Here is my story....

Ok, it was about July 2005. My wife, me, my two kids and my daughter's friend all took a trip to New York and Washington DC. I have some great aunts and uncles as well as cousins in the New York area. So I made the decision to visit my great aunts and uncles who live in Queens. They are getting to be in their 80's and I may not ever get back to NY for who knows how long so seeing them was a priority. While we were visiting, we were sitting around the table eating and talking and the subject was rebelious teenagers. One of my great aunts said something about my mother being quite the rebelious teenager and my ears perked up thinking I might get some juicy stories about my mom. Little did I know. My aunt said, oh yes, you do know that your mom was married to someone else prior to being married to your dad. No, I had no idea was my response. I think they all honestly thought I knew this information and they did not reallyvolunteer too many more details. So, said all our goodbyes and left. I am glad we made the choice to see them because 2 years ago, 3 of the 5 that we visited all passed away within a 3 month period. Anyway, back to the trip. We get back to the hotel room and first thing I do is get on the computer searching for info on my mom. I do not remember the website, but I did find a record of my mom and dad's wedding date. I honestly never knew when it was. They were married a year and half after I was born. I never knew that information either but now it raised two questions. One, who is this person my mom was supposedly married to and two, are my parents my real parents. Keep in mind I am 41 years old when all this is happening. So we get back home from the trip I try to figure out what is the best course of action to take to find out the truth. I really cannot go to my mother because my mother and I do not really speak to one another because of some issues I have with my mother and her 3rd husband. On top of that, my mother lies and cannot be trusted to tell the truth. So I cannot go to her right away. I have a cousin who works for me and is 10 plus years older than me. So I corner her one day soon after being back and I ask her if she knows if my parents are my real parents. Her face turns ghost white and her voice quivers and all she says is I should talk to my parents about that. Well, I knew I was on to something. So I go over to talk to my aunt who is my mom's younger sister. I ask her basically the same question. At first she was dragging her feet on saying anything but then she relented. She tells me this. Yes, my mother was married prior to being married to my dad. Apparently the guy she married was a real bad person but she does not know too many details. She digs up some old records her mother kept and we both go through them trying to find out the guys name. We find it. The story is something like this. My mom being about 17 at the time supposedly gets pregnant. Her parents decide the best course of action to take it for her to get married so it does not cause them any shame. So they take my mom and this guy to Las Vegas and get them married. Soon after, it is determined that my mom is not pregnant. My mom is married for a total of 3 years from marriage date to divorce date. This all took place in California. At some point things got bad between my mom and her husband. I guess my grandparents were also very controlling and I think my mom had enough and said she was leaving home and going back to the east coast to live with her aunt and uncle. About 2 1/2 years into the marriage, my mom (now on the east coast) actually does get pregnant. My mom says the guy she was married to was not the guy. She says their relationship had long broken up and she had a boyfriend on the east coast. She says she was with him for about 3 months when she found out she was pregnant. She says right away she calls her parents. First thing they ask is the baby's father the guy she was married to. She says no. Her mother gets on a plane, flys back east to get my mom and she come back home to California. My mom says they guy who is the biological father never knew she was pregnant as she just up and left. Ok, so now I am skeptical. My mom cannot be trusted to tell the truth. I have talked to my cousin mentioned earlier and my aunt and they both say they are sure the guy she was married to was the father. I also made some other calls to other great aunts and uncles who also say they same thing. So everyone who knows the situation says one thing, my mom is saying something different. Who do I believe? So I figure I will try to track down the guy she was married to. My main resource was ancestry.com. Thank goodness for that website. Yes, it is spendy but there can be a lot of information on it. First I found very quickly the guy my mom was married to. Turns out he has already passed away. Then I start looking for relatives to him. I end up making a list of potential relatives to him. It is sort of scary making a cold call to someone you do not know and how to bring this up. So I just do it and the first person on the list is a hit. It is a nephew of the guy my mom was married to. He swears I am his uncles child. He gives me other family contacts to call. I call two more. Only one of those two was around and old enough to remember and that person also swears I am related. So now I am like what the heck is going on here. My mom says one thing. Her family says something different and her ex-husbands family is also saying the same. I go back to my mother and I reveal this information that I have discovered. She still sticks by her story. She also then tells me that her ex-husband had another kid that he did not reveal to his family. I am like what, why didn't she tell me this earlier. So I figure the only way to figure this out would be for a DNA test to take place. So I get a hold of family from my mom's ex-husband. One of them who I seemed to really connect with would have been a first cousin. So he agrees to do a DNA test with me. Wammo, it turns out we are not related at all. I am blown away. I really thought with all the various people saying one thing and my mother saying another, that my mother for some reason was lying to me. So now the issue is, there is some guy out there who my mom was with for appx 3 months. He got her pregnant and she split town and he never knew. My mom says he was a pretty nice guy. All she knows or can remember of him is his name but not the proper spelling of it and that he was going into the military. She has very little details. I have searched ancestry.com up and down looking for this person but with so little to go on, I have not found any credible leads. Part of me wants to really believe my mom, but then part of me says I would not be shocked to find out something else may have happened. So I am reluctant to jump full fledge into trying to find someone out there who may or may not exist. Every once in a while, I pick up the search thinking maybe new information has popped up, but so far nothing. Back to the man who I know as my dad. My mom was back in California. I was now born and running around. He met my mom and fell in love with her and me and they married. My mom's ex-husband was taken off the birth certificate as the father and the man I know as my dad was put on. I am pretty sure there was no formal adoption that took place as there is absolutely no record of anything like that happening. If you look at my birth certificate, my dad is on there and there is no note to indicate anything otherwise. I really want to find my biological father. But more than that, I want to know that I know the truth no matter what that is. I think at this point in time, only my mother really knows what happened. If you have any other sources of looking up information other than ancestry.com, please do share.