SurvivingInfidelity.com^®

New member.

Let me just get to the issue without a detailed background. If needed, I can fill in my background later.

I am 60 years old married to my wife in her mid fifties.. We have been married over 34 years. Only marriage for both. No issues, no separations, no mention ever of divorce or need for counseling. We have a son in early thirties and daughter in her late twenties, both now out of the house and living independently.

Recently I used a dna face matching app to see how closely related my son and I were. I did it to test the app and not because I had any doubts at the time about my son’s paternity. (That said, my son and I do not look alike at all, both in facial features and in bodily frame.) In short, I only wanted to see if the app could detect subtle features which indicated our relationship.

The app has a high score of 100. Any score of 50 or higher suggests a relationship of some type. The closer you get to 100, the closer you are likely related. Thus, as a pure example, a score of 60 suggests you are most likely an uncle, while a score of 80 or higher suggests you are more likely to be the father. A score of less than 50 suggests no relationship whatsoever. The lower the score is from 50, the higher probability of no relationship.

There were two tests. A basic test and an advanced test. Each test scored the same way.

I took the basic test first. My score was 34

I took the more advanced test. My score on the advanced test was also 34.

Both scores strongly indicate that I am not related to my son in any way.

I know a facial paternity test is not a real dna test, even though it is advertised as a facial dna test. Moreover I know the technology is still in its infancy, with no known studies to test its accuracy. That said, should I ignore these tests?

I have not spoken to my wife about this. Since my proof is based on a new technology, I am not sure I have any strong basis to raise the topic anyway.

As a side note, at the time of my son’s conception I had no fears that my wife was cheating. But then again, in the months before the conception I had just started a high stress job in a new field with long hours. In short, when my son was being conceived I was heavily distracted and overwhelmed with work.

Any chance for a surreptitious DNA test? In criminal cases, the police get used cops and glasses etc so the donor does not know he or she is donating.

The really frightening is before I got cheated on and started all this research, I would have thought you were nuts/paranoid to have suspicions based solely on what you have. Now, I see infidelity everywhere.

The only way to confirm one way or another is a DNA test, that obviously will require your son to participate.

To get there you're going to need to steer your boat thru mine filled waters. If the DNA test shows your son is indeed yours, this could really hurt your wife, and, shake up your relationship with your son.

If he isn't your son, then what? That will be more than just a bump in your marriage.

If you proceed with a DNA test, either result is going to hurt someone. Not proceeding probably puts a strain on your marriage, too. Hard not to withdraw from your wife if you don't know. Maybe you're strong willed enough to forget about this and carry on. Personally I think I would have to know.

The drama has just arrived in your retirement.

Probably best to be above board with your wife, arranging a secret test with your son I think would be a bad move.

The face dna stuff is in its infancy. You could try getting them to do one of those family tracking dna test for fun if it is really bothering you, or a true dna test. Speaking as a betrayed person that is a life time of beautiful memories to let go. If there is a different truth(chances are at this point probably not) You got to ask your self do you really want to know? If things are good with your family and have been for years do you really want to dig in and cut your own heart out? If you do it is your choice but I doubt any peace will come if it. You do deserve truth, but at your age you also deserve peace and love. As for the test it probably is not correct.

You should casually say to your wife that you’re going to have a DNA test and ask the children to have one too. You’re curious as to how much they inherit from each of you. (In my case I know that my son belongs to my husband but he looks nothing like him. I can find almost no resemblance but my son looks exactly like my side of the family). A geneticist said this is all a crapshoot. If you think about it you might have five brothers from one family and they all look different. Back to DNA. If your wife balks it’s time for one and acting in good faith ask her to have have one too.

My kids look like my H and his side of the family.

They are adopted.

I’m sure the facial recognition test would score very high for us.

I think it’s nonsense and unless you have a DNA test done you should discount this.

I have many siblings. I look like one grandmother. My other siblings look like the other grandmother. Need I say more?

Get a real test. I second the "family DNA test for fun, and plus it has health insights!"

Alternatively paternity specific tests are $80 and you could try to do it without your wife finding out.

Agreed, do the whole "family time", and invite her to participate to see who inherited what. Make it seem like a fun game, and hopefully, it turns out to be a fun game instead of the alternative.

My kids don't look like their father. I see some similarities with some of his relatives and some of their medical stuff. Other than that though, they look like me.

ETA: I don't think you can tell much by a person's refusal to do DNA kits for fun either. I would NEVER turn over my DNA to some corporation.

[This message edited by SI Staff at 1:20 AM, Monday, February 14th]

Not an expert, but couldn't he collect something with saliva or hair surreptitiously?

I would think facial “DNA” tests would only be able to measure similarities in appearance. You need a real DNA test.

As a side note, at the time of my son’s conception I had no fears that my wife was cheating.

Is there any question of infidelity over the course of your relationship? Are there any concerns about your daughters paternity?

There’s no mistaking that my siblings and I are brothers, even though one of them has a different mother. I once waited on an Irish cop who did a double take when he saw me. He swore I was a dead ringer for his uncle. No Irish in the family tree on either side.

Not an expert, but couldn't he collect something with saliva or hair surreptitiously?

