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Will this destroy my family?

Nemo1Casual Contributor05 Jan 2025, 2:16 pm AEDT

Will this destroy my family?

I've been in a very long-term relationship - 46+ years. This goes back to the beginning when we first got together. At the time everything fitted and made sense and it has been like this since them, and we have three adult children.
During some recent tidying up and de-cluttering my partner discovered some old minutes which differ to both our recollections of what happened 46 years ago, and its timing.
It now appears that I was likely to already have been pregnant when we first got together. I had left my previous boyfriend by then. All the signs were there that I was not pregnant (yes, I did have a period after we split, sorry about the TMI), but in hindsight we were naive and accepted that our firstborn was a month or so early. Looking back now, with all the life experience we have he was too well-formed to have been early.
We suspect it, my partner is very accepting and is being supportive, but I am really concerned about telling our eldest.
Do we tell him? Yes, we're planning to this week so it's not a "family secret" because we've seen them cause ongoing issues within my partner's family.
The plan is to tell him and see whether he want to follow it up with DNA testing. Once we tell him all decisions about who is told will be up to him entirely, including his two siblings.
Just him or his partner at the same time? Should I warn her first - no details just that it may be a traumatic discussion.
To add to the trauma for him I discovered his possible genetic father died last year aged 65 suddenly which is another reason to tell him. I am really sad about this.
There was one daughter from his (potential bio father) marriage, so there's another consideration.
I am unable to do much right now, I keep randomly crying, thinking my son may reject me, he can blame me if he wants to. Remember this was 1978 - it wasn't possible to buy a pregnancy test back then, Google wasn't around - you had to go to a library to look up detailed information. I was 19.
If anyone has been there please let me know how you coped and what you did.

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In response to: Will this destroy my family?

Nemo1Casual Contributor25 Jan 2025, 11:22 am AEDT

Re: Will this destroy my family?

An update: the DNA test, which was back within 7 days of ordering, proved that my partner is not his bio father. My son isn't sure what to do next, and neither am I as there was very little information in the death notice to go on with (no surnames).
The bio father has a lot of professional and academic presence online, but no photos, and nothing personal. I have no idea whether his wife used his surname or her own, or whether the daughter is his or how she may be known on social media.Her full name doesn't help.
I approached the funeral parlour and requested an of the order of service booklet however they said they do not have one - no hardcopy or pdf. I did think of sending them a request to pass on my (or my son's) contact details with a note that it was a personal matter. Is there another way to find people?

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