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My mother Bonnie McDonald (her name in 1969) was in a relationship with Ron Shirtliff some time in 1969 and I was conceived around October - November 1969. I was born premature on June 2nd 1970 so I'm guessing sometime late October or any time in November 1969 was when they still had their relationship. Something happened and he ended it and left and she failed to tell him that she was pregnant because she didn't want to make him feel trapped (this is my assumption) but she kept in contact with his mother until I was about 3 or 4 years of age. When I turned 15 in 1985 she told me about him but her story wasn't the right story. She didn't want me to think badly of her because of the truth of the relationship which was he was married.
In the early 90's I asked her for his name and she refused to tell me and she asked me not to look for him for her own personal reasons but I also found those reasons to be untrue and I know the reason but I wont reveal them here. She took his name with her to the grave and any information about his or his mothers whereabouts.
In the mid 90's I tried looking for him but with just a picture there was not much I could do. I didn't have his name or social security number and even Unsolved Mysteries wouldn't air the photo of him. Not knowing anything about him I gave up the search. Some time around 2002 I got in touch with my Aunt Betty and she revealed to me the whole truth about the relationship and even gave me a name. I am one step closer but I am still at square 1. Without a social security number I have nothing. I have recently restored the one and only picture I have of my real father and grandmother and colorized it. It makes me feel good to have this restored and in color. It has also gotten me to start my search again. I have been scouring the search engines and military websites to try to find some trace of him. Eventually I'm going to have to cough up the money to one of those agencies online because I have found his name through them but they wont give me any information unless I pay them for it and even then I wont know for sure that that is him. I wish I could say that money is no object but unfortunately I can't. I'm poor.
Here is a picture of my birth father and grandmother. If anyone out there can help me it is much appreciated. You can contact me by email using the form (or just reply in this post) I have on this website. There are many different variations of the last name that I have seen on search engines. There are Shirtliff, Shurtliff, Shirtleff and Shurtleff. As far as I know my grandmother lived in Reseda, CA in the 60's and 70's and possibly 80's across the street from Reseda High School or in that neighborhood. I don't know her name though.
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That is the pasted story from my website and as you can see there are several spellings of his last name. If someone does see this blog and you are him or a son, brother, cousin... whatever, I am not looking for him because I want something in return. I just want to fill a void in my life. I want to know who my real father is, where I come from. I don't care about the circumstances of the relationship of him and my mother and I would hope that after 39 years there wouldn't be any thought about any of that. I just want to know who my daddy is. And, if I have a brother or a sister or any cousins I want to meet them.
If for some reason my real father doesn't want to meet me I am ok with that. But please, someone let me know so I can stop looking. I don't want to be left in the dark. I just want the pain to go away in my heart. If it can't be filled then I will go on with my life knowing that I tried and that I wasn't able to find him because he didn't want to find me. But please, don't leave me hanging. Just reply in this blog post saying so and I will delete all message board posts and I will delete this blog post and the page on my website. I just hope that is not the case though.
Here is the colorized picture that I restored from the black and white and folded picture as well as a picture of my grandmother that my aunt let me have.
