Birthmother may have named wrong biological father

Depending on the state you live in, there are "Birth father registries". That basically says that when a man & woman have sex that it may result in a pregnancy & if it does, he will take full responsibilty, emotionally & financially. He can register anytime during the pregnancy or I believe up to 30 days after the birth. This is published in local papers notifing that an adoption will be taking place at "X" date if he has not registered by that time. Whether he knows of the pregnancy or NOT, if he hasn't regisitered, the BFathers rights are terminated. It's best to talk to a GOOD adoption attorney! Someone who REALLY knows the laws inside out & backwards! We have a similar situation. Our sons BMom named a man as our sons BFather, but put unknown on the Birth Cert. He supposedly didn't care. I questioned her if it wasn't her male friend, which she denied. Our sons Grandma says he looks IDENTICAL to a family friend, whom BMom had an affair with. On our son's 2nd BDay, BMom said he looked IDENTICAL to a DIFFERENT man! I asked her, "Who the heck is this guy!!??" She told me it was his BIRTH DAD! I asked her about the man she named at his birth, she didn't know who I was talking about. Yet his name is all over the paperwork. Her other children tell me the BDad IS the friend of hers I questioned her about at his birth!!!! Soooooo, that is 4 different men! She lives in a state that has Birth father registry. So we aren't worried. Check to see if your state has this. GOOD LUCK! Deb

Thank you so much for responding. It puts me at ease a bit, though, I haven't yet checked the laws. I was certain that this had happened to others. I still have the situation with the named biological father's family. I am not sure what to do about that. They would want paternity testing, I am certain of that if there were any question. sigh.... I really appreciate your support and insight. God bless you and your family. :wings:

I would just keep your relationship going with them and not mention it. They have already lost their child once. They don't need to loose him all over again. Wether he is the biological father of not...they love him and will want to be part of his life now that they have grown to think of him as their son/grandchild. I mean does biology really matter when love is concerned? As an adoptive mom I'm sure you can understand that. Plus that isn't your information to really share. If the birthmother would like to brign it up that is her choice. If when your child is older he'd like a paternity test done then hopefully they will understand and comply. But you may want to talk to the birthmothr about it. Find out what she is wanting to do witht that information? Wether she indeed wants to do a paternity test on the other guy (which I would do first anyways before telling the father's family that is already involved and happy in his life). Why bring problems and doubt into a good healthy relationship? If the other guy does end up beign the father then it's time to set the record straight and share the information you have and go from there.

This advice rings true and sound to me, now that it comes from another person. I came to the same conclusion, but thought I was clouded with my own fear of a disruption. I did check into laws and it seems we are safe. To think of disrupting this relationship with the named biological father's family, is so painful. You should see them with her. They are amazing and so supportive of us. We are Euro-American and they are African-American. They have been very generous and graceful with us. Our birthmother seems fine with things staying this way. She doesn't even know this other guy's last name and he has lots of other children with many women. I have learned a lot about biology through our parenting through adoption. We have two older biological daughters, and frankly, I believe DNA connections are way overrated. Family happens through the heart, experience, and knowing each other. Becoming her mother, was just as easy and natural feeling as it felt when our other babies came out of my body. My husband feels the same way. THANK YOU to all who read and respond. I can't tell you how much this has eased my mind. God bless you too, Louisa's mama

Yes, no reason to upset the Birth Fathers family. We too have 2 bio children & 3 adopted children. There is ABSOLUTELY no difference in how I feel about them. We are also Caucasian & our adopted children are African American. It didn't matter to them that we were white. Obviously, because they chose us to adopt their children. We also have total open adoptions. It is kinda funny though when we get together with our sons birth family. When we come ALLLLLLL the relatives come over so they can see our son!! My husband & I are the only white people in a house of 20+ AA people!! Not ONE person cares! I found this quote I thought you may like, "How can blood be thicker than water when the people who gave me water for my thrist were not my blood relatives?" Deb

