FMW Posted January 6, 2019 Share Posted January 6, 2019 Familysecret, I'm sorry your family is in such pain and turmoil right now. We posters, of course, all come with our own baggage and the comments reflect that. It's easy to post opinions when we aren't the ones that will have to deal with the consequences. I hope you made your decision to tell based on your own convictions and feelings. I wish you and your family peace and healing. 1 Link to post Share on other sites
BaileyB Posted January 6, 2019 Share Posted January 6, 2019 (edited) I told them. They are all devastated and I just want to die. I Will survive, but I wish I could just disappear. My son and soon-to-ex-husband are in pain and I now wonder why I told them. I hope some of you are satisfied. I understand that you are upset right now, but you can not shift the blame to the people who have commented in this discussion. Every decision has a consequence. You have lived a lifetime keeping this secret, trying to avoid the inevitable consequence of the decision you made all those years ago... Nobody here is “satisfied.” I am sorry that your family is hurting and I hope that you are all able to heal and move forward in a real and authentic way now that the truth is known. For what it’s worth, I think you made the right decision. Edited January 6, 2019 by BaileyB 2 Link to post Share on other sites
elaine567 Posted January 6, 2019 Share Posted January 6, 2019 I believe in honesty but I'm not 100% sure what I would have done in your situation. I think I may have just let my son do the DNA and let the outcome determine what I should tell. That being said and since you have already told, I wish you and your family healing. Your husband is your son's dad no matter what the test says. If I found out one of my kids wasn't biologically mine, say he were switched at birth or something outrageous like that, it wouldn't change how I feel about him one bit. It wouldn't change the fact that I bonded with him, loved him, raised him, etc. But that scenario would be due to an error, a mistake by someone outwith the family, that is not the same as your spouse cheating on you, having a child by another man, whilst you were oblivious for nigh on 40 years. Seems to me men take biology a lot more seriously than women and many men will have nothing to do with other men's children either. He may continue his relationship with this "son", he may not. The husband here is now obviously contemplating divorce, which is probably in reality a disaster for him as he is in his mid seventies... no wife and a family blown apart. Sometimes "the truth" is best left alone... 1 Link to post Share on other sites
Rubix Cubed Posted January 7, 2019 Share Posted January 7, 2019 Sometimes "the truth" is best left alone... ... if you're the guilty party. 2 Link to post Share on other sites
salparadise Posted January 7, 2019 Share Posted January 7, 2019 The husband here is now obviously contemplating divorce, which is probably in reality a disaster for him as he is in his mid seventies... no wife and a family blown apart. Sometimes "the truth" is best left alone... Yes indeed. If the husband had never known not a damn thing would be different in any practical sense –– but he would've been spared the suffering to live out his years in peace with his family. Laying this on him invalidates his most precious source of homeostasis. I wish he could've been spared. I wish they all could've been spared. I think moral absolutism is for simpletons. It's obvious to any thinking person that the definition of right or wrong changes over time, and is largely dependent on context. If one can prevent or alleviate suffering without hurting anyone else, it's usually right. Note: usually, not always. 1 Link to post Share on other sites
Timshel Posted January 7, 2019 Share Posted January 7, 2019 I think that it's fairly obvious to any thinking person that no person in this thread would want this husband/father, son and the entire family to endure this pain. In fact, I think we all wish the need for this thread to not exist in the first place. The fact is that the OP did not create this thread based on a crisis of conscience, rather a fear of being caught. That has been an inevitable consequence, if her son is not his father's biological child, since the moment of birth. Perhaps that discovery would not have been made until after his father's passing, then again, 71 isn't necessarily death's doorstep either. The train left the station decades ago, long before our advises came along. Every day for decades, the OP smiled into her husband's and son's eyes with this secret in her soul. Moral absolutism, hardly. It isn't that people don't make mistakes but the ability to accept consequences instead of self protect, particularly with people who love and trust us the most. This unfortunate event could have been handled YEARS ago. Maybe the son is his father's, if he isn't it is unlikely the father will choose to shun him now. Every one is currently in shock. As the dust settles, it is likely that the burden of deceit lifted will far outweigh the continued perpetuation of it. 1 Link to post Share on other sites
