Doubt if I fathered this baby

With Auntie Agatha,gataedo@yahoo.com, agatha.edo@gmail.com,Tel: 08054500626

Dear Agatha,

I met my wife in 2004. Shortly after our meeting she told me she was pregnant. As a result of the pregnancy she moved into my house.

I decided to see her parents to do the normal thing.

In the process of doing that she announced she was again pregnant. At this point, I suspected a foul play. And when the baby came, the second child, it bore no semblance of me. But I kept quiet.

I am however thinking of paying her bride price in April but almost every member of my family is against it, because they are of the opinion that the child isn’t mine. The child lacks any semblance of me.

Before I met her, she already had a child for someone else, something I regard as a mistake.

With what I have observed about the baby, what can I do to prove the paternity of the child? Besides this is the problem she is having with my family members. What can I do?

Concerned Man.



Dear Concerned Man,

What gives you the impression other than the fact that the baby doesn’t look like you that the mother of your child is cheating on you? Must all babies take after their fathers to be accepted by their paternal family?

Much as you have every right in the world to pursue the matter to a logical conclusion, this is a very delicate matter you must have to handle with all the maturity in the world. You have to have sufficient evidences to question the paternity of a child. You don’t condemn a child’s entire future or that of the its mother on account of the baby not taking after you in terms of physical appearance.

A lot depends on who among the two of you have the stronger gene. If the woman has the dominant gene, the children are most likely to take after her own side of the family in physical looks. It doesn’t make them less your children or lacking in any of your quality. A child can take after its mother or father side of the family in terms of look. To condemn its mother on account of this as being unfaithful is not only unfair to the woman but also to the baby as well. What excuse would you give the child in future if you are told you as the father needed the assurances of the medical science to accept responsibility for its existence?

If your position as well of that of your family is informed by the fact that she already had a child for someone else and on the basis of that cannot be trusted to stay faithful, discussing your fears with her is more ideal than subjecting her to the emotional trauma of your suspicion and lack of faith in her. Unless you have a pressing reason to doubt her, this would destroy whatever chance of happiness you have together.

Marriage isn’t about what your family wants but about you being happy. Are you happy with this woman? That she doesn’t get on with your family isn’t the same thing as she not getting on with you. Both of you have lived together for at least more than a year. What have you on your own discovered about her? Does she have some of the qualities you have always wanted in a woman? Besides what your family thinks about her, what do you think about her? Irrespective of what they think, your decision concerning her is final if you think she has what it takes to make you happy.

And if you noticed anything unwholesome about her character, did you at anytime discuss anything with her? Did you draw her attention to it or simply wait for your family to support whatever suspicion you have to stop whatever plans making permanent your relationship with her?

There is also the issue of the interest of those children to consider. Assuming you are right in your suspicion that the second child isn’t yours, what about the first one? What would happen to that child? Who will care for the child? These are issues you have to deeply reflect on before arriving at whatever conclusions you desire.

The fact that got pregnant immediately after the first doesn’t make her guilty of any crime. Did you not make love to her within the period? Did you use any form of protection? For some women, pregnancy could occur in the first month after delivery. That she got pregnant almost immediately after the birth of her first child doesn’t make her guilty of anything. She has no power to determine the way her body works. Her body is functioning at the level God designed it to.

If you however feel you still want to go ahead with your decision to prove the paternity of the child, through Deoxyribonucleic Acid (DNA), go and see your doctor who would make arrangements for it to be done. Because the DNA contains the genetic instructions used in the development and functioning of all known living organisms, it is the most conclusive means still available to man to determine the paternity of a child. Since it contains the instructions needed to construct other components of cells such as proteins and RNA molecules, it is most accurate than the usual blood test.

To minimise the effect of your decision on mother and child, be bold and honest. Make her understand it is the only way you can relate freely with you and the child.

Plead with her for her support because at the end of it all you two still have pending matters that would forever require your joint attentions irrespective of whether you decide to go ahead with the marriage or not.

Both of you should pray for the peace of God in your lives because if His presence is in your lives, this dreadful suspicion wouldn’t have been.

Good luck.