I (27M) am a Child of an Affair, My Step-Father (57M), Who Disowned Me 10yrs Ago, Just Passed from Cancer, I don't know what to feel.

I don't even know if this is the right place to talk about this. I feel this weight on my chest and I need to get it off.

Growing up I thought I was the luckiest kid in the world to have my family. Sure, my older twin sisters by 7 years and I didn't get along much but I always linked that to them being girls and so much older than me, not to mention the weird twin thing. But I still loved them. My mom was a wonderful woman who was always there for me. And my dad, my dad was there for me too but he was a bit emotionally distant. I always thought that was because he was kinda old school macho, wanted me to be tough.

I was so wrong and I'll never forget the day the truth kicked me in the nuts and told me my days were numbered. Ten and a half years ago, the day after my seventeenth birthday party my dad and mom came into my room with the most serious of faces, I thought grandma died or something.

My dad looked at my mom and asked "Well?" Mom just shook her head and looked down. Shit, did grandma AND grandpa die? At the time I never thought there could be something worse than a death in the family, I was wrong.

So my dad looked me right in the eyes and said to the best of my ability to recall "I want you to understand that this isn't a joke, a prank, or anything else like that. What I'm about to say is as serious and truthful as it will ever get. Do you understand?" I nodded.

"Seventeen years and nine months ago your mother went on a trip with her sister Sally to Las Vegas and she had an affair," he started and it felt like the bottom of my gut fell out. I wanted to ask what but nothing came out.

My dad, because that's how I still thought of him, continued, "You were a result of that affair. The only thing we know about your real father was that his name was 'Steve' and your mother only knew him for a few hours before she slept with him." Mom was crying when I glanced at her, but dad's voice was always a commanding presence growing up so my attention snapped right back to him, "Your half-sisters (ouch that hurt) were seven at the time and your mother confessed the affair immediately when she got home. She begged me to take her back and I agreed. A month later, we found out she was pregnant. There was still a chance you could be mine but I demanded a paternity test once you were born. Eight months later you were born, they did the test, and you weren't mine."

What was I doing during all this? Sitting there in shocked disbelief and silence. My mother was sitting next to my dad, face in her hands, crying. But dad wasn't done yet.

"Now, I love your mother, so I promised the woman I love that I would give her son a safe and loving home until he was an adult but then he would no longer be welcome in my home. Which means that when you turn eighteen, you're out. I won't pay another red cent towards your life, that includes college. I told your mom she had until this day to tell you and she hasn't, that's why we're here. Do you understand what I've said?" Silence, "I expect an answer." "Yes."

Mark, that was my dad's name, stood up and walked towards the door of my room and I blurted "Does this mean you don't love me anymore, dad?" "I never loved you and my name is Mark." Mom tried to comfort me but I screamed that I hated her or some stupid bullshit. She told me she loved me then left my room too. I cried like a little bitch until I fell asleep.

The next day, Mark informed me that I was still responsible for all my chores around the house and told me to get off my ass and get to work. So I did, I was terrified of being kicked out. At dinner, yes we all ate dinner together, even then, Mark told me I needed to get some part time jobs to start saving money unless I wanted to be homeless.

I'll skip over this part a bit. The rest of summer vacation was filled with searching for a part time job and usually working three part time jobs (sleep is for the week). My girlfriend at the time dumped me because "I wasn't spending any time with her." I didn't tell my friends or her about it, I'm still not sure why. Maybe pride, maybe shame, maybe not knowing at that age how to remotely explain the situation. I used some of my summer money to buy a shitty, but running car for like $600, it was an old VW bug that needed to be push started most days and it didn't have A/C, which is a problem in the south. I returned the car Mark purchased for me when I got my license. I remember he looked at me how he looked at me before when he was proud of me, but it was only a fleeting moment.

When school started back up I realized it was going to cut into my money earning endeavors so I studied up on getting my GED, and had it by the time December rolled around. My mother, who was a SAHM, gave me around $1000 for Christmas. Mark gave me some windshield wipers for my rust bucket (which was more than I expected TBH). And my half-sisters, they got me a couple nice dress shirts I'd probably never go anyplace to wear them though. Seven months until the big 18 and I was done with High School. College wasn't going to happen, so I needed a trade, I had done some gofer work at an electrician so I asked him if he'd train me, and pay me, while I got my certs. His sons didn't want to uphold Electrician & Sons tradition of getting zapped for a living so he agreed.

