How weird is it to find out about a father's death after 3 years

[HereSince1628]

Poll question: How weird is it to find out about a father's death after 3 years

[CanuckAmok]

1. It was six for me...

...his new family m,ade a point of keeping it a secret so I couldn't contest his will.

[HereSince1628]

2. That sucks

I have nothing to add but best wishes.

[truthspeaker]

3. that sucks. Here's another one

This happened to my grandfather. He found out his father had died only a few months after the fact, maybe less. The catch was he thought his father had been dead for 55 years. His parents divorced in 1905, the year he was born, and his mother told him his father was dead. 55 years later he gets a call from someone claiming to be his half-brother, telling him the father he thought had died 55 years ago had just died recently.

[HereSince1628]

4. Similar story for my father...

my grandfather died in 1934, my grandmother left him in 1924, and told my father that he was dead. My father found out the truth in 1954 when one of my aunts wanted to sell the oil rights (so. Ill).

I learned my father died while researching my own IRS records on the web...so much for close family ties.

[trof]

5. Apparently this isn't uncommon?

Parents divorced when I was 4 and we never saw him or his family again.
A few years ago I was "discovered" by some cousins from his family that I never knew existed. I learned that he died several years ago in his 50s. Have no feelings about it, one way or the other.

BTW, it's been great finding family I didn't know about, in spite of them mostly being right-wingers.

[HereSince1628]

6. Apparently not, but it doesn't fit well with the prevailing model

based on Dick, Jane, Sally, Spot and Puff.

Personally, I'm a cast-off rather than a discovery. Like you I don't have stong feelings about my non-membership.

I heard a song by Robin and Linda Williams a number of years back in which relative of ex-spouses were lamented as disappearing "like ghosts in the wind."

There is an odd feeling to being ghost while still alive.

[CanuckAmok]

7. Fight Club:

talks about the phenomenon of men just pulling up stakes, leaving their families behind, moving somewhere else, and starting another "franchise".


I don't have an emotional attachment to my dad--I hardly knew him. But he was quite wealthy, and never paid alimony or child support to my mom or me. He lived in England, so it was very difficult enforcing child support laws against him. He died in 1992, worth about 5 million pounds. My half-sister and her mom got everything, because her mom and uncle made sure I didn't find out about my father's death until after the will was executed. My half-sister is this 20 something twit who is a minor TV personality, and goes to Ascott Ladies' Day and all that other poncy classist crap in England. Basically, she got everything I never did; excellent education, orthodontic work, connected opportunities, and a big bag of loot when my asshole father died.

Those people, I have quite an emotional attachemnt to. Mostly blinging, white-hot hatred.

[JohnKleeb]

8. weird but not at all rare

My grandfather who is still living doesnt know what happened to his brother, I did a search on the SSN death list and we may have found him. Still not sure but we can't ask anyone else because all my grandfather's siblings have passed on.

[HereSince1628]

9. I wouldn't say this is good, but I am surprised about how common

this is.

And that isn't to say that it is a majority of cases, but there really seems to be a large number of people whose emancipation from their families is an act of/or results in estrangement.

[JohnKleeb]

13. Well its good and bad IMO

Good because you know what happened bad because well you know its sad. With my great uncle supposely he went off to California, he was a dancer according to my grandfather, and they were from Pennsylvania orginally.

[Faygo Kid]

10. Mine left when I was 9; saw him again at 23, then dead four months later

Long story, of course, but he split when I was 9 (beat my mother, alcoholic), then called out of the blue when I was 23. Went and saw him with my brother next when I was 23. Bizarre but cordial meeting. Then, he died a few months later, and I identified his body at the morgue, and made arrangements to ship him back to Minnesota, where he was from. Inherited $20 from his wallet, which was full of pictures of my brother and me when we were little. That was it; my relationship with my father. Apparently not alone, according to these posts. Been a good Dad to my own daughter (now 27). I have outlived him. Conservative "family values?" The world is never so simple.

[HereSince1628]

11. Well, sorry, and good job both seem appropriate.

I think there is a story hiding in your dad's wallet, though I don't presume to know what it really is.

Good-o on your daughter.

[Faygo Kid]

12. Pretty simple story, I think, and thanks.

Those pictures represented what his life once was, briefly, and might have been (as the poets say, "the saddest words. . . ). All he had out of life. Thanks for the compliment; just another dad who did his job. (Miss her though; she moved far away. Had a great time with her at New Year's, though; watched lots of football together, which may seem strange, but she always liked watching football with dad).

[TheZoo]

14. I found out on New Year's Day that my grandfather

Died on Thanksgiving day. They (my grandma & mom) decided not to tell me until 1/1 because they didn't want to "ruin my holidays."

From T-day until the day before New Year's Eve was Marie's O8) time of the year. My mood was bad enough before I found out, and I'm still in shock.