I’ve always kind of wondered about this, where a man has kids that turn out not to be his biologically, but was (supposedly) clueless about it until the wife fessed up, or a paternity test was done.
I mean really, come on! I can look at teenaged son and daughter and see crystal clear facial and physical physical traits that come directly from my side of the family. If a kid looks like your wife, but has little if any resemblance to you, isn’t hat a pretty clear indication you’re not the bio-dad.
Is this really a brain teaser for so many men, or do many of them kinda-sorta know the probablility is high they are not the bio-dad, but go along with the notion that they are for the sake of the integrity of the family?
I have wondered that too. I don’t have anything to worry about with my 2 1/2 year old daughter. People freak out when they see me with her because the resemblence is so strong. They don’t say that to my wife much at all. However, my younger brother who looks very similar to me also has a young child. My brother has very dark brown hair and eyes and chiseled facial features. His son looks like a little blonde haired, blue eyed cherub. I believe that it is his but he got furious at me this summer when I made a joke about it.
It is possible that your biological child simply won’t look much like you. It is also possible that your wife may have gotten the supplies from another depot. Most men would tend to assume the former rather than the latter when it comes to a child that they love. Sometimes, the evidence for the latter is pretty strong however and they either figure it out and just play dumb or get pissed and try to get the courts to let them out of the deal (doomed to failure).
Well… in my experience, in most cases where you have a child, and his or her bio dad, there is generally some readily identifiable physical trait(s) that the bio dad can (or should be able to) see as evidence of his genetic paternity. It’s not like you have to call CSI in on the case. The evidence is generally in front of you.
If the child has few if any physical traits in common with the father I can imagine most men would be quite suspicious that they are not the bio-dad. It’s not rocket science. The number of men who are (purportedly) “surprised” or shocked that they are not he genetic father is what amazes me.
I’m a girl, so forgive the intrusion - I don’t look anything like my dad. If you take a picture of me as a kid and my mom as a kid, you can’t tell them apart (other than the black-and-white). We have the same faces, same hair (that got curly at puberty), same teeth, same mole on the forehead, really similar voices, handwriting and gestures. The things I got from my dad (height, fast metabolism, tendency towards depression) aren’t things that would be readily apparent, nor easily perceptible when I was a baby/ little kid.
I don’t mean to say that my dad couldn’t tell I was his daughter - but it seems like a conclusion that would be based less on physical similarities and more on abstracts, like identification and emotion.
I’ve known three kids that were “misidentified”. It was not readily apparant in any of the cases - there’s always Grandpa Al or someone with any feature you can see in a child.
I too am wondering why we’re going just on physical traits. The only physical features I share with my dad are dark hair and eyes, not exactly things that would seal the deal. However, I am very like him (and his side of the family in general) psychologically, much more so than my brother and sister who have more physical resemblance to him. You can’t discount the personality.
I’m the same way with my parents as aurelian is with hers. It was pretty obvious when I was growing up that I was my mother’s daughter, but it wasn’t until I was late in adolescence that any physical similarities with my father popped up. I have the female version of his body type – short legs, long torso. In the past couple years, my nose has turned into a feminine version of my father’s. Any other physical traits that don’t come from my mother are from my grandmothers.
As for personality, I am the image of my father. We’re both impatient, perfectionist procrastinators, who would rather do something ourselves than see someone else fail, because at least then it’s our fault. At the same time we’re both very empathetic and soft-hearted. The personality thing has been there since I was born. There was never anyway I was anything but my father’s daughter for exactly that reason. But from looking at me when I was little? Couldn’t really tell unless you knew his mom.
Missus Case is Japanese and I’m a blue-eyed blonde, and Little Case has reddish blonde hair and grey eyes, so I’m pretty sure the milkman wasn’t involved.
I share almost no physical similarities with my pops or most of that side of the family – they’re taller, leaner, more athletic. Pops also suffers from a host of allergies I’ve never had. Where it’s obvious I’m his child are personality traits and intellectual inclinations. And these became apparent long before I went to live with him at age 15.
My daughter inherited all her physical traits from her father, and none from me: to the extent that if I am out somewhere with her and another woman, it is assumed that the other woman is the mother. None of my sister’s children resemble her in the slightest either.
My dad is Filipino. My mom is tall, pale, blonde, and blue eyed. At first glance I don’t look especially like either of my parents, unless all of us are standing together (which is rare considering they’ve been divorced for ages and my mom lives in another state). Some people think I’m Native American. Filipinos that don’t already know me sure don’t think I’m half Filipino.
I don’t look like my Da at all. From the neck down and re coloring, I’m Mom’s clone.
