How To Find Your Birth Father is a question we get asked often so we have put together a story from one of our clients Rosie.
My name is David Oates, I am the Head Researcher at Relative Connections, you can view my LinkedIn by clicking here.
I am also the director of an adoption support agency which is regulated by Ofsted. I have spoken about finding long lost family on BBC Radio 5 and was part of the featured team on BBC1’s Family Finders TV series.
Here is Rosie’s story
Rosie was embarking on a search to locate the father she had never met but always dreamed about
Rosie came to us earlier this year to find her father. This is Rosie’s story in her own words. Thank you to Rosie and her father for allowing us to use this story and photo.
I hope my story helps encourage other people to find lost loved ones missing from their lives!
I’ll be eternally grateful for all the help and support I have received from Relative Connections, Sue in particular. As well as taking care of the obvious practical tasks of conducting such a search. Relative Connections are extremely aware of the moral support that people in my situation need.
Growing up with no knowledge of a parent feels a bit like reading a novel with the first chapter missing; you still enjoy reading the novel, but it never quite makes complete sense.
I’d been curious my entire life about who my father is and what he is like. Since childhood, I have felt like a part of my heritage, roots and identity is somehow missing.
Finding myself curious over silly little things about myself such as, who have I inherited my curly hair from? Who have I inherited my athletic physique from?
Why am I left-handed when my mother and all her family are not?
Why is my personality so unlike that of my Mother’s?
These differences sometimes leaves me feeling incomplete or like I do not fit in, but most of all it leaves me curious about myself and who I really am.
(Above is Sue who supported Rosie throughout her search and found her birth father for her)
I have tried all my life to find a way of tracing my father. As an adult, I asked friends in various different professions, from police detectives to nurses, if they might be able to suggest how I locate a parent I know so little about.
Nobody had any answers for me and despite being surrounded by friends and colleagues every day, I felt like a huge part of my identity was undeveloped or incomplete. I lacked a sense of belonging in the world.
I had branches, yet I was rootless
I felt homesick even when I was in my own home. Not really knowing who I was. I had branches, yet I was rootless.
I had carried out some very rudimentary researching of my own prior to contacting Relative Connections, such as browsing through people with the same name as my father on Facebook and asking other family members if they might have any information that could lead to my father.
I was unsure about how else I could go about tracing someone I had never even met.
I came across Relative Connections in a very peculiar way. In February 2016, I was having my pet cat re-homed. The lady who bought my cat was very nice and although we had never met before, we instantly clicked and ended up having a long chat over coffee.
She told me that she was suffering from cancer and when she had first received her diagnosis in 2015, she felt the need to find out if anyone else in her family had suffered from similar health issues.
I listened very intently when she explained that she had managed to trace her biological parents through a special organization that deals with reuniting long lost family members.
I explained to the lady how I had always wanted to find my father, but didn’t know how to go about it. The lady gave me the details of the organization she had used so I contacted Relative Connections!
I decided to go ahead after the initial consultation because I got the impression Relative Connections was a very reputable organisation that offers a very high standard of service.
I spoke to Mel who was extremely professional, polite and sensitive to the emotionally delicate, yet challenging journey I was embarking upon. I was also aware of the extremely high success rate Relative Connections has.
I felt like I had nothing to lose and a lot to gain by trying and that if I was ever going to have any chance of locating my father, this was it.
When you find your Birth Father, it is a huge moment
It wasn’t long before my researcher called me to say they had located my father to a current residential address, three weeks to be precise!
Once the initial letter of contact was sent out to my father I went through a roller coaster of varying emotions. At times I felt optimistic and at other times I felt totally disheartened.
I tried to put the search out of my mind and just get on with my normal day to day life. It is important for people in my situation to be able to manage their emotions.
It is easy to feel emotionally vulnerable and open to rejection whilst you are awaiting a response.
But I will never forget the moment I was told my father had responded to the letter Relative Connections had sent out.
It was a cloudy Monday afternoon when Sue called me to tell me she had found my father and had just got off the phone to him.
I was in my kitchen making homemade butternut squash soup. Sue sounded extremely cheerful on the phone when I answered. She told me I should sit down before we had our chat. I was trembling, overwhelmed, happy and tearful all at the same time. I have never experienced anything like it in my life.
Sue arranged for me to call my father later on that evening.
Even though it was only a few hours later, waiting to speak to my father directly felt like the longest wait of my life. In a way I guess it was. I had waited 36 years for this conversation.
My very first telephone conversation was surprisingly easy.
We chatted for over an hour and there was an instant connection. I quickly realised my father and I are very similar in temperament. Even though I had never met him before. The similarity certainly brought to light the whole nature vs nurture debate!
I now speak to my father on the phone almost every day…
and we meet up once every week or so and it feels as though I have known him all my life.
It doesn’t feel like I am speaking to a virtual stranger (even though he kind of is).
It’s a bit like that feeling we all get when you meet up with an old friend you haven’t seen in years and you’re able to effortlessly just pick up where you left off without any awkward silences.
‘’Please do pass on my gratitude to Sue and all at Relative Connections. You are all doing a very important job. I hope my story helps encourage other people to find lost loved ones missing from their lives!’’
To begin your own how to find your Birth Father search call us now on 0113 282 5900