Dara O Briain reveals he is adopted and says search for birth mother ‘positive’ but ‘unnecessarily hard’
TOP comic Dara O Briain has revealed he is adopted - and told how his search for his birth mother was “positive” but “unnecessarily hard”.
The Mock The Week host said he knew from an early age he was adopted and had a “fantastic relationship” with his adoptive parents.
The 48-year-old said it wasn’t until later years he thought again about how he was adopted.
In an for their Winter Nights festival, he said: “I come from an unbelievably content family background.
“Being adopted [for me] is a state of knowing you’re adopted, then it not being mentioned for ages. And then at a point in later life going, ‘hang on, am I adopted?’”
The London-based presenter recalled his father meeting him for lunch and them having a conversation to “clear the decks on everything”.
He said: "I told him, ‘I seem to remember knowing [that I'm adopted]’, and he said, ‘yeah, but it’s not a secret. I quit telling you because, you know, why would you keep saying it?’
"They were very supportive ... It gets mentioned, but why would you bring it up all the time?”
TOUGH PROCESS
After watching Philomena - a film in which an Irishwoman embarks on a quest to find her adopted son - Dara was inspired to begin his own hunt for his birth mother.
He said: “Maybe [my birth mother] might want to know how it’s turned out. And maybe it’s our responsibility to go: ‘that worked out, I did end up in a stable home and you should be grand about that’.”
The Wicklow native, now married with two kids of his own, described the process of finding his birth mother as "positive, positive, positive" but also "unnecessarily hard".
Under Irish law, the rights of the mother to privacy override the rights of the adopted child to find out who they are, therefore making it difficult for adoptees to discover their roots.
Much of the information he was able to get his hands on was marked “redacted” and the presenter revealed when he eventually got his birth certificate, it was an emotional experience for him.
EMOTIONAL EXPERIENCE
He said: "I remember getting this birth cert and folding it and thinking, ‘I do not want to open it’. I wanted to find a quiet moment to open this document.
"I remember finding it and reading it for the first time. It’s an elemental piece of paper. It’s a huge document to get in your hand.
"I wasn’t crying or anything like that, but it was still ... that this other person is me."
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Dara has since met his birth mother as well as some biological siblings - but has not met the whole family yet due to Covid-19 restrictions.
He added: "I talked to my birth mother about it today, and I said, ‘look, did you want this?’ and she said, ‘there was no choice in this’.
"The whole thing was built on shame and expediency and a feeling of, just get this done."