ok so this may be completely futile posting this, but I am pretty much hitting roadblocks every where else I look. I am trying to help my boyfriend locate his father. We dont have much to go on. All we know is his first name, approx. age, height, and physcial description, and that in 1988 he lived in bloomington, il and attended a rehab/AA meetings there. We tried to call the rehab and get his last name but they wont give us any information because of HIPAA laws. Im just wondering if anyone has any ideas or knows of anyway to get around HIPAA. We dont have much money for a PI and ive posted on message boards for peoplefinders and classmates.com and such. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
You’re not going to get around HIPAA without breaking the law.
That isn’t enough info. You could try doing 23andme and getting the DNA tested - he might be able to find some relatives on the paternal line that COULD give you a last name. This would be a long shot - maybe 1 in 20 to 1 in 50. It seems like most of the people on that site are White/European - if he isn’t - even longer shot.
However - if you have a list of POSSIBLE last names - that could help narrow it down further.
Thanks, i think we are willing to try just about anything at this point. It’s so frustrating knowing that the one place that can give us his last name/info on him cant because of this law. I know its there for a reason but DAMN!
If there’s a story attached to this that the local newspaper might be interested in, you could use the article to ask if there’s anyone in the area who remembers being in rehab with him. I know that might not be possible and/or desirable.
Why can’t you just ask the place to pass on a message to the person.
Or put his information here and maybe if you’re looking for him, he’s looking for you and it will come up in a Google search. Most people google themselves
You are expecting too much from too little information. Putting aside the HIPAA issue, you would be expecting the rehab place to give you the last names and whatever other info on how many guys who went to rehab in Bloomington that year? Eight Ernies? Ten guys named Lou? Was he even addmitted to an in house treatment program? Maybe he only went to the AA meetings or was an out-patient.
Even if they were to cooperate ,they don’t know which man you are looking for, all you have is a first name and a description of every other guy on the street. Are you sure the first name is correct. You’ve got to have some more information.
Where was he born? Don’t need the exact city because the records may be held by the county. Did he ever work? Doing what? Somebody knows more information if you have his first name.
My neighbor’s name is Lou, but he goes by Ernie, I have no idea why, some inside family joke from when he was young.
I’ll start with the obvious.
Has your boyfriend checked his birth certificate? The father’s name should be there, doesn’t have to be though.
Next step, was his mother married to the father? She might have been depending on how old your boyfriend is. She also could have lied about it. You might want to check the county court house where your boyfriend was born to see if there is a marriage certificate for her. He might also want to check the other areas that his mother lived at around that time.
Another option is to check the newspapers for birth announcements where he was born. Not all papers do this so it might not work.
Another long shot that I can think of that most may not is getting your boyfriend’s original Social Security forms. Unless your boyfriend filled out the forms himself then the mother and father may also be named. He will have to request the paperwork himself.
There are other ways, but I’d have to think about them more.
Good ideas.
Also, did he try asking his mother? Are there any other relatives that might have been there or might know?
Another option might be the phone book for Bloomington, Il in 1988, but with only a FIRST name, that would be tedious. See if you can find an electronic version.
If you know what schools he might have attended, you could check school directories or yearbooks.
We asked his mom, and she says she only remembers his first name. questionable i know! He’s not on the birth certificate. We already checked that so i doubt he would be on social security forms. Everyone basically says they dont know anything about him. He has never met him. I signed up for classmates.com and have posted on the message board but to no avail! I’ve been looking at the pictures of people posted on their with the same first name, and nothing that even resembles his dad. Do you know where i can find an electronic phone book for that year??
Unless they only had one drunken hookup or something she is not telling all she knows, your best bet is for your BF to seriously speak with his mom and let her know he wants to find his father no matter what bad blood exists.
Your BF’s mom is the best source for this info.
Then one of the family tree type DNA testing might come up with some results. They have tests that do only the male line, the female line and there are tests that will look for close relatives. Now of course that means that someone else would have to have taken the tests too. Some of them are not cheap either.
I’d also say the best way is to just ask the mom.
Why not ask the rehab clinic to contact him and give him your details? Then he can contact you if he wishes.
For those who suggest asking the rehab clinic to pass the message along, I think it’s entirely possible that the clinic does not have any up-to-date contact information for someone who visited there 24 years ago. I’ll go with the others in saying that mom should be asked for more information. Even if she’s telling the truth about knowing only his first name, ask her where and how she met him. Does she remember anyone else who knew him? If she met him at the rehab clinic, does she remember others from there who might remember him?
Well, we have sat down with his mom and asked her, and she said she doesnt remember anything else. I dont know if we should just give up, or if when we get the money maybe hire a PI? I dont know if a PI would be able to find anything out based on the little information we have anyway.
And for AA, isn’t one of the hallmarks of AA the fact that it’s, uhh, anonymous? I’ve never been part of AA - do they take down your full name for their confidential files and then let you mingle anonymously, or is it fully anonymous?
It’s as anonymous as you want it to be. There is no registry or place they take down names. Some of the regular attendees learn the full names of other people as part of getting to know them well, seeing them around town, etc.
There might be some AA people who remember him and could fill in a few more details, but it’s another long shot. I’m not sure how you’d spread the word in the AA community either.
Does mom’ family (sisters?) or best friends remember anything more about this guy - where he worked, who HIS friends were, etc.? In the circle of friends, someone might remember something, unless it was one of those relatively anonymous hookups that nobody told their friends about.
Surprised no one has asked this.
Why?
Why does you boyfriend want to find what seems to be some random guy his mother doesn’t even remember? Is it curiosity? Is there some important health issue? The answer to that is very relevant to how far you should take it or how much you should spend.
Another vote for mom knowing alot more than she is telling or is hiding something. It could be that she hid the pregnancy from him, or he was one of several guys who could be the father but just figured she would use him as the example.
Even a few one nighters I have had over the years I could find if I had to as I tend to keep info, email addresses, notes from chat times with contacts from personals.
I don’t know, people didn’t tend to have email addresses or Facebook pages in the 80’s, which I’m guessing is the general timeframe we’re talking about here. I dated enough people that I knew by first name and phone number alone. This doesn’t seem that surprising to me.
Sure, it’s worth it to pursue a little more with the mom. But I can believe she’s telling the truth.