Contact Long Lost Child

LegacyUser

A long story…

When girlfriend and I were in our late teens we had a baby. Fantastic kid who never gave us a moments bother. I had the baby (don't want to be specific as to gender) at the weekends and she had the baby during the week. Afterwards we split up but we still shared our responsibilities with the baby the same way. It was a very complicated and painful time as her family really disliked me. In fact they disliked me from the moment we started going out, for reasons I never quite figured out. They said when I met them I didn't look them in the eye, a shy teenager, a big crime obviously. So over the years we went out and for a couple of years after that I was only ever in her family's house maybe 10 times. I was actually thrown out of her family home three or four times for pretty much nothing. You get the picture anyway, I really wasn't liked and they could be temperamental. Some weekends I wouldn't see them for no particular reason that I could see and with own pride I wouldn't always ring to see either. An interesting thing to note here is although I'm by no means perfect, I'm in my thirties now and I've had the opposite experience with all my other girlfriends’ families. Point being I'm not a bad guy whatever mistakes I've made. When the baby was nearly three and was due down for the weekend there was no sign. So I let it go until the following week and when there was no sign again I got my mother to ring their house to see what was happening. My mother was told very abruptly on the phone that why didn't she go and ask my bother why, followed by a hang-up. Now my mother is a decent and kind woman who wouldn’t deserve that. I rang myself and was told that they were accusing my bother of sexual abuse. They had gone to their family doctor who ‘confirmed’ the suspicions they had. So I met with the ex to try and somehow salvage the situation. But where do you go from there, how do you fix this. They didn't even have the ****ing decency to tell me until nearly three weeks later, and only after we rang. How would anyone think this is okay, even if they are accusing my brother.

Some other info:
Their family doctor was near retirement and wouldn't in my opinion be considered any sort of expert.
My ex wouldn't go near this same doctor on her own, she would make me go with her. She really didn't like him or rate him.
My brother was only eight or nine and no one for a second seemed to have bothered to look at this fact. And an innocent 8 or 9 year old too, who's never done the slightest 'weird' thing before or since.
My child and my bother were best buddies, and there was never a bad moment between them.
We questioned my brother who only blankly looked as us, he hadn’t a clue what we were talking about. He’s also told me many times since that it’s total rubbish. I really feel sorry for him.

For me using any kind of logic this didn’t happen, there was some innocent explanation and lets face it it’s not the first time someone has been accused of abuse when it didn’t happen. If we could have got together and brought both of them to actual experts right away I think that would have been the end of it. I wasn’t given that option and the long and short of it was I never saw my child again.

Roll on a few years I received a letter from the adoption board, the ex’s new partner was looking to adopt the child. I wrote to them so see if I could see the child but quickly realised that A. I was just thinking of myself and B. The adoption board were not going to assist me in any way, or tell me anything. Writing to me was a formality nothing more. They really know how to keep unmarried fathers down in this country. I didn’t even get a reply to my letters.

Every single day since that first day I have thought about my child. I have basically tortured myself thousands of times over as to what I should have done differently. But the person I am now isn’t the person I was then so it’s all just second guessing a past life almost. I swore to myself that as soon as my child became an adult I’d track them down. So I have tracked them down and could make contact easily. But as you can see from my long story heaven knows what they’ve been told. I also know who my kids’ partner is so I could test the waters there. Or I could get my partner to contact their partner. I just really don’t know what to do. I am going to make contact because I just can’t go on like this anymore. What do you think?

MagicMarker

That's a lot of information to take in.

First of all, how old is your child now? Secondly, what did you do in the past to try and see your child?

Most people have no experience of this on boards!:) So, what you read here will only what people would do in your position.

Personally, depending on the age of the kid. I would put everything i have to say in a letter, EVERYTHING! If you just show up on their doorstep then emotions will be running wild and people may not think straight. Arguments may ensue and you're left in a position not much better than how you are now.

Until more information is provided, that's all i can really say.

LadyJ

OP, I wouldn't know what to tell you but maybe check out the
adoption forum. Perhaps someone
there could help you out.

spurious

TBH, if it was my child, I'd be more concerned about the allegation that someone abused him/her. If I knew it could not have been my brother, I would be looking elsewhere until I was satisfied it didn't happen - saying the doctor is elderly is not enough - he/she presumably found signs of it.

I would not let that one just go away.

If the child is settled with a new 'dad', leave him/her be. Write a letter to the child and leave it with a member of the family to be given to them when they are of age, then the child can decide themself whether to have you in their life.

LegacyUser

Thanks for the replies. I've never spoken to many about this situation as it's just so messed up. My child (not so much a child) is now officially an adult so this is why I'm going to contact him/her. Sorry saying child as I don't want to elaborate on gender.

To MagicMarker - As I was saying above unmarried fathers had no rights and when I did contact the adoption board I didn't even get a reply. Plus I realised that I might very well make things worse, if I just thought about myself and how I felt above what was then best for my child.

To spurious - There was no one else this is my main point, it just didn't happen. I've never been blind or stupid so I'm not just hoping it's not true. It doesn't make any sense, things went down a path and no one called stop. If I had been actually given the chance at the beginning I could have shown how it didn't make sense but I wasn't. Unfortunately this type of thing has happened to a number of families in more recent times in the UK and it took them years to prove it wasn't true.

They are an adult now but I still don't know what can of worms I'm opening.