ZayKayWill Posted January 8, 2019 Share Posted January 8, 2019 You've gotta be kidding me. Link to post Share on other sites
ZayKayWill Posted January 8, 2019 Share Posted January 8, 2019 ... if you're the guilty party. Yeah. I agree that's bull****. I would much rather cry over the truth than smile over a lie, even if the lie is decades old. 1 Link to post Share on other sites
ZayKayWill Posted January 8, 2019 Share Posted January 8, 2019 I think that it's fairly obvious to any thinking person that no person in this thread would want this husband/father, son and the entire family to endure this pain. In fact, I think we all wish the need for this thread to not exist in the first place. The fact is that the OP did not create this thread based on a crisis of conscience, rather a fear of being caught. That has been an inevitable consequence, if her son is not his father's biological child, since the moment of birth. Perhaps that discovery would not have been made until after his father's passing, then again, 71 isn't necessarily death's doorstep either. The train left the station decades ago, long before our advises came along. Every day for decades, the OP smiled into her husband's and son's eyes with this secret in her soul. Moral absolutism, hardly. It isn't that people don't make mistakes but the ability to accept consequences instead of self protect, particularly with people who love and trust us the most. This unfortunate event could have been handled YEARS ago. Maybe the son is his father's, if he isn't it is unlikely the father will choose to shun him now. Every one is currently in shock. As the dust settles, it is likely that the burden of deceit lifted will far outweigh the continued perpetuation of it. This person knows what they're talking about. Link to post Share on other sites
salparadise Posted January 9, 2019 Share Posted January 9, 2019 Moral absolutism, hardly. It isn't that people don't make mistakes but the ability to accept consequences instead of self protect, particularly with people who love and trust us the most. This unfortunate event could have been handled YEARS ago. Maybe the son is his father's, if he isn't it is unlikely the father will choose to shun him now. Every one is currently in shock. As the dust settles, it is likely that the burden of deceit lifted will far outweigh the continued perpetuation of it. Yeah. I agree that's bull****. I would much rather cry over the truth than smile over a lie, even if the lie is decades old. Ability to accept the consequences, eh? Could've been handled years ago? Handled how––confession I presume. I think this precisely fits the definition of moral absolutism. It's an inflexible mindset, an absence of rationality where 1÷0=42. In this case, suffering consequences has no relationship to anything real. There must've been literally millions of examples where the same thing happened without any consequences, other than relative emotional congruency of the family. Oh, but the wife knew and believed she had gotten away with it, and that is evil... so she must be punished for her sins, accept the consequences, and the perfect way for that to happen is for the son and husband to suffer and in turn ensure that she suffers too? Yea, that's how our justice system works... it's like sentencing a mother to fifteen years in prison for selling weed, and telling her child to have faith because this is for the best and sets things right. It must be nice to have all of life's hard questions tied up in a tiny box with a pretty bow. Maybe in my next life I'll be be born a 19th century Baptist circuit rider. Link to post Share on other sites
ZayKayWill Posted January 9, 2019 Share Posted January 9, 2019 Ability to accept the consequences, eh? Could've been handled years ago? Handled how––confession I presume. I think this precisely fits the definition of moral absolutism. It's an inflexible mindset, an absence of rationality where 1÷0=42. In this case, suffering consequences has no relationship to anything real. There must've been literally millions of examples where the same thing happened without any consequences, other than relative emotional congruency of the family. Oh, but the wife knew and believed she had gotten away with it, and that is evil... so she must be punished for her sins, accept the consequences, and the perfect way for that to happen is for the son and husband to suffer and in turn ensure that she suffers too? Yea, that's how our justice system works... it's like sentencing a mother to fifteen years in prison for selling weed, and telling her child to have faith because this is for the best and sets things right. It must be nice to have all of life's hard questions tied up in a tiny box with a pretty bow. Maybe in my next life I'll be be born a 19th century Baptist circuit rider. Self justification at its finest. *rolls eyes* 1 Link to post Share on other sites
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