How do you forget to mention you have an estranged daughter for 3 years?

Some red flags here for me.

*3 YEARS is plenty of time to tell your significant other that you have a child. Why didn't he? Doesn't he pay CS??

*WHY does he have no contact with the daughter?? The mother cannot just DEMAND he not see his child. He could have gone to court to fight for his parental rights. Sounds like he willingly abandoned his daughter.

*If you have a child with this man and split, will he abandon your child, too??

His sister told his secret, but to me, this is HUGE. What will happen if this child comes looking for her father some day? Ish.
If you plan to stay with this man, keep your finances separate. Get a pre-nup. The possibility that he will need to pay CS (including back CS) could mean you will be relied upon to cover more mutual expenses. Seriously consider if a secret of this magnitude is OKAY. It would not be okay with me.

Ok, so to me the big thing here is you guys have been together for THREE years and he never told you he has a daughter. He claims the last year has been tough for you, but that only takes one year out of the equation and regardless of how shitty the year has been to you it doesnt change the existence of this child.

His sister told you, ok, so had she not when was he planning on telling you? What is he planning on doing about this? This situation cannot just be left up in the air, if he was paying CS until she got married and told him she no longer wanted his support where is his proof?
Because, frankly, the courts dont really care, all they care about is if there should be CS being paid and if it hasnt they will backdate it.
If she wanted him to sign adoption papers and he never received them then what is he doing about it? Is he happy about doing that? Does he want to sign away his parental rights? If so, why?
If he wants to have contact with her why hasnt he done something?

To me this is a really serious issue, because frankly it sounds like he is a lazy "I dont care" personality, and if he is that way about children he recreates then chances are, hes not the great guy you think he is.

Whether you decide to stay with him or not is ultimately up to you. Personally Id already be out the door, I just dont buy any logical explanation as to why the subject of his existing daughter was never relevant to him to talk about during a 3 year relationship.
If you do stay together then keep ALL finances separate, heck dont move in together because a day probably will come that the BM wants the CS then even if he pays that you will be lumped with the rest of household costs.

Its one thing to date someone who has kids, and Im not by any means saying that people who have children shouldnt date, but it is one of those important topics that NEEDS to come up in the super early days of a relationship. Regardless of whether that child is estranged or not.

Besides the fact that he outright kept this important information from you (and who knows if he was EVER going to tell you), this has the potential to be a huge mess (financially and emotionally).

He just stopped paying CS? Brilliant. Why did he not follow up on the adoption papers and keep paying CS until it actually happened? Did he try to get visitation set up at all? How could he just completely drop the ball on something like this?

The thing about "estranged" family is, they eventually come out of the woodwork and it is not always a happy, fun reunion. And in this case, may not come cheap. I know men that have been sued by their adult offspring for back child support.

I would be furious, not to mention, hurt. There is no excuse for him not telling you and I bet he had no plans to.

Are you sure you really know this guy?

Wow. Yours is one of the most incredibly hard stories I have read on here so far. I would be angry about him never planning to say anything about the fact that he has a daughter. That little piece of information affects you.

It sounds like he has no relationship with the daughter, and really doesn't plan to. Even if he did, at this point it may be hard since the girl may not want to have a relationship with him, especially if she is being raised by someone else. In all honesty it may be in the best interest of the girl to not be forced into having a relationship with someone who doesn't want to have a relationship with her.

I am not going to sit here and pass judgement on your bf. He may have given up for many reasons. It may have been he didn't want the responsibility or dealing with the mom may have been a losing cause. You need to find out why, and if you are okay with that reason the. Move forward. He needs to find out about the cs situation sooner rather then later. He is going to have to tread lightly with the mom and very nicely ask her if she still wants him to sign his rights over so that her dh can adopt the child. I say tread lightly because he doesn't want her to go after back child support.

I wish you the best.

I knew of a woman, who separated from her husband, while separated she pregnant with her boyfriends kid.
Her DH and her made amends, and the child was born. The DH took responsibility for the child, signed the birth certificate and raised the child for 2 years. After that, they ended up divorced.
The child still legally belongs to the DH, he pays child support for it, the boyfriend knows the child exists.

Its hard to say what will happen, but I do believe that most children want to meet their biological parents at some time for some reason, so that could happen in your case.

this is simply not cool at all.
do the math - his daughter is 9. last time he saw her she was 4 or 5. so he hasnt seen her in four or five years. you've been with him for three.

so it'd only been a year or two since he'd seen her when you met him. NOT TEN OR FIFTEEN. and the douchetard KEPT it from you?

her mom still has nine years to pursue child support. as far as the girl, she's got the rest of her life ahead of her if she chooses to find him. there was a poster here that, last year i think, tracked down her biological father. from what i read it seemed to turn out ok, BUT you yourself need to be prepared for any possibility at any time.

you've got a loooooot of thinking to do.