This is serious
 

K, here goes. This is the most personal I've gotten on a public forum. This question has been burning in me for some time now. You people are anonymous enough that I think it may be safe to ask this question.

I'm not really looking for answers, but input. Tell me what you think. I'll lay it all out tomorrow. This is just a tease I guess.

My youngest son might not be my son at all.

What to do?

Welcome

if you've treated him as your son, according to the state, he's your son, that's at least what the law states in NY.

As far as you are concerned, do you feel love diminish for your son thinking that he may not be your biological son?

Well, obviously this is a big deal for you. I imagine the option of loving him as if he were your own, working things out with his mother, and going on as if it never happened is off the table?

If it's that big a deal, then before you freak out, you should FIND out.

Is the concern mostly about how to deal with your son or how to deal with your (I'm guessing) wife?

Are you married to his mother?
Did she 'fess up to an affair? Or do you think he was switched at birth?
What are you going by to come to this?
How old is he?
The obvious answer would be get a paternity test, but the above factors may alter that answer.

Figure out if you really want to know for sure. Are you o.k. with getting either answer, if you get a test done? If finding out that he's not yours won't alter how you treat him, it may be better to live with uncertainty than risk getting an answer that you don't want.

There is much more to being a father than the blood in your veins.

Best of luck to you, no matter what.

*patiently waits for story

This is scary. I read a big article on this in mens Health a while ago. Here is the link if you would like to read it for yourself.

http://men.msn.com/articlemh.aspx?cp-documentid=4725722

Go on maury or montel- this type of thing makes for classy television.

-or-

If you love him like a son, treat him like one. Biological relationships don't have to be that important when it comes to being someone's parent.

If you don't love him like a son, at least treat him well.

Beyond that, shit, good luck. Dealing with corrupt baby's mommas (or daddies, if the shoe fits) can be pretty complicated, from what i've seen (though thankfully not with my own baby's momma) so it would be difficult to offer any sort of specific prescription. Be civil and assertive, and don't let pettiness come into play. Remember that people make mistakes and often deserve forgiveness, but also that people who can't own up to their mistakes or can't learn from them are very rarely "helpable".

To everyone that posts in this. It is not always that simple. Read the article that I linked to and you will understand.

What will the woman do, what if she leaves you and wants you to have nothing to do with the child and you get stuck with child support. Just read the article.

Love him like a son. Fuck genetics. If he thinks you are his dad, then you are his dad.

How do continue to live with a woman who has just proved herself untrustworthy? Who basically lies to you every day?

And whom the courts will award child support to if she leaves, and you've been acting as the father for (I think) two years or more?

And the biological father never pays a dime?

he is your son. i would keep treating him as if he were my "blood son" but have a talk with the lady and see if you could work something out.

i would feel betrayed tho..

If you can forgive your woman, you can forgive the child. If you can't forgive her then you might just as well pack up and leave.

"Cheating" is not something that goes away. It either continues or it lingers but it never goes away. Accept it and carry on or move out and start all over again wiser than you were.

There are standard reasons why you should pack up and leave but there are just as many standard reasons why you should stay. It's up to you how you deal with it but the most important thing is how your relationship is with your woman today - not yesterday.

That's probably the wisest rule to remember.

I see this as being an serious issue between you and the mother, and having nothing to do with the child (depending on how old the child is). You are and always will be the father of the child, no matter how you are related biologically. I hope you take that seriously.

My stepfather raised me as his own, and even after he and my mom split up, he is still my dad... and I'm in my late 20s. Nothing that happens to us will change that relationship, and that's how I think it should be. Genetics are overrated.

I reserve my advice for hearing the whole story

OK here's the whole story, and to ShaniFaye and others who waited for, big ups.

Years ago I walked in on my current ex wife and my sister's current ex husband in an embrace. I didn't really think anything of it, but I said to her that if I didn't know better, I'd think something was going on. I laid down for a nap, I'd just worked a bunch of hours and was to cook dinner before church.