Thanks God, the part that goes over the neck came directly from my paternal grandma.
My brothers look a lot like Da, you have serious problems finding any bits that look like Mom. The biggest difference between Youngest Bro and pictures of Da at the same age is that the pics are black and white and Bro still has all his hair.
But of course, if you look like your Da and not like your Mom, nobody makes nasty jokes (not that it couldn’t happen, I’ve known cases).
My sister and borther-in-law both have dark hair and brown eyes. They have a set of twins. The boy twin has dark hair and brown eyes. The girl twin has blond hair and blue eyes.
I’m thinking it’s not really likely that one twin was fathered by my BIL and the other wasn’t. I mean, sure, that happened on The Guiding Light , but so did a lot of things I don’t commonly experience in real life.
My dad and I look almost nothing alike, and looked even less alike when I was a kid. A music teacher I had for years once asked me if I ever got to see my real dad! (My parents are married.) My dad is Ashkenazi and really looks it - black curly hair, olive skin, brown eyes. My mom is of Irish descent, though, and while I don’t really look like her per se, my coloring is obviously inherited from that side of the family - I’m very pale, with dead straight light brown hair (blond when I was a kid), and blue eyes. The physical attributes I inherited from my dad are all minor things only I would notice: long narrow feet, a yellowish cast to my skin (it’s like I have the world’s palest olive skin) and bushy black eyebrows that look out of place on my face. My sister doesn’t look a lot like my dad either, except for her curly hair, something no one in my mom’s family has.
And yet, I am pretty sure dad is dad. My mom has told me more than I ever wanted to know about their decision to conceive.
Re-reading this point, it occurs to me that I have some college friends who infamously broke up for about seven months and then got back together – shortly after which the woman announced she was pregnant. One of my friends took this news much more angrily than anyone else in our circle who could do the math. About a year after she had the kid, and after my two friends got married, my friend who got all upset by the pregnancy in the first place cornered me one day and asked, “You think that kid looks like anything him?” I had to admit he didn’t look much like his mother OR the man she was married to. “But,” I stressed,“That’s his son.”
Whether or not that kid is biologically his son may well be irrelevent unless some medical issues come up. Spiritually, behaviorally, emotionally, that IS his son. They have love, trust, a bond, respect and mutual admiration and pride. I would never voice my suspicions. If my friend suspects he may not be that kid’s biological father it hasn’t caused much visible stress. BTW, he and his wife have been married six years now.
In many respects biological relations are overrated.
I am the spitting image of my mother except for the eyes - they’re my Dad’s. However, I didn’t start looking like my father until I was in my late teens. My younger brother also has Mom’s features, but looks more like her brothers. Weirdness.
I don’t think it’s always just as simple as seeing if they look like their father. I’ve known many kids who look nothing like their fathers, but there was no question.
Anecdote:
I had a friend (let’s call her Courtney) who, over a period of several months, was sleeping around with three different guys, and got pregnant. She instantly claimed it was her longtime boyfriend’s, and they got back together, reconciled, etc. There was a lot of whispering behind her back, and for good reason. When the baby arrived, it ruled out one fellow that she hadn’t been with at the time the baby was conceived (unless the baby was in there for eleven months, and I think she would have had some complaints about that!) The other guy who might have been the daddy had flaming red hair…
So, one day, I bumped into my old friend at a gas station, where she had her baby, and she let me hold her. While cooing and playing with the baby, I gave her a good, scrutinising look.
Later on, when I went to work, I mentioned to everyone that I had seen Courtney’s baby. Everyone asked in hushed tones: “So, did the baby have red hair?” And I said no… “Did the baby look like X?” I said no… “Did the baby look like Y?” No, no… “Well, who did the baby look like?” I said that the baby looked like Courtney. Silence. Then I couldn’t resist: “Well. At least we know who the mother is!”
I was at the old Panama Hilton (in the pool section of course) with My Lawyer, my wife, my father-in-law and a young man who could have been my son. My F-i-L was convinced the kid was mine. He told me not to waste the money on a DNA test.
My Lawyer was convinced he was not my kid.
I was certain he was.
My wife was unsure and insisted on the test. She always get what she wants.
I was so sure that I paid to have the kid’s teeth fixed (he had been opening beer bottles with them) and signed him up for a year of school.
The DNA test came back negative.
Both the kid and I were crushed, but you cannot argue with science.
I think people notice more the similiarities than the lack of them… I dated for 4 years a girl that had a kid from her former relationship. When we started dating the kid was 1 year old…
When we went out with her kid everyone really thought he was my kid… and it was an easy mistake to make. People just try and match the similarities. Naturally he did get some of my expressions and physical ways of moving… making him even more similar to me.