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I don't know if the terminolgy is usual or not, but I think if you are going to embark on this then as difficult as it may be you will have to accept that you may find out some unpalatable things. If your wife wants to find the truth of her story I don't see how she can pick and choose what she wants to know. Maybe some counselling before you go any further would be a good idea. Good luck

Guess it would depend what the court order was for? Could be lots of reasons for birth father name being missing from birth certificate. In order for his name to be in the certificate I think he would have had to be there when the birth was registered? If he wasn't, then his name wouldn't be on it. What does your wife want to do? Hopefully she is getting some support from social care while she searches?

Hi. I was a relinquished baby. It is quite normal for the birth certificate (original one) to not have birth father name on it. The birth father had to be at the registrars office at the time of registering the birth to be on the certificate. Also given the birth mothers age (below age of content) the legal realities of being on the certificate for BF would of been complicated. My original certificate is the same. I would suggest that you contact the Post Adoption Support SW at the Local Authority your wife was adopted from. They will source the original adoption file and it will be very informative regarding BM and BF. The SW are trained to guide your wife through this process and can make contact on her behalf with Birth Family if this is what your wife wants. Many birth families registered on the adoption file if they were open to contact at a later stage. It really is not recommended that you do this on your own, social media traces can open an unwanted can of worms and you loose control.

There are counselling services specially trained to help your wife through this process. Having known several adults of my own generation who traced birth parents in their twenties, i know they had a whole range of different experiences. Its worthwhile getting some support and guidance.

I don't think its possible to prevent heartache - but to prepare for it and understand it as much as possible. Counselling is advised for all adoptees seeking information about their birth circumstances - especially if they are considering contact. That is from a specialist service who help with tracing - maybe AUK could advise or as suggested contact post adoption support in your area or a specialist organisation. Whatever happened for a young girl to give up her baby it will be hard to deal with and your wife will need all the support she can get. Also I don't think there is anything that is "better off not known" - we often imagine things to be far worse than the reality and the actual circumstances / facts once known will help your wife understand what happened to her and come to terms with it - she doesn't have to share it with others if she'd rather not

Hi all who have kindly commented and left advice/your opinions. It's very much appreciated. I guess I'm just trying to protect my wife from any upset, but like you've all intimated, you can't pick and choose what you find out. If you've chosen to find out about your past, you have to be prepared to find some good and bad information. I'm very supportive of her journey toward finding her birth mother, and she does things at her pace and is as much or as little involved in the process as she feels comfortable. Reading the terminology of the letter, we have both speculated about her conception and some of the possible scenarios. We know from her adopted parents, that her mother was very young, but what if her birth father was much older, for example? I also fear her finding out something quite sinister about her conception (for example), which might cause irreversable emotional damage. She's currently in two minds about delving further into her past, saying that there's always been an uncertainty and absence of something in her life. However the old age 'ignorance is bliss' is very much comforting to her.

I think you have been given some excellent advice and like the other posters I would strongly recommend not doing this alone, but getting professional help. Your local authority has a duty to support anyone affected by adoption, including adult adoptees looking to trace their birth families. The professionals are trained to do this and can go through all the implications with your wife and help her to make the best decision. They also work with birth parents and can mediate and find out information before any direct contact is made (sometimes birth families do not want contact for a host of different reasons). In terms of her birth Dad, as others have said the reason he is not on the birth certificate is most likely to do with her birth mother's age at conception as he could have been charged. He is most likely to have been a similar age and its unlikely there is anything more sinister....but anything is possible and there may be some really tricky stuff that is uncovered as your wife starts to delve....which is why professional help is really important.