IL IL - Paul Fronczak, newborn, Chicago, 1964 + UID Male, 1, NJ, 1965

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Gardener1850 said:
Yes, excellent summary! I'm so surprised that Bio Paul has been found and is still alive! He could have been adopted and died under his false name and it would have been so hard to figure that out after he was gone. I hope we get some new details soon-- maybe the police are still investigating? I was sad to read on Paul Jack's blog that his quest to find his birth identity has lead to a rift in his family. He says that after he did the DNA testing that for 3 years his parents and brother didn't speak to him and his wife divorced him. That's so sad and I struggle to understand it.
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I watched an interview with him earlier and he said it was about a year that his parents didn't speak to him. I guess they were angry he did the tests behind their back. He also mentioned that it had consumed his every thought and every minute of his day, hence his wife getting fed up.

It's such a mad case and, if it were me, I don't think I could have rested until I'd exhausted every avenue. Looking at Paul Jacks personal FB page it looks like he's done ok for himself in life.

I'm SO intrigued to find out - hopefully! - where Bio Paul grew up and with whom. Questions to be answered about where he was taken after being snatched from hospital. And also, what actually happened to Jill.
 
gregjrichards said:
I can’t read the article due to European GDPR regulations but thank you for posting this incredible news.
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Annoyingly, I managed to find a Europe-friendly article earlier, but can I heckers find it now. Will keep looking. There's not much news other than what's been put on the thread (I don't think), looking forward to hearing more this week!!
 
CoverMeCagney said:
I watched an interview with him earlier and he said it was about a year that his parents didn't speak to him. I guess they were angry he did the tests behind their back. He also mentioned that it had consumed his every thought and every minute of his day, hence his wife getting fed up.

It's such a mad case and, if it were me, I don't think I could have rested until I'd exhausted every avenue. Looking at Paul Jacks personal FB page it looks like he's done ok for himself in life.

I'm SO intrigued to find out - hopefully! - where Bio Paul grew up and with whom. Questions to be answered about where he was taken after being snatched from hospital. And also, what actually happened to Jill.
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The way I remember it is that he asked his parents to take Ancestry DNA tests with him and they refused at first. I think it took him a year to convince them to do it. They were hurt by his desire to know and they did NOT want to know themselves. I can understand feeling somewhat hurt that your son wants to do this and you might find out he is not yours biologically, but I really can't understand the lack of curiosity-- all those years and they never wondered if he was really the stolen Paul or not? They essentially adopted a child and raised him as their own and they will always be his family. Paul told them that. I don't understand their inability to put themselves in Paul's shoes and support him in his desire to know the truth. And didn't they ever wonder if the biological Paul was still out there? They could have biological grandchildren or great grandchildren they don't know about. And wouldn't it be important to Paul Jack's brother to at least find out if his brother Bio Paul, was out there? He may not ever feel like the bio Paul is his brother and might not want a relationship with him-- but without finding out this biological info Paul's brother's children could end up meeting and marrying their first cousins and never even know it! If Bio Paul grew up in Michigan, then that is not far from Chicago. I feel like it's important to know who you are related to but I guess not everyone feels that way.

MOO.
 
Gardener1850 said:
The way I remember it is that he asked his parents to take Ancestry DNA tests with him and they refused at first. I think it took him a year to convince them to do it. They were hurt by his desire to know and they did NOT want to know themselves. I can understand feeling somewhat hurt that your son wants to do this and you might find out he is not yours biologically, but I really can't understand the lack of curiosity-- all those years and they never wondered if he was really the stolen Paul or not? They essentially adopted a child and raised him as their own and they will always be his family. Paul told them that. I don't understand their inability to put themselves in Paul's shoes and support him in his desire to know the truth. And didn't they ever wonder if the biological Paul was still out there? They could have biological grandchildren or great grandchildren they don't know about. And wouldn't it be important to Paul Jack's brother to at least find out if his brother Bio Paul, was out there? He may not ever feel like the bio Paul is his brother and might not want a relationship with him-- but without finding out this biological info Paul's brother's children could end up meeting and marrying their first cousins and never even know it! If Bio Paul grew up in Michigan, then that is not far from Chicago. I feel like it's important to know who you are related to but I guess not everyone feels that way.

MOO.
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I reckon they spent years suspecting and fretting that they had the wrong child, but I totally agree with you about wanting to know the truth as I'd feel the same. Up until the arrival of DNA testing there would have been no way to ascertain it one way or the other, so I guess they'd had to park it up. They were in their 80's by the time Paul asked them to test and very much of the generation to keep tight lipped about family secrets.