Most reputable places would need consent, so yeah.. that would probably mean falsifying documents or even outright forgery. Then there's what happens if your family member finds out you turned their DNA over without their permission. Personally, I view DNA as a privacy issue and I'd go bananas if I caught someone sending mine in without my permission.

Was curious about the face matching website. What's the URL?

We don't post unauthorized URLs.

If you think it would be "in character" for you, then just order some "23andme" kits, and don't even ask for opinions. Just say you're interested in what you can learn about yourselves and the others. It's not as reliable as a paid-for DNA test from a solid, reputable lab, but it's still pretty reliable. I mean, if your son doesn't share any DNA with you, the only way something like 23andme could get it wrong is if they used the wrong samples or got the results mixed up; the test itself that they have will absolutely show no relationship if there is none. If the results come back and they show anything other than a very high percentage chance that you're the father, you could then navigate the waters of asking for a more professional test.

It depends on your family dynamics, and your personality. For many people, doing 23andme would be completely in character and not raise any alarm bells. For other people, it would seem really strange, and your family might wonder if there's an ulterior motive.

A variant of this would be possible if you have a near relative (brother/sister/parent) who you trust enough to share your concerns with. If so, that person could pretend to have gotten really interested in genealogy, so much so that they decided to pay for a bunch of 23andme kits, and are asking a bunch of relatives to participate. They could say that they're starting with themselves and your family, and if the results are interesting, they'll move on to other close relatives. Then you'd just pay for your brother/sister/parents tests, as well as the tests for you own family. If that's more plausible, and you're not worried about the relative you take into confidence breaking your trust, it might be away to get around them suspecting you if it wouldn't be in character for you.

Depending on the relationship you have with your son, perhaps you could talk to him and keep it between the two of you. You could say that your feelings for him will not change at all based on DNA results, but if you're not his biological father, it's important for him to know, so that he can learn about any medical issues or genetic diseases that run through his biological father's side of the family. Obviously, how this would be received would depend hugely on the relationship you have with your son. I can imagine some sons who would completely understand your concern, and would understand that you think there's only a very small chance of you not being the biological father, and would understand that saying anything to his mother would cause a lot of hurt and damage for no good reason. I could also imagine sons who would want (or feel obligated) to tell their mother that you have these doubts.

I don't know much about facial matching, but I would be shocked if it's got anything greater than like a 80% chance of correctly showing that two people are unrelated. I'm pulling that number out of my ass; I just think if it was that easy for an AI to do it to a high degree of confidence, that human beings would be able to do it with a pretty decent amount of success, and the world would be a very different place, given the number of children that are born and raised by husbands who don't realize they aren't the biological father. I've seen estimates of up to 5% of children being born this way, which I don't really believe. But I would find 1% plausible, and that's a *lot* of kids; I really think if facial resemblance was enough to go by, we'd have seen many more fathers finding out than we historically have.

So, if it were me, I'd try to get the testing done without arousing suspicion. It's hiding the truth, but in this case, I think that's the better option. If I couldn't find a way to get it done without making my wife suspicious, then I'd have to think hard about whether to tell her about it in order to get the testing done, or else just let it go, and enjoy my golden years without potentially stirring up trouble. For me, I'm insecure enough that I'd probably need to know, even though the rational part of my brain might be telling me that I'd be far better off just letting it lie; the uncertainty would wear me down. But I think if I had better self-esteem, I'd be able to just let it go and enjoy my marriage and my son without investigating.

Whatever you decide, please update us. This sort of thing is going to get more and more common as time goes by, and it would be really useful for regular members here to learn from some real-life experiences, so that we're better able to advise others in the future.

I hope this works out for the best.

Got it, thanks.

For what it's worth, I look nothing like my mother, and neither does my sibling. Every feature of our faces is different than hers, from bone structure to facial details. We strongly leaned toward my father's side. If you saw me standing with my mother, you'd never guess our relationship.

I'm not sure what the facial recognition test would indicate, but I wouldn't be surprised if it also failed to find a resemblance.

My and my husband's kids are the more typical sort of mix, a little of each of us can immediately be seen in them.

I'm sorry you're going through this.

I would lump this in the same class as hair follicle analysis, which was accepted for years but recently disproven as highly inaccurate.

I wouldn’t trust it or stress about it, only an actual dna test will carry any weight.

I raised a brow when I first considered how a 99 cent smartphone app gimmick landed you on an infidelity web forum questioning total strangers about whether your kids were biologically yours…

Then I educated myself on this tech and your query is compelling.

I would follow up with a legit DNA test for peace of mind. If you’re like me, you’ll have no peace until you do. I wish I had the mental discipline to just block that out but I don’t.

If you could block this out, and not let it haunt you, and effect your relationship going forward, I absolutely would let this die. Because in the off chance it’s true, it was probably a one-off event, long ago, and your WW ultimately decided on you and followed through.

I have a hard time believing the DNA Facial App’s claims of 95% accuracy based on a one dimensional photograph. Did you use photographs or a LiDAR scan of a real multidimensional face?

If you prove the app wrong, you could have a good legal case based on pain and suffering endured secondary to their false or exaggerated claims of accuracy.

[This message edited by RealityBlows at 8:08 AM, Monday, February 14th]