Listen to A Pocket of Time: The other side of the Irish adoption story below.
As part of our spring season of Documentary on Newstalk, producer Susan Dennehy introduces us to four natural mothers who talk openly for the first time about adoption and reunion from their point of view.
If you listen closely to the voices you have heard in the recent debate about adoption, following the success of the film Philomena, you will realise that we have heard very little directly from the younger generation of women who gave their babies up for adoption in the 1970s and 80s.
Unlike the women who became pregnant in the 1950s and 60s, these mothers were not placed in institutions and their babies were not taken forcibly from them.
There are a myriad of reasons why these natural mothers have been so quiet until now - there was the shame of becoming pregnant in the first place; the huge sadness and pain that surrounded their loss; anxiety that they would be judged for giving away their own child; and more recently, fear of jeopardizing the fragile relationship they are attempting to build with their adult child, if in fact, they are lucky to have been reunited.
But things are changing and Irish natural mothers are beginning to look back at their decision and experiences with bewilderment and regret, they are finding their voices, and they are coming out.
In this documentary, four of these mothers reveal their most personal experiences in heart-rending accounts of separation and reunion.
The four stories are woven together as one, representing the 44,000-plus Irish natural mothers and giving an insight into a pocket of time in Ireland’s very recent history when adoption was the number one solution to pregnancy outside marriage.
'A Pocket of Time – The other side of the adoption Story ’ will air on Newstalk 106-108fm on Saturday April 12th at 7am, repeated Sunday Apr 12th at 6pm
'A Pocket of Time – The other side of the Adoption Story’ was produced by Susan Dennehy, The programme was made with the support of the BAI, Sound and Vision fund.
Podcast available at: www.newstalk.ie/documentaryonnewstalk
