'AITA for meeting my biological father without my parents' consent?' UPDATED
"AITA because I met my biological father without my parents consent?"
Here's the original post:
I recently turned 18 giving me the legal right of being able to get in contact with my father for sperm donors. I was conceived through a sperm donation and have known this for most of my life. I have known since the age of 13 that I was going to want to have a go at making a relationship with my father (biological).
However my parents have always been against this. They have given reasons which are valid points such as that my father may not want to meet me, and I could ruin his life in someways.
Despite their unsupportiveness I went and did it anyway and found him on facebook. Of course I was thinking that anything could happen, but he was one of the nicest people I ever met and proved to me further how much I want a good relationship with him.
To cut a long story short, we decided on a place and time to meet each other and we did. I was able to be brought back to his house and I met his family, of his wife, kids and brother, he had a sister that I didn't get to meet on that occasion.
Upon returning to my home, my parents had sat at the dining table and were waiting for me in silence in an extremely intimidating manner. They asked the usual, "where've you been?" And "what time do you call this". Something was fishy from the start and my suspicions were proved to be correct when my dad said he knew where I had been.
This continued for a few weeks, where I would spend time with him and I even introduced him to my girlfriend and her dog, as the only people that really supported me through this. My parents behaviour has become increasingly aggressive towards myself and people close to us. It is really making me question my doing here. Was I an a-hole?
What do you think?! This is what top commenters had to say:
Prudent_Border5060 said:
Question. Did you ever ask why he is on your birth certificate if he was only the donor. As far as I know, when you go through proper channels, he shouldn't be on the birth certificate. I did some checking, and if your parents went that route and added him to the birth certificate, then he is technically your legal parent. I find this very strange. Are you sure there wasn't some sort of arrangement?
And OP responded:
In terms of arrangements I am not really sure why he was on the birth certificate, its possible that he was in something like that which would explain why he was happy that I reached out to him.
And Prudent_Border5060 responded:
I am guessing something is wrong. Maybe your mom had an affair, and they decided that he did not have contact. Unless you reached out. I would sit your parents down and calmly talk about why they were so against you meeting him. And if they don't give an answer then talk to him. You're not getting the full story. Verdict nah. Because somebody isn't telling you everything.
BohemianJack said:
NTA. You are an adult now and can make your own decisions. It sounds like this meeting has been a positive experience for you and gave you some closure. Your parents are being aggressive and manipulative.
And LavishnessNo3139 said:
NTA but please update. 😁
And OP did exactly that. The day after the original post, he shared this doozie of an update:
So as I mentioned as a reply to a comment, this man was on my birth certificate, and I was told by you guys to sit them down and have a conversation with them all. So I did. After my mother returned home from work, I gathered everyone into the lounge, (bio dad on zoom) and asked why he was on my birth certificate. So here is the story:
Bio dad met mother 5 years before I was born and had a relationship going on, for that entire time however I feel like I should've mentioned this before but my parents now have been together for just over 30 years, you do the math.
That means my mother was having an affair, but in the time that they had been seeing each other, my mother became pregnant with me. My non bio dad is actually infertile, something I didn't know about till now, so when he found out my mother was pregnant, he reacted in a different way; he was happy for her.
She said she didn't want a divorce but was willing to keep the baby with him, he said yes as they had been trying to have a child for about 11 1/2 years at the time, with 0 luck.
So the reason why bio dad was named in the brith certificate, was because they had an arrangement together that he would be present at birth without, my dad being there so he would be named on the certificate, and at 18 I would be encouraged to meet him and told this story. In return, he would tell no one about them and would give monthly payments, as well as staying far away from her forever.
He upheld his end but she didn't do the same which dissapointed my bio dad, but made him very glad that I had contacted him. So now long story short if any of you couldn't be bothered to read that. Mother had affair, parents kept me, bio dad on certificate get to meet me at 18 and I would be told the story.
I in no way will be disowning my current father, he has been the figure that I had needed in my life so many times that I just couldn't even if I wanted to, I will continue to see my bio dad and will keep you updated on the progress if you guys want to be.
EDIT 2: So basically the entire sperm donor thing just happened to be the first thing they thought of at the time and they just let me believe their lie.