters? I would be very concerned that this man has been grooming you with the intention of abusing your daughters. I have a friend who this happened to (although the man was childless) and her 8-year-old little girl was abused (he waited several years until he had moved in and had the trust of my friend and her children).

I would be contacting the police, I would want to know if he has been charged with anything. If he is on the sex offenders register, then he could be breaking the terms of his parole.

Oh dear, read all of the thread hoping for better news. I’m sorry. And yes, we are allowed to use all the tools at our disposal to protect ourselves in a new world of online dating. To sit there with eyes firmly shut clinging to old world etiquette and hoping everything is as they say they are and can and should be trusted as their word is their honour my gad... well, it’s going to leave you somewhat vulnerable.

I like the sharks cage concept, and think it has relevance here.

4 months is a bloody lifetime when you're dating! I was pregnant with our first child after 4 months - still happily married many years later!!

I don't understand this have the odd date, don't meet his family, don't meet his friends business. If you haven't met all of his significants after that length of time, he's either a. not that into you or b. hiding some shit!

But do you know what - I don't want to know. I just don't want to unravel that can of worms.
I whole heartedly agree with this, MrsRDV
Well done

Uum, 4 mths might be a lifetime for you @StarUtopia, some of us on the other hand choose to take our time a bit. Eg. It was a month before I'd even slept with my now DH (of 16yrs). Didn't meet his friends for ages either. And guess what, he was that into me, and wasn't hiding any big ol' skeletons. We don't all rush into things.

Why don't you understand that people do things differently??

OP, I'm sorry this worked out the way it did for you, but glad you found out before you were any further down the road.

In OLD 4 months is not a long time - you might only see each other once a week if you both have kids. And its very likely you wont have met any friends or family.

I hope you're okay OP. Turns out it was good you raised it with him - though its still rather mysterious why he failed to mention his daughter. Do you have any curiosity about why, or do you know and just dont want to say?

I totally understand you don't want to see him anymore - the omission and manufacture of stories that delete her is not okay and revealing of his character.

I just wanted to point out that sexual abuse doesn't necessarily mean the father will be prevented from having access to other siblings. It would usually be in a contact centre and supervised, unfortunately, judges are big on allowing the father to continue contact where possible. And really he has lied by omission which means that he could have been being flexible with the truth (lying through his teeth)

Your definitely right to ask, and I would have done the same- as in looking at Fb, I’m sure he’s had a look at yours, why wouldn’t someone want to know more. As for an explanation as to why he would lie, I don’t know. But I do think that if your right and he has lied, move on. It’s not a good start and you can do better.

Thank you for the constructive input. It has been so helpful.

I'm never going to know the full story about what happened with his daughter. I heard a brief outline of his version. I doubt I heard it all. He wouldn't be the first parent who'd been on the receiving end of false or exaggerated accusations but nor would he be the first parent who had crossed a line with one of their children. I'm never going to know exactly where on that continuum his actions sit.

For me, the deal breaker is the concealment and the perpetuation of what was a massive lie about how many children he had and the kind of person that he is. To omit an entire child and carefully and repeatedly whitewash them from all your stories about your past and then to omit the two year legal battle about access, suggests such a high level of deception to me, that I could never trust him again - even if he were completely innocent.

Totally agree Op - well done for being so strong & doing your research.