My boy Riley's biological father has been genetically established, thanks to some amazing detective work by his wife Jess.

His name is Jim Pruden, at least we have the same first name, and his last name was not Pruit as we thought. He died in 2016 and would have turned 75 in June. He has a great large family in LaPorte, Indiana that loved and respected him.

Jess has been working on this for years as a surprise for Riley. They did a DNA test back in 2018 but nothing with the name Pruit matched. This was the case for years but somehow she connected with Jim's sister Mary on Facebook with the last name Pruden, and offered to pay for a DNA test, Mary agreed but went half in.

Suddenly all the dots came together, and Riley's father had been found. They have since been in touch with the family and they're all very exited to meet them. They did meet with one of Jim's brothers and his wife when they were in Arizona, and made a great connection. (link) They shared photos of Jim and he looked like Riley's twin.

This is amazing! I'm very proud of Jess, I actually thought Riley would go through life with no father on his birth certificate. Now they're going to fix that, and they have a brand new family!

Update: I guess you could say that I was Riley's dad and Jim Pruden was his father. I actually held Riley in my arms before his mother did. He was delivered Cesarean, in a San Francisco hospital, and the nurse brought him out of the delivery room and handed him to me. His legs were bent back up towards his chest, thus the C-Section.

His legs straightened out just fine, and we have had a wonderful life together. Jim died not knowing he had a son, and that's sad, but I was more than happy to fill in!

I told Jess that Riley saved my life, he gave me a reason for being. She replied: Thank you, you mean the world to him and I know that without you he would not be the man he is today (he's also said you saved him & influenced him greatly)! In fact just about all his fond memories include you! You did something most men, especially back then, wouldn't do... You loved him (still do) unconditionally as your own!