[FONT=Comic Sans MS]I dunno, this doesn't sit well with me. Forget for a moment the apparent birth father's awesome family. Something like this would hanging over me until I got some resolution. What about the little girl? If the other possible birthdad has many other children, what happens if she starts dating one of them, marries and has children? If I was in your situation, I would want to know 100%.[/FONT][FONT=Comic Sans MS]Editted to add: Maybe the birthmother has thought it was the other guy all along, but chose to name the guy with the nice family. Maybe as time goes on she's feeling guilty and 'casually' mentioned the resemblance to the other dad to feel you out, hoping you might act on it. Just a thought.[/FONT][FONT=Comic Sans MS][/FONT] [FONT=Comic Sans MS]Would there be a way to have the other guy tested without the bfather's family knowing? If the other guy's not the dad, you'll know for sure and no harm done. If the other guy IS a match, you can decide from there how to handle it.[/FONT]

I suppose I am not going to be very popular for voicing my opinion, but here goes: I do understand the "leave well enough alone", BUT, have you considered what this would mean to the family that you say is so wonderful? If there is a possibility that this family is unrelated to your child, I think it is cruel and unfair to allow them to go on for say, 18 years, thinking this child is a part of them, when in fact, he/she may not be. Also, I think it is terribly unfair to the child to lead them to believe something that may be false. As someone who has been through a contested adoption, I know all too well the fear of losing your child. But if your adoption has been finalized, you should be safe anyway. If it turned out that the man who is named is not the biological father, it does not mean that you would have to cut ties with him or his family - don't we all say that the more love, the better? I just think that this could be a very messy situation for a lot of people later - including you if you pretend that you do not have this knowledge. I was faced with this exact situation when my ason was almost 3. His first mom ran into a man she had dated briefly and was convinced he was my son's biological father. It scared the living daylights out of me, but I felt that I owed it to both the man and my son to act on the information. After some deep digging, we discovered that there was no possible chance that he could have been the father (the dates weren't even close), but I knew I had done the right thing for my son. I would think this through, carefully. Good Luck to you.

I grew up in open adoption - I've always known my birthmother and her family - but she refuses to tell me who my birth father is, she named someone else, to avoid telling him - so, in the end, I'll never know. I urge you to find out the truth - either possibly hurt the bfathers family now, or possibly hurt your daughter later...the truth usually comes out and it usually isn't pretty.

I COMPLETELY agree with this. I think you need to find out, you don't have to be very obvious about it but you need to do this for your daughter. What a difficult situation! :grouphug: Good Luck!!

I read everyone's posts very carefully. I appreciate the feedback. Most of the points, I have turned around in my mind a million times. I didn't think about the possibility that our daughter could end up marrying a sibling!! The birthfamily lives 1200 miles away. I hadn't heard from our birthmother for several months. She keeps losing phone contracts, so I can't call her. I finally spoke with her last night. She had moved again, (the 7th time since we met her two years ago.) Our conversation was short because we got cut off, so after waiting for several months to talk to her about this, I lost another opportunity to do so. It is becoming clear that the only way to answer this question is to appeal to our named biological father's mother to broker a paternity test on her son. I don't have a good enough relationship with him to do it myself. Also, he was abusive toward our birthmother. I don't want to put her at risk in anyway. It is evident that our birthmother could not help us find this other guy. As I said, she doesn't even know his last name. This is probably one of the most difficult situations I have faced. I am at such a loss. I want to do the right thing for our daugher, but I am not clear about what that is, really. I have been praying about it and looking for the signs. Unfortunately, we plan to travel down at Christmas. I feel we have to decide one way or the other previous to that trip. Thanks to everyone for their input and please keep us in your prayers.....Louisa's mother.

Reading this -- I hope you find the answers because it doesn't do you any good to keep wondering if this man who she named is really the father when there is always that nagging doubt that he might not be.