Later, she woke me with tears in her eyes, bawling out her confession. She insisted that it was only a kiss and it only happened once. I countered that a kiss is the beginning of something, how am I to believe it was only a kiss? If you can cross that threshold, what's stopping going further?
I talked to my sister. She had married beneath her. Not that we were above anyone, he was just a weak, noncontributing, goofy bastard.
I ask my then wife, even if it was a kiss, why she did it. She said I didn't tell her she was pretty. Fact is she wasn't. Our only son was approaching a year now and her body was absolutely the same or larger as when we left the hospital. When I left for work she was in her bed clothes with her bed hair. When I came in from work she was in her bed clothes with her bed hair. She only got dressed when we would see people, you know shopping or going to church or something.
Anyway I loved her and the family we'd started. If I could be assured that it was only a kiss and it wouldn't happen again, I could put it behind me and go on. All of us talked about it over a meal and long story short, everybody stayed together.
Over the next few months we found ourselves pregnant. I was a dumbass cuz it didn't occur to me at the time. But to my credit something happened that took precedence over almost everything else. She was hospitalized for a mental condition. It was the first of many over the next few years.
The doctors said it was psuedo seizures. She gets overwhelmed by trying to suppress and express profound anger, frustration, etc., that she has a seizure that's not really a seizure.
I visited every day, sat and talked with the Docs about what I could do to help, until I caught a knowing glance. I was then cut off from the Docs, you know doctor patient privilege. After that I still visited, but just going through the motions.
What strengthened my suspicion was a set of pictures that showed my son and his cousin, born a couple months before looking like veritable twins and looking like my brother in law.
Today my sons are 23 and 22. My former brother in law is wanted by the law for some credit card scheme. My ex has remarried to an obvious homosexual. Trust me that's not jealousy, my boys said it first. They think it's a joke.

I haven't said anything to my son, aside from obvious reasons, because he is reeeaaally sensitive about everything. Imagine the blow to him.
Why worry about it now? Wouldn't it be a bigger blow for him to find out from someone other than her or me? What if some medical thing came up? What if?

so you have no proof that this child ISNT yours, just suspicion....is this cousin the child of her sister?

He's been your son for 22 years....unless you just HAVE to know I'd leave it where it is

Best advice in this thread. Not that there wasn't before, but there's nothing left unsaid here.

What's the need to rock the boat here? What will it do to the relationship between you and your son?

I've weigh both sides, clearing the air and keeping quite

Clearing the air would open discussion that would explain a lot he doesn't understand about why i wasn't there. It would give me answers. It would show how big a man I've been for their sake. It would answer questions he and his brother gotta have. It would expose their mother and the sacrafices I made. Almost all selfish reasons. Almost

Keeping quite, mantains the staus quo, but risk them finding out on their own and casting me in a bad light for not saying something before.

The whole thing is balanced by the fact that I haven't had any test made. Would it be wrong to 'steal' some DNA and test it? You know a hair brush or something?

Isssmmm...sorry about this situation. I know it has to hurt. But your son is your son, genetics be damned. What is there to gain by exposing the potential that he isn't biologically yours? In contrast..what is there to lose? Everything. Screw biology, screw genetics. That isn't what makes a family.

I agree with ShaniFaye, as far as you being his father and not rocking the boat.

But, is it possible she's already told him? Is it possible that you still could be the father?

As difficult as it might be, don't you think a conversation with Her is in order so that you can get past this? You deserve to know for sure, quench the "burning".

ummm how long have you *thought* he wasnt yours? If its been a long while then you should have *found out* when he was younger, if its been recently, then why on earth do you feel the need to make yourself appear the *big sacrificer* now?

is this about him being your son, or you being pissed that some crazy chick may have cheated on you 22 years ago?
it sounds like you've already been through the worst of it. if i read it correctly, she is now your ex, so that's "taken care of." if you raised the kid, and he has called you dad for the last 22 years, then you are his father. it don't matter if he came from an alien abduction, the feelings between you and him are all that matter.

I agree with most of the sentiment on this thread. He is a grown man and he is your son.

Really, the ex-wife and the ex-brother-in-law are now irrelevant characters in this story.

Write them out. Love your son.

.....and there....it is!

Indeed. If you feel he is your son and you found out he isn't. It doesn't mean you have to stop taking care of him like your son. Whether you are blood related or not. I believe that you have a strong attachment and connection to him and he as well to you. So don't worry about the small details and just go for it.

Thanks T, I'm OK though. It's just a burning question that pops up every now and again. He IS my son genitics or not.

The thing I have a problem with is, what if the situation underwhich he finds out (if it's true) is dire or hurtful for him or his brother?

Me? I'm OK, we've been divorced over ten years now so I'm somewhat indifferent towards her.

