After breaking the news to both my Mom and Dad, and finally having an open conversation between them and James, my parents decided that they wanted to be the ones to break the news to my other brother (the third of the triplets, Adam) themselves.
Part of me was fine with this, but part of me also wished that I could be there when it happened, too–partially so that I could help and serve as a buffer in navigating the conversation. This felt like such a high-stakes conversation, such “big deal” news to learn about yourself, that I was feeling the need to protect my brother’s (potentially) “soon-to-be-shattered” worldview and conception of self, his core identity, and family ties. I didn’t want him to hurt. However foolishly, I thought that, somehow, if that message were delivered under my control, knowing the perspective (or at least one) of being in his waiting shoes, and having some empathy and understanding for my parents’ perspective as well, I might be better positioned to soften the blow and to help in healthily shaping his reaction.
Even more so than with James, I was concerned that Adam’s relationship with our father wouldn’t be able to survive the truth. It already seemed to me to be tenuous, in many respects, and I was deeply fearful of the possibility that my brother could reject my father–our father. The last thing that I wanted in going through this process of revealing the truth (and opening the door to finding out about previously unknown family) was breaking our own family in the process. My parents didn’t deserve that. They may not have been entirely truthful and forthcoming with us all these years about something seriously big, but they didn’t deserve rejection, and my father certainly didn’t deserve to lose a son. A feeling, I’m sure, akin to a death. Nothing was worth that, and so yes, my inner control freak was screaming and begging to be the one to (softly) deal the blow. Maybe I could say it in a way that wouldn’t have to hurt so much, for any of us.
I also felt pretty badly that he was the last to know, and how he might feel about that. I wanted to be able to explain how and why I approached each piece of our family puzzle in the way that I did, and that it had nothing to do with how much I care about him. No one wants to feel excluded, especially not when the feeling is paired with a fundamental identity crisis. Selfishly, I needed him to know that I never wanted to isolate him.
Why didn’t I tell him when I told James? Well, for one thing, James was at home for the full length of my week-and-a-half long Thanksgiving visit, so purely from an opportunity perspective, there was that. Also, James already had the log-in information for my Ancestry account, which was now inherently linked with my AncestryDNA account, so he was going to figure it out anyway–and that just didn’t feel like the right way for it to happen. On top of that, based on James’ pre-existing interest in our family trees, genealogy, and research, I knew that this type of information–knowing and exploring one’s biological roots–was already important to him. This was something he would want to know. Finally, I knew that he had already asked these questions about our paternity in the past–so this was something he has at some point expressed an interest in knowing.
With Adam, I was going in blind. I had NO IDEA if this would be something he would want to know, if given the choice. I’m not even sure that anyone would really, truly be able to make an “informed” decision about whether or not they would want to know something like this about themselves even if they were given the opportunity to choose. You might think you would want to know, but the reality and gravity of finding out, as an adult, that your father is not your biological father is something that I don’t think you can truly appreciate until you actually find yourself in that boat.
What if he wouldn’t have wanted to know? How could I even gauge if he would (especially without letting the cat out of the bag in the process?)
Once I revealed what I knew to my Mom, everything after that happened so fast, and suddenly, for 4 out of 5 of us, the truth was already out on the table. At that point, I didn’t feel like there WAS a “right move” in terms of if or even how to tell my brother. And, before I even had a chance to verbalize my inner conflict about how to proceed, sitting in the living room with my Dad, Mom, and James after just having broken the news to my Dad, my Dad announced that he wanted my Mom and him to tell Adam together.
Honestly, at this point, I was so thankful that the Earth hadn’t exploded after this most recent reveal that I figured I’d throw my parents a bone and let them feel at least one small ounce of control over the limited remains of their secret.
I’ve felt tremendously guilty ever since.
Despite logically knowing that my own “locus of control” is, ultimately, limited, I can’t help but feel that I might have been able to help if I had been there.
It took my parents several weeks to tell him (apparently the times they were together before then were times when he was accompanied by his girlfriend, which they didn’t feel would be the best circumstance for a big reveal like this). From what they told me about when they did, Adam didn’t seem to have a huge reaction (then again, neither of my brothers tend to be all that loquacious about their feelings). He seemed to be “fine”.
After being told by my parents that Adam now “knew”, I texted my brothers, asking how they were doing with processing this whole thing. Adam essentially said that he was doing fine, and just that it was a little “weird, haha”. I told him to call me soon so we could talk about it, but neither of us really followed up. Ultimately, I was scared and didn’t want to rock the boat, and up until that point we hadn’t really been the type of siblings that typically confided our deepest feelings in one another, so I’m not sure that either of us even knew where to start. So we let our busy lives fill the silence.
They did. Going through this is a lonely process, especially since there are so few donor conceived folks out there (that are aware of their origins…estimates are that only about 10% of donor conceived (DC) folks are “in-the-know”). The difference is that, in our case, I’m NOT 100% in this alone. I DO have 3 former “womb-mates” who share this crazy situation with me. But each of us process things differently, and as a result seem to still be going through our shared origin story individually. We live across the country from one another, and so rarely talk. What we seem to want from all of this moving forward seems, so far, to be different, too. I just wish it didn’t feel like I’m still going through this alone.
What a very Adam-like response…