A BOY who was raised in poverty after being swapped at birth abandoned his "mum" who raised him to live with his real family.

       Fyodor Spinu always felt like like the odd one out at home.

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       Fyodor Spinu with partner Alina. Fyodor had been swapped at birth and hasn't returned to his 'mum' since finding out Credit: Facebook 3

       Viktoria Bulmaga always suspected there was something odd about her son Andrey Credit: Facebook

       Growing up in a poor home in Moldova, the blonde youngster always wondered why he looked nothing like his parents.

       “My parents were always quarrelling,” Fyodor said. “My father even beat my mother. My mum once said the neighbours had made fun of her saying her son didn’t look like her at all as I was too blonde.”

       But it turned out Fyodor's suspicions weren't wrong and years later found out he had been swapped at birth and that his real parents had been living in a neighbouring village.

       When he finally met them, he stayed for 18 months and decided he wasn't going back to Russia where he and his "mum" Maria had been living for some years.

       Fyodor still remembers getting a call from his biological dad Nikolay, who broke the news to him.

       "It was about 3am,” Fyodor said. “Some man called. He said we had a mutual friend. Then he asked if I looked like my father and mother. I said something rude to him in response. I asked ‘Who are you and why are you calling at such a hour’.”

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       Nikolay explained how Fyodor had been switched at birth.

       “When he heard this, his voiced changed,” Nikolay said. “I realised my son was crying.”

       'IT SUDDENLY DAWNED UPON US'

       This twisted story began 20 years earlier when Viktoria Bulmaga gave birth to a son Andrey in a maternity hospital in Moldova.

       Because Andrey suffered a small injury during birth, doctors brought him to unsuspecting mum Viktoria all wrapped up.

       “I looked at the door and a strange thought came to me, could it be they had brought me a different baby?” Viktoria said reflecting on the labor.

       But the mum-of-three let her suspicions go and stopped asking why Andrey looked to unlike her other kids.

       All she wanted was for Andrey to be happy, well fed, dressed and cared for.

       Her husband Nikolay treated all his sons equally and never played favourites.

       When his son was just two years old he draw a picture on the wall of three swans, two white and one black.

       It was only years later he realised the painting had a deeper significance.

       “Suddenly it dawned upon us,” Nikolay said. “The two white swans were our younger children, both of them are blonde but then there was the black swan, our dark haired, dark eyed boy Andrey.”

       Their peace was shattered when they realised they had been raising someone else’s child for the past 18 years.

       Nikolay said: “It turned out the black swan was not ours. It was from another flock.”

       Andrey said: “My mum and dad told me I was not their son. I didn’t believe it at first and I was offended and shocked. I didn’t know how to react. I ran away from home.

       “But then I talked to my friends and calmed down and came back.”

       Things then took another turn when Andrey underwent a mandatory blood test to get a passport.

       It turned out he had the rare type B blood while his mum and dad were type O and A.

       Viktoria said: “Doctors told me it was impossible to have a different type of blood.”

       She was “haunted” by the idea that if Andrey was not her son, then where could her real one be?

       Searching through old documents at home Viktoria found medical reports that indicated that her child’s height had somehow shrunk from 56cm when he was born to 52cm a month later when she took him to the doctor for a check up.

       Andrey was also described as having a different personality from his brothers while growing up and said to be quiet and introverted.

       “People would say he is very unlike you and we laughed it off,” Viktoria said.

       Viktoria and Nikolay then started a private investigation and got hold of the archives from the old maternity hospital.

       They discovered on the same day Andrey was born another woman had also given birth to a son.

       Viktoria said she could “hardly believe my eyes” when she saw photos of the mum and her son.

       She put the photos together and it then became clear to her.

       “Andrey and the other father were like two peas in a pod,” Viktoria said.

       For almost 16 years Viktoria’s real son, Fyodor, had been living in a nearby village.

       Hoping to find her real son she took a photo to a friend who worked at the local market and told her their son had been switched at the local hospital.

       She showed her the photo and she claimed she knew him because he had been to the market.

       Viktoria now thinks she may very well have sold him pies she made at the market.

       'IT WAS MY FATE'

       When Fyodor turned 16 his father died and he and his mother moved to Russia.

       Then when he was 18, a blood test revealed Maria wasn't his real mum.

       After receiving Nikolay's early morning call, a meeting was scheduled and Fyodor made his was back to Moldova.

       The story became big news and reached a peak on live TV when the families came together.

       But the shocking story wasn’t quite over.

       “He got into his car, turned his head away and drove off,” Viktoria said. “It was so hard to part. We seemed to have found our son but again he was not around. But we comforted ourselves and thought he would come back to us.”

       Then three months after the meeting Fyodor went to visit his biological parents for a few days to get to know them better – but he ended up staying for 18 months.

       The other mum, Maria Spinu, was now left on her own as her biological son refused to go to her.

       After being with his biological parents Maria asked Fyodor when he was going to come back but he told her he was “ashamed to leave his parents”.

       She asked him though wasn’t he “ashamed” after she had been raising him for 18 years.

       “Of course, it hurts,” Maria said. “But what can I do?”

       Maria then hoped Andrey would go to her and they could find “a common language” but it didn’t work.

       Fyodor’s biological family offered him everything he lacked in his childhood – a comfortable life with a quiet family.

       Andrey found himself in a difficult position, having to welcome the lad whose position he had been occupying since childhood but wasn’t going to step aside.

       Fyodor is the only one to call Maria from time to time with Andrey only rarely speaking to her.

       “I’m not expecting anyone anymore,” Maria said. “It is my fate.”

       Prosecutors tried to track down those doctors responsible but they had already quit their jobs or retired and there was no one who could remember what happened that day.

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       Nikolay Bulmaga broke the news to his real son Credit: Facebook

       I was dirt poor after being switched at birth while the other kid was rich - I resented mum for not swapping me back