News that I would never have expected…..

 Today started out as any other day.  Got up, got my boys’ ready for school and on the bus, sat and talked with my hubby while he got ready for work.  I took some time to chat with a long time friend about some issues going on in her life.  And then the phone rang…..

Caller ID told me it was my Mom, so of course I answered it.  Right away I could tell this was not a ‘normal’ call.  She started out by saying ‘I just wanted to call and warn you",  right off the bat you know the news to follow is not good!

Apparently she had just gotten off of the phone with my Dad.  Which, in itself was a shocker to both of us!  I am 36 years old and I have not had any type of contact with my Dad in over 20 years.  In my entire lifetime I have only been face to face with him a couple of times.  I am an only child, I came along when he was in between relationships (sorta) and he’s never acknowledged me as his.  Even with Court appearances to establish paternity and what not, he still denied me.  So it’s always just been my Mom and I.

Well, today he calls her out of the blue.  Says he has something awkward to ask her and he doesn’t know how to go about it.  He asked her if I really was in fact his, and Mom told him I was.  He said it had bothered him for quite some time and he just needed to find out.  He said he tried calling her once before but her phone was busy and he never tried again.  But today he found himself home alone, his wife was out and he just felt he needed to call.

It sounds simple enough I suppose, but then the real truth kind of comes into play.  Recently he got a call from his daughter.  She said she knows she has a sister and she wanted information from him about me.  Of course, not having anything to do with me my whole life he had nothing to tell her.  She asked where I lived, was I married do I have children, etc.  Because apparently she wants to get to know me.  She wants to talk to me, to meet me at some point.  We live about 2 hours apart I guess.

So he called, he asked the question that apparently has been eating away at him  for quite some time.  And once he heard that answer he told my Mom about the situation with his daughter calling and askign him all of these questions.  So he was given my phone number to pass along to her so she can, at some point presumably, get in contact with me.

Now, I’ve already mentioned he has never acknowledged me in any real way.  He told my Mom today that his wife knows nothing about this and he’d kind of like to keep it that way.  (Real winner, right?)  He was on and off with her at the time I was born, married a few years after I was born.  She does not know about me, and that I’ve know my entire life.  And apparently, unless it comes out in the open from someone else, she may never know about me.  But at least one other person in that family does know I exist and wants to reach out.

I honestly don’t know how I feel about that. I knew he had 2 children from his first marriage, a girl and then a boy.  His son died in an accident at the age of 16, about a year or so before I was born.  As far as anyone knows for sure, he only has the one child remaining.  How anyone made a connection like that between he and I, I may never know.  My birth certificate does not list his name, no documents have ever listed his name in connection with me.  So I am at a loss to an answer there.

But I don’t know what to do if she should ever contact me.  Do I talk to her?  Do I meet her at some point?  What do I do????  He doesn’t want his wife to know about me at all.  So is there a purpose in getting to know someone in that family, if that is the only connection I have?   She told her Dad (our Dad?) that she wants to get this information and get to know me "before he croaks" because hes the only one with the information to share, he’s the only link she has to me.

I kind of feel as if I’m in a daze right now.  I feel pulled in different directions inside, not knowing if/when she will call, if she does what I should do.  It feels as if this is not truly my life right now.  That I must be living in a reality TV show and this is just some weird plot twist in the storyline that is my life!

What would you do?????

 

****EDIT FOR CLARIFICATION****

It’s taken much thought and talking it over with people close to me.  And while I’m not 100% sure exactly how I would react if I held a phone in my hand with my sibling on the other end, I do believe I would take the chance to speak with her.  After all, it’s not her fault he has lived a life of lies and secrets.  If it’s meant to be that we get a chance to meet and know each other in some way in this lifetime, then I’ll take the chance.  But I am not naive enough to just jump into it full on, dragging my family through it with me.  For the protection of my children, I think it would be best if I am able to establish some foundation with her alone.  I need to know if the situation is a positive or negative before introducing my children in to the mix.  

Another thing I realized I had forgotten to mention in the original post.  I went to Jr. High and High School with a girl that carried the same last name as my Dad (it’s not a common name, and there’s not many in the town where we grew up).  People often commented that we looked alike.  And once I was older and knew the details of who my Dad was and everything I started to wonder.  I have often wondered if somehow she was related to him, to me.  But I never had the nerve to ask if she knew him.  Likely because I was afraid of the answer, and likely because if she did I didn’t know what to do with that information as a kid.  

The little information that I had gleaned from my mom over the years included the fact that it was kind of a running joke when she was expecting me that with her luck she would end up in the same maternity room with his daughter who was expecting a child at the same time.  Well, this girl I went to HS with just happens to not only have the same last name but she was born about a week before I was, at the same hospital.  If she’s in deed a child of my Dad’s daughter, then I grew up going to school for many eyars with my own niece and never knew it!  lol  And she’s older than I am!  But like I said, I have yet to figure out if she is or isn’t related in some way.  Maybe time will answer that question for me too someday.

Just more confusion to add to my already confusing, crazy life today.  lol  

 

For those of you who have commented on this, thank you.  I appreciate everything you have to say.  And, as strange as it feels to say, I am glad that I am not the only one who has found themselves in this situation.  For those of you who have made that connection with someone I hope it worked well.  For those of you wishing to the chance to do so, I hope you get that chance sometime in your life.

 

I will have to update if things should ever change.  But for now, just trying to p

rocess it and get used to the idea that someone out there does know I exist and does acknowledge me.  Even if it’s not the person who was partially responsible for giving me life.  It’s his loss, not mine.