I still don't get why it matters one way or the other. Even if he finds out under "dire or hurtful" circumstances, all you have to do is say "son, it changes nothing about how I feel about you. You've always been my son and you always will be." Because that seems to be true here...

yeah... I have to go with the fact that you dont need any genetic's to know who your father is, to know who your son is.

The thing is, genetics do matter, medically speaking. If the dead-beat-ex-brother-in-law has a family history of something, any offspring needs to be aware of it.

Besides, don't you think your ADULT son has the right to know?

Perhaps there is a discrete way of getting a DNA test done?

I think mixedmedia might actually be Yoda. She is just too wise for her own good sometimes... :)

Wisdom of Yoda, with the hotness of Leia.

God, that sounds so nerdy that I need to go beat myself up now.

oh please, fellas, I'm just older than all you guys :p

I'm a bit torn on this issue, partially as it relates to the bigger question of paternal rights and partially as it relates to the issue at hand.

In general, I think every father has a right to a test when the baby is born in order to confirm paternity. With all the stories you hear about mishandled babies in general, I think parents ought to have one as they leave in order to confirm it and make sure the hospital didn't screw something up. i mean, forget right, it should just be done when the baby is having its just born tests done. MOST of the time it'd be a total non-issue. When it was an issue, the poor bastard could deal with it then and leave the cheating bitch to deal with her kid on her own. That would nip the problem in the bud instead of creating this whole nonsense of "Well you treated the child as your own, so that makes him your own even if he really wasn't." Paternal rights are really shit on in this country. Unless I decide to do so, I (and I don't think any other guy) wants to care for anyone else's progeny as their own. It's an abhorrent abuse of the trust implicit in the relationship and there is no reason to "protect" people from the truth of it when it comes to the surface.

Specifically in this case, you're just stuck with the reality that the system does not seek to protect your rights and that it is honestly past the point when any of this could have been rectified or changed. You're divorced, you have a good relationship with your children (genetic or otherwise) and you don't really stand to gain anything by pushing the issue. HOWEVER, your youngest son has very good reasons for wanting to know whose genes he has because of the possibility of genetic defects or propensities for disease. If you are very convinced that this is a possibility, I think you should first talk to the mother to see if you can confirm it further and then you should talk in a very straightforwards and adult way with your son if your conversation with her confirms or adds to your suspicions. I don't think it should be a "I hate you and everything you stand for and don't want to be your father" discussion but rather a "I've discovered something that's upsetting and disturbing and that might have an effect on your current and future health and wellbeing." The point shouldn't be to try to ruin or change that relationship, but rather to let him decide for himself if he wants to open that door in order to know where he stands.

It's a difficult choice and a difficult position. The relationship you've built over twenty years should be more important than whose genetics he carries going forward in your relationship, but he may nevertheless want to know.

Unless you do genetic testing, how would he 'find out' from anyone else? It's not like you weren't having sex with your wife, right? I assume if that's the case you would be smart enough to put together that 1+0=/=2 at the time of the pregnancy.

Since I assume it didn't take you 22 years to realize 'oh shit, I wasn't boning her nine months before the baby!' then I've gotta say...without you doing genetic testing, there's no way anyone can 'find out' anything. Whether she slept with someone else or not, there's still a significant chance he's yours, so why not just roll with it? :thumbsup:

Unless there was a medical reason to know, I can't see how this would help with anything.

I didn't say whether it would help anything or not. I asked if he thought his son had a right to know.

I think if there IS something to know--history of cancer, mental illness, diabetes, things like that--it would be best for him to know it. Apart from that, I'm with Ustwo; I don't see it does any good to tell, provided YOU can live with that.

We're jumping the gun, though. You're still speculating. Cousins sometimes have a strong resemblance. That photo isn't evidence.

I agree that finding out should not radically change your relationship with your son and I'm not so sure the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy is a good one. There may be good medical reasons to know who or who isn't your biological parent as pointed out in the following clip from the previously mentioned article in Men's Health magazine.

You should be able to judge if your son is mature enough to handle the truth with your reassurance that it will not change how you feel. Finding out on his own may cause more problems than you discussing it now with him.

That same artcle pointed out there there are approximately one million fathers unknowingly raising another man's child in 2005 or about 4% of the total. (Off the subject) I wonder about those who trace their family trees and the chances that they wind up tracing geneology totally unrelated to them.