How do I find my birth father, my biological father, without a name?
I really want to know who my father is.
Is DNA the answer? Will DNA help me find my dad?
Why is it important to know who your father was?
For many people there is a big hole in their lives, half of their story is untold. They can’t reflect on who they most look like, or whether their musical talent is inherited, they have no idea whether their love for Ireland is because of their roots, or where their green eyes come from. When they travel on the train on a long journey, they don’t have the chance to look out of the window and remember that their ancestors came from a village just over that hill. They want to know if their father was a kind man or funny, generous or fond of his food, sporty or artistic, was he good with his hands or a clever clogs? Could they be proud of him? Would he be proud of them?
And then there are the health reasons. How do you answer questions about whether there is heart disease or glaucoma in your family when you don’t even know who your family are? What if there is a predisposition to something you need to be aware of, but you don’t know you are supposed to look out for it?
It is very hard for someone who is not in this position to understand the strong feeling of loss and the driving need to know that people have about discovering their unknown fathers. Here at Finding Families, we get it, we know that our clients will lie in bed tossing and turning for hours, with endless scenarios and unanswered questions burning away. That’s why we have dedicated ourselves to finding him and bringing peace.
What circumstances lead to people wanting to find out who their father was?
There can be many reasons why someone doesn’t know who their dad was. They may have been illegitimate, brought up by their mother but without a birth father, perhaps by a stepfather. They could have been a foundling, left on a church step in a soft yellow blanket – those people don’t know who either parent was; their need to know is even keener. They may have been donor conceived, so a loving dad brought them up and they wouldn’t change him for the world, but they still want to know who their biological father was. They could have been adopted, their birth mother’s details are on their original birth certificate, they may even have met her, but perhaps she won’t or can’t say who their father was. And for some people they simply want to get to the bottom of suspicions and family rumours, they want the truth.
Linda was a war baby, illegitimate and given up for adoption. She met her birth mother once after forty years, but she wouldn’t tell her anything about her father. Linda felt perhaps she was trying to protect her own reputation, particularly as they discussed this in front of the man she later married. But Linda couldn’t bear not to know, it consumed her. She spent years of her life speculating. Finally, she took an autosomal DNA test and came to Finding Families to understand the results. We were able to establish that her father was an American airman. He has long since died, but we were able to locate his two children in the States and help Linda to contact them. She has now been to visit, has seen pictures of her dad, visited his resting place and talked about him as much as she liked. It has completely changed her life and given her the sense of belonging she has always craved.
How can you find out who your father was?
Whether you are going to seek professional help, or try to find him yourself, there are different methods you can try, but in each case, you should start by gathering clues. What might you already know? You need to understand your story as best as you can, write down what you do know and can remember being told, if anything, about the circumstances of your birth. Think of any slender clues. Ask everyone who is in a position to add to that information. You might have a name and some geography possibly. Having a few clues to go on could really help.
Ann was illegitimate and never met her father, but her mother’s family told her his name and a few small facts about him. They knew which region of the country they believed he came from and had an idea what he might have done for a living. Ann took a DNA test and we started to draw closer to him, using the family trees of her DNA cousins as building blocks. We came across a man with the right surname in the right place who could be a relative, and because we had that clue from her, we stopped and looked closely at him. Eventually we were able to determine he was her great uncle and from there we found Ann’s father. We would probably have discovered him anyway eventually, but in this case, knowing what geography and surname to concentrate on cut the task down considerably.
How to find your biological father without a name
Most people don’t have a name though; some people know nothing at all. Thankfully, it is perfectly possible to find him without.
The first and most successful method to identify your father is through DNA testing
DNA testing
What is DNA testing? There are three main types of tests: autosomal, mitochondrial and Y-chromosome. The one that is most useful here is autosomal. That is the method that DNA genealogists would recommend. You would submit saliva to a laboratory and be sent your results by email.
Your sample will be compared with millions of others, and you will be given a summary of your likely ethnicity – which is what the TV adverts largely focus on, that you are 10% Spanish and that explains your love for paella for instance.
Crucially, you will also receive a list of everyone else in the database who shares some identical DNA with you. Depending upon how much DNA you have in common (it is measured in centimorgans, or cMs), determines how close your relationship is. So, you may find a large number of people on your list who are approximately fourth cousins, and a handful who are third and second cousins. If you find anyone closer than that you will really have hit the jackpot.
Attached to many of those DNA cousins of yours will be their family tree, which you may be able to see, depending upon their individual privacy settings. By studying those trees and finding connections, it is perfectly possible for a good genealogist to discover exactly who your family are.
We don’t recommend the following tests if you are looking for unknown birth family, but you may wish to know what they are anyway. Mitochondrial DNA is passed on only by a mother to her children, so if you took such a test, anyone you found that shared this kind of DNA with you, would have a common female ancestor within the last 500 years on the maternal line. You could share this DNA with a male, and he would have inherited it from his mother, but he won’t pass it to his own children. Most companies have stopped undertaking this now.
The Y DNA is passed on virtually unchanged, from fathers to sons. It is a useful tool for answering questions about the direct male line back into the medieval times. If you tested for this and were fortunate enough to find a decent match (without good matches it is not helpful) it could be useful, in a western society with the same naming patterns, to see what that person’s surname was in case it suggested what your father’s might have been. Again, most of the testing labs have stopped offering it for sale.
Tell me more about DNA and how it works
DNA testing: The practicalities
What is a second cousin, once removed or half?