Life at the house became pretty horrible. I basically slept there and occasionally I'd ask my mom about the situation when Mark was gone. What I learned is that Steve was very attractive, very charming, and my mom was very drunk. It didn't help that my Aunt Sally very much encouraged to affair and Steve. Which explained why I had an Aunt that I'd literally never met. Mom had tried to find out who he was but there wasn't much to go on. The months marched on, June hit and then my birthday. There wasn't a party. Mark literally brought boxes into my room and told me to start packing.

I had already bought two duffle bags and dumped all my clothes and personal effects into them. I took a shower and then I took my laptop and my mp3 player and was out the door. I'd already gotten a cheap phone with texting so I could keep in touch with work. And I also gave my mom my number.

I'd managed to save enough to get a tiny 1 bedroom in a shitty part of town. And that was my life. Thanksgiving rolled around, there was no invitation for me, I had a bologna sandwich. Most of my friends had gone off to college and what they say is true, out of sight, out of mind. Christmas, was bad, I called my mom and asked if I could come see her, she said we could meet somewhere.

Tears, I love yous, do you need anything? Don't cry mom, I love you too, no, I'm okay. On my nineteenth birthday, my mom didn't call me, I tried to hang myself off the living room ceiling fan in my apartment. The ceiling fan broke. So I got shit faced and called it a night. The next day I walked into a church and talked to the pastor.

He told me that what Mark did was unconscionable (I kinda understood Mark's position though) but that I had to focus on the good things going on in my life. Which was basically work. So Pastor-approved workaholism life is the life for me. I went back to talk to the Pastor a few more times to talk when the dark feelings came, he never tried to recruit me though, I always appreciated that.

From that point on, work was all I cared about. If I did my job and stayed to myself, I'd be okay. If mom called me, she called me, if not? "Oh what has to be done at work."

At this point I also started looking into plumbing certs. So when I wasn't working as an electrician I was going to school for plumbing. That "healthy" lifestyle lasted for two years. On my twenty-first birthday my coworkers took me out to a restaurant and our server was (then 21F now 27F) Beth. There was something about Beth, there still is. At the end of the evening I asked her out, not to a steakhouse where she worked.

As we're still together, and married, to this day it'd be a safe bet to say she knows everything. We married at 23. I invited my family, including Mom, my sisters, and Mark (hopeful? no, hope fool) Mom came, my half-sisters, who now knew the truth, did not. Mark? Do you have to ask? No, he didn't show up. I got to dance with my mom, reminded me of when I was a little boy and she would let me stand on her shoes and dance with me in the living room or kitchen.

Beth (then 24) gave me two beautiful children, a son and a daughter, twins strangely enough. Mom saw them, no one else from my "family" did. I know I've not mentioned it yet, but, we (Mark, mom, and I) still lived in the same small city. So on occasion, I would see Mark or mom out and about town. I remember seeing Mark shortly after the birth of my kids and thinking "he looks thinner."

Shortly after that I didn't see Mark around town. What I didn't know was that it was his first bout with pancreatic cancer. He survived that time, three years later, he didn't. I know why my mom didn't come meet me for our usual Christmas visit or why she hadn't been around to see my kids. Mark was dying and he finally lost his battle on Monday evening.

A part of me is sad that the only man I ever knew as a father is gone. I don't believe that he never loved me. You don't spent 17 years raising a son to be a good man without having love in your heart for them. I'm so angry at him, how could he not know after everything he did for me that I loved him and knowing the truth would only make me love him more. He didn't have to take care of me, he could have dumped my mom but he didn't. He stayed. He taught me to ride a bike, and fish, and drive. But maybe it was all just lies. I wonder if his obit will say "he is survived by a son." His memorial is on Saturday.

What does a person do in this situation? I don't even know what I'm asking. Should I go? Should I talk to my half-sisters? Try to make peace with them?

TL;DR Mom cheated 27ish years ago and made me. Not Dad disowned me at 17 kicked me out at 18. Not Dad died from cancer Monday. What the hell do I do?

Submitted December 31, 2020 at 11:44PM by ThrowRAOrphanAffair https://ift.tt/380IEgF