[ti]shock[/ti]Tell us your "strange coincidence" story.

If you can find your father though, he might have had other children.

My mother-in-law was reunited with her brother when she was in her sixties. She did know about him but he had no idea that he had a sister. They are in contact a lot now, but he lives in England.

LOL at a gracie sister.

I had one adopted cousin.. she was no different to us than the other 30 odd cousins (on Mum's side alone) that we had...she was my age and we spent a lot of time together in school hols etc.. she didn't live close to us.
She never married or had kids... has a partner now I think..

I always thought it would have been a bit hard if I had been adopted into a family that had bio kids Fig. I have an adopted brother.

Bio Mum would have had a hard time, being sent away because she wasn't married and stuff. She was Catholic, there was probably nuns involved and they can be really mean LOL. plus I was a nightmare birth- they had to get the forceps, poor thing. I had a caeserian thank god. haha.

When I went into adoption services here about 18 months ago to get copies of my adoption papers I got a bit of a shock.

Hubby said to me when he dropped me off did I want him to come in with me...............for support.

I said no...........there was no surprises expected...................just paperwork for my family history.

When I sat down for the compulsory counselling session she told me she had a bit of a shock for me.

A man had gone in there a few years ago saying that he was my natural father.

I asked them why they had not contacted me...................I had signed papers years ago saying I was open to contact from anyone on either side.

They said he did not match the physical description my mother had given of my father...............(she had refused to name him)

My natural grandmother had told me who my father was...........as she did not know my mother hadn't...............(and I never told anyone this)

So I asked the lady what his name was.

And it was not who I was told was my father.....................but it was a name I knew was known to my natural family.

So I agreed to have contact with him to tell him myself that he was not my father.

He was the one who also told them that my natural mother had died.

I left there a tad confused about how I felt about it all.

I also am not one for sitting back and waiting for others to sort things out for me.

So I decided I was going to track down some of my natural mothers sisters and brothers and find out what was what.

I found one of her sisters on Facebook and asked her is my mother was still alive.

She told me to ring her that night...............and I did.

My mother was still alive.......................(but very unwell........and in care)

I told her about the guy who thought he was my father...........and how he had contacted adoption services and wanted contact with me............and that I had decided to tell him personally that he was not my father.

She said to me................it was too late....................he died that afternoon.

Golly! No wonder family trees are so difficult to sort out.

As some of you will know we had an adopted son (fostered then adopted)
His mother had been put into care at the age of 3 after her mother died and her father remarried, so she had no role models when it came to parenting.

She had her first child at 16 and then twins a couple of years later all of whom were put up for adoption.
So our little fella was her 4th. when he was born she gave him to a friend (who had already had a child taken from her by the welfare and was unable to have more) and in order to square things with the authorities the friend's husband (a policeman would you believe) signed a stat dec to say he was the father, even though this was patently untrue.

We became involved after the baby failed to thrive (he had a defective heart) the so-called 'parents' separated and the welfare stepped in and told his mother either she would have to care for him herself or they would take him into care. His mother was boarding with a family down the road from us at the time - she was obviously not coping and we started minding him for her when she went out.

Then she moved into a share house with other young people as scatty as herself. The occasional minding turned into most weekends, then whole weeks at a time, and we used to dread giving him back because he would so often come back to us with unexplained bruises. Eventually we asked her if we could apply to officially foster him. She agreed and then said "Oh, well, if you are going to foster him you might as we adopt him" and that was that.

Sadly his heart problem didn't improve, he was in and out of hospital all his little life and a couple of months before what would have been his 3rd Birthday - and just 2 weeks after the adoption was finalised - he died in my arms on the flying doctor plane on an emergency flight from Kalgoorlie, where we were living at the time.

We were shattered - I really thought I would never get over it - but time does heal and when I remember him now I remember the love and happiness he brought into our family and I know we are all much better people for having had the privilege of loving and being loved by him.

Looking back I feel he just didn't have the blueprints for being any older and crammed a whole lifetime into those 2 short years

That is sad, penny.. Good though that he had time with people who loved him (you and your family).

Similar story... parents went on holiday... left their son at the neighbours next door (my step MIL's sister/OH and kids).. parents never came back... The neighours they left him with, kept him and brought him up.

Sadly, he died in a windsurfing accident when he was in his early 20's. Of course the parents showed up then.. wanting the funeral where they lived (not were he had lived all his life, where the people who brought him up lived). He had a very good job and had saved a huge amount of money.. so they were after that ..... . The couple that brought him up didn't want/need the money, but they sure didn't appreciate the 'missing' parents laying claim to it.

Penny, what you and Mr Penny did for that little one is so beautiful. You gave him the gift of love and safety. Beautiful.

I put in a library request for that one Kay.

Still Alice sounds sad.... when my Mum was in the retirement home there was a woman in her 40's in there... not sure if alzheimers though.. maybe brain damage...She was quite unnerving (for other residents and visitors).. called out the same things all the time (mainly negative things about the Catholic Church) and her stare went right through you.. she wasn't there long.. moved on.. to somewhere more suitable perhaps..

this is why you are so beloved by so many.because you're YOU.

Thank you Mamasin, what a lovely thing to say.
It is 40 years now since Alan died. In that time we have grown into a huge extended family, far flung now, but still closeknit and unfailingly supportive of each other. I firmly believe this empathy and family bond is Alan's gift to us all.

you know what? it's REALLY cool that we all have incredible family members who do so much good too!
it gives you faith in HUMANS,doesn't it?

Here is another coincidence that happened on the weekend.

I was in K-Mart in the book section and I picked up a book from a display table and it was written by Jojo Moyes.  I have never heard of Jojo Moyes before but I gave it a quick scan and it looks like a nice bit of chick lit so I decided to give it a go.

Before I left I noticed a book by my favourite author, Marian Keyes. One I hadn't read so I'm definitely buying this one too.  I turned it over to see the reviews and recommendations on the back cover.  There were four reviews.  Three from British newspapers and one from...... drum roll...... Jojo Moyes.