Fun fact: when Paul Jack found out he was Jack, it turned out his real birthday was the 27th October (not April as he'd always thought) which just so happens to also be Dora's birthday!

I'd not really registered the impact on brother Dave. Of course he will now have a fully biological brother to meet which will be interesting for them both.
 
The cast (biological version)

Chester Fronczak - father - born 1930 died 2017
Dora Fronczak nee Vucson - mother - in her 80's now?
Paul Fronczak - bio son born April 1964 - 55 year old in Michigan tbc
David Fronczak - son and brother of above

Gilbert Rosenthal - father - deceased
Marie Rosenthal - mother - deceased
Jack Rosenthal - twin born Oct 1963 - raised as Paul Fronczak
Jill Rosenthal - twin born Oct 1963 - missing for nearly 55 years
5 other siblings - I hope Paul Jack has at least met one direct blood relative.
 
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I hope Dora will get to meet the biological Paul and hope she was the first person notified that he was found. Paul was her first baby and I can't imagine her pain leaving the hospital without him. From what I've read it sounds like she knew deep down that Jack was not Paul but she wanted him to have a good life so she said he was Paul and raised him like her own and didn't want to do the dna because she considered him her child.
 
I can understand Dora. She had already lost her husband. And then her "first born" wants to go and find out whether he really is her son and possibly just disappear if he is not, to live with his "real" family (in her mind). It must have been a scary situation for her. That's not an easy situation to be in when you're in your 70s or 80s. I hope she is thrilled and happy and relieved now that her bio son has been found.

MOO.
 
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Elainera said:
I can understand Dora. She had already lost her husband. And then her "first born" wants to go and find out whether he really is her son and possibly just disappear if he is not, to live with his "real" family (in her mind). It must have been a scary situation for her. That's not an easy situation to be in when you're in your 70s or 80s. I hope she is thrilled and happy and relieved now that her bio son has been found.
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I re-read the 2018 news story to refresh my memory. Paul first did the DNA tests in 2012. Chester Fronczak didn't die until 2017. And Paul was already married and had a daughter of his own in 2008. He had left his parents home long ago. He said that when his daughter was born he realized he couldn't tell her an accurate family medical history because he really wasn't sure who his parents were. It's not as if he was threatening to cut off contact with his parents-- he just really wanted to know and had thought about this all of his life. They all agreed to the DNA test at first and all 3 swabbed their cheeks, but then changed their minds and asked him not to send the tests in. He held onto the tests for weeks but eventually he really wanted to know and sent the tests in against their wishes.

Source: The FBI said I was my parents' stolen baby
 
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It's sad that Paul cannot form attachments. Not unusual for children who have no chance to bond with a single caregiver at a very young age. I hope he finds his sister. A twin is a different kind of bond.
 
Gardener1850 said:
Paul first did the DNA tests in 2012. Chester Fronczak didn't die until 2017.
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Ah my bad! I got the dates confused :rolleyes:

Gardener1850 said:
And Paul was already married and had a daughter of his own in 2008. He had left his parents home long ago. He said that when his daughter was born he realized he couldn't tell her an accurate family medical history because he really wasn't sure who his parents were. It's not as if he was threatening to cut off contact with his parents-- he just really wanted to know and had thought about this all of his life.
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Yes I'm aware that Paul/Jack was already in his late 40s and did not live with parents anymore when he got the ball rolling. I didn't mean to imply that he seemed to want to cut contact with the Fronczaks if it turned out he wasn't their biological son. I'm sure he did not. But it might have been a fear of them that he'd prefer his biological family over them and move to live closer to them etc. Being in their 70s/80s at the time of the dna testing they might have been apprehensive about the major upheaval in the family the results could bring. Just my speculation of course.
 
Elainera said:
Ah my bad! I got the dates confused :rolleyes:



Yes I'm aware that Paul/Jack was already in his late 40s and did not live with parents anymore when he got the ball rolling. I didn't mean to imply that he seemed to want to cut contact with the Fronczaks if it turned out he wasn't their biological son. I'm sure he did not. But it might have been a fear of them that he'd prefer his biological family over them and move to live closer to them etc. Being in their 70s/80s at the time of the dna testing they might have been apprehensive about the major upheaval in the family the results could bring. Just my speculation of course.
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Yes, I suppose that many adoptive parents feel that way and are afraid of being "rejected" by the children they raised. It's just so hard for me to wrap my head around that fear in a case this dramatic. He wasn't given up for adoption-- he was abandoned on the street corner. And there was always the possibility of their bio son still being out there. Dora and Chester had to have considered in the back of their minds (even if they never spoke it aloud) that if he was not their bio son that he might have come from a rough background. Dora admitted that when the FBI had her meet the abandoned toddler boy she thought about the consequences of if she said she wasn't sure about it being Paul-- that this boy would go back to foster care and who knows what his fate would be then. But she knew if she said it was Paul they could give him a good life. She said he was her son and they took him home and raised him. If anything, I think the Fronczaks would be concerned that Paul might being seeking out criminals and bringing dangerous people into their lives by seeking his birth family. I would think their concern might be for Paul and how he would feel if he found his bio family and they rejected him. That's a reasoning for not wanting to know that I could have gotten behind (protecting their son).

