Never in Canadian history has Government considered the natural mothers of children surrendered for adoption. Never has Government addressed unethical and illegal adoption practices.

Australian mothers asked for and achieved an investigation into past adoption practices for obtaining babies. Now, we mothers in Canada have the opportunity to be heard, also.

They decided to do something about it, and they are succeeding. Now, it is our turn.

The key to freedom for the mothers in Australia was to reunite with their own children and to speak openly of the horrors of being separated. Let us use the same key to unlock the door of enforced silence and acquit ourselves of the "crime of motherhood" by demanding that our government hear our stories and investigate the abuses of past adoption practices that unjustly separated us from our children. The courage and wisdom of the mothers in Australia will allow us to "begin facing the nightmare of our past and to begin seeing clearly for the first time."

This will be our best chance to help our children understand that they were not "given away" as people would like to think. They need to know that. We need that validation, too. And mothers who continue to be exploited by the adoption industry today need the knowledge and protection we didn't have.

• Prior to signing a consent, were mothers provided with information — about financial provisions, foster care, and applying through the courts for support from the child's father — to enable them to keep their babies?
• Were mothers warned of the permanency of adoption and the lifelong implications, risks, and emotional consequences? For example, "Are you sure you won’t later deeply regret your decision to surrender your baby once the adoption goes through because you will never see your child again? You will be surrendering all parental rights and your child will be seen ‘as if born to strangers’ and not to you?" Legally, you had to answer "yes" before your signature could properly be taken from you.
• If foster care was used, was it coerced into being a permanent arrangement?
• In cases of "open adoption," were mothers warned that open adoption is not legally enforceable?
• How were mothers treated in maternity homes, in hospitals; by doctors, nurses, social workers, and any person involved in the adoption process?
• How have we been affected by our experience?

We intend to expose how the demand for babies could only be met by failing to provide us with our legitimate right to alternatives, once a market had been found for our babies. In doing so we hope to take back our dignