I am a man in my mid-40s and found out that the man I believed to be my father, was not my real father.
Let me start from the beginning.
I am the last child of my parents. I have older siblings in their 50s; our eldest sister is almost 60. This gives you an idea that we are not babies here.
Now, our father, the man I had always believed was my dad, had suffered a stroke some years back. He was 85 years old. His illness soon began to affect his speech and I guess he knew he was going to die, so he called his children, my three elder siblings and told them that I was not his biological child.
When they asked him why he said this because as I guessed, they must have asked him, he said they should ask their mother…the woman we all called mummy. Our mum.
Since I was not called to the conference of the moment of truth, neither was my mum, who had long separated from my dad even before his stroke, I got to know this a few months ago.
My siblings said nothing to me and our mum.
So, how did I find out?
Our dad, or their dad, died early this year and left me completely out of his will. I mean, our dad. I can’t call him their dad because until a few months back, he was my dad.
Anyway, when I queried why Daddy left me out of his will, my siblings, who had known two years ago about me not being his child, then began to tell me that Daddy had told them I was not his biological son. He did not tell them who my dad was, he just asked them to ask our mum who my father was. My siblings did not want to upset me at that time and so they all agreed not to breathe a word to me or cause any rift between us. So they kept the information from me.
They said when Daddy told them, they didn’t want to upset even our mum as she was also battling high BP and diabetes that had caused us to go back and forth to several hospitals, so they kept it to themselves.
Now, our mother…thankfully, she is also my biological mother, like I said before had left our dad several years before. If I had been them, maybe I would have done the same thing. That is, keep the information.
You see, growing up, Daddy never made me feel I never belonged to him. I went to the same schools my siblings went to. I wore the same clothes, I was hugged and loved just like my siblings and I think I was disciplined like them too, although, being the last born, I enjoyed a bit more pampering than my elder siblings.
So I understand why my siblings could have found it hard to accept that I was not our dad’s biological child.
Now, when I saw that I was excluded from the will…of course it shattered me, what do you expect? When your parent suddenly says you’re not their biological child, how would you feel?
I am a married man with my children, my eldest is 18 years old…so you can understand how emotionally bereft this left me. It was not the fact that Daddy gave me nothing in terms of property.
I was shattered. Even though my siblings kept saying, “Don’t worry D, you are our brother and we will share our property with you…” I was angry because they seemed to be missing the point.
Who the hell is my father?
Why was that information kept from me?
I remembered instances growing up when my siblings would be ill and I would be spared the illness. That is a clue. I did not doubt the veracity of Dad’s claims, I just could not authenticate with anyone I knew.
Is my dad some shady man from Mum’s past?
Is my dad the reason they separated? But they had been separated years ago and Dad still paid my fees and visited me at school…
Anyway, why waste time? I didn’t listen to my elder siblings when they said not to ask our mum as she was too sick to be troubled with more devastating news.
Our eldest brother forbade me. You see, when mummy gets agitated, she often goes into crisis mode. She was flown abroad to go stay with my elder sister just weeks after our dad died. Even though they had long separated, she was somehow affected when she heard he died.
Anyway, this was no phone matter. I wanted to do a face-to-face. So early last month, I went to see our mother to confront her about who my father was.
Of course, Mum had heard that Daddy left me out of his will. I need you to understand that wealth was not my issue because I had property. The house I live in with my wife and children is mine…
In America,I asked her, “Mummy, who is my real father?”
My mother went into crisis mode…no first, she denied it.
She said, I was my father’s son, she didn’t know why my father would do what he did…
I said, “Mummy if it was not so, I mean, I had no issues with Daddy before he died. There was no quarrel between us and it was not like the man was senile before he died, yes he had a stroke but he was lucid. So him saying I was not his child was not the ranting of a depraved mind. So Mummy, who is my real father?”
She was hyperventilating…
I gave her water and opened the windows for air.
I said, “Talk to me mum, who is my real father? Is he dead? Is he alive? Where is he?”
My elder sister started shouting, “We just lost our dad, don’t come and kill mummy with your questions…no one thinks you are an outsider…”
I said, “Sister, you are missing the point here. If you were me, wouldn’t you want to know?”
I never got answers because my mum was crying, singing, then began to cough…so bad the next thing I knew, my mum went into shock…we had to call an ambulance and since then, she has been in their care…she has not talked!
I want answers and I hate my mother for doing this to me. I hate my dad, too, for keeping me in the dark for this long.
O, but I will get answers, I won’t stop digging until I get answers. I know digging includes exposing the fact that my father is not my dad. It includes asking my aunties, uncles, and friends of my parents for answers…if Mum will not talk, I will find out through other means.
(Series written and edited by Peju Akande and based on true stories)