But it seems like they didn't want to think about the possibility of him not being their son. It's as if they thought if they found out they were not related by blood then he would no longer be their son. They protected this secret for most of Paul's childhood. They hid the newspaper clippings about the kidnapping away in boxes and then got angry when Paul found them as a kid and asked about it. It's as if they had made their own reality by denying any possibility he wasn't their son. I think Paul's desire to know the truth rocked their worlds because it endangered their carefully constructed reality. They had told themselves he was Paul. The FBI had said he was Paul. They didn't want to consider any alternative. I have so much compassion for them as ultimate victims-- in some ways they lost their bio son twice-- first when he was kidnapped and then again when they found out they still didn't know what had happened to him. That said I still struggle to understand the not wanting to know. That they didn't eventually make the change over in their minds to suddenly accepting it and wanting to find the real Paul strikes me as strange. That's just me though and maybe it's because I'm not of the same generation as Dora and Chester. I'm more like Paul/Jack and I would seek out the truth too and try to find the real Paul. I hope Dora was finally able to meet the son she gave birth to, the son who was stolen from her. And I hope she welcomed the reunion and has realized it doesn't mean that Paul/Jack is no longer her son. It means she has 3 sons now. MOO.
 
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Gardener1850 said:
Yes, I suppose that many adoptive parents feel that way and are afraid of being "rejected" by the children they raised. It's just so hard for me to wrap my head around that fear in a case this dramatic. He wasn't given up for adoption-- he was abandoned on the street corner. And there was always the possibility of their bio son still being out there. Dora and Chester had to have considered in the back of their minds (even if they never spoke it aloud) that if he was not their bio son that he might have come from a rough background. Dora admitted that when the FBI had her meet the abandoned toddler boy she thought about the consequences of if she said she wasn't sure about it being Paul-- that this boy would go back to foster care and who knows what his fate would be then. But she knew if she said it was Paul they could give him a good life. She said he was her son and they took him home and raised him. If anything, I think the Fronczaks would be concerned that Paul might being seeking out criminals and bringing dangerous people into their lives by seeking his birth family. I would think their concern might be for Paul and how he would feel if he found his bio family and they rejected him. That's a reasoning for not wanting to know that I could have gotten behind (protecting their son).

But it seems like they didn't want to think about the possibility of him not being their son. It's as if they thought if they found out they were not related by blood then he would no longer be their son. They protected this secret for most of Paul's childhood. They hid the newspaper clippings about the kidnapping away in boxes and then got angry when Paul found them as a kid and asked about it. It's as if they had made their own reality by denying any possibility he wasn't their son. I think Paul's desire to know the truth rocked their worlds because it endangered their carefully constructed reality. They had told themselves he was Paul. The FBI had said he was Paul. They didn't want to consider any alternative. I have so much compassion for them as ultimate victims-- in some ways they lost their bio son twice-- first when he was kidnapped and then again when they found out they still didn't know what had happened to him. That said I still struggle to understand the not wanting to know. That they didn't eventually make the change over in their minds to suddenly accepting it and wanting to find the real Paul strikes me as strange. That's just me though and maybe it's because I'm not of the same generation as Dora and Chester. I'm more like Paul/Jack and I would seek out the truth too and try to find the real Paul. I hope Dora was finally able to meet the son she gave birth to, the son who was stolen from her. And I hope she welcomed the reunion and has realized it doesn't mean that Paul/Jack is no longer her son. It means she has 3 sons now. MOO.
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You are making many good points and I would also have wanted to know the truth. However I can also imagine that in some situations the truth might simply be too painful. Maybe the Fronczaks were able to finally find peace in their hearts and lead a normal life after several agonizing years of not knowing what happened to their newborn when they took Jack in. Maybe they were convinced the boy was Paul and the possibility that the agony from decades ago might now resurface if it turned out that he wasn't was simply too much to bear. Because, the question would then again be: What happened to our baby son? With all the nightmares and pain that come with it.

I have never been in such a situation and can't imagine the pain, so I don't want to judge them (not saying that you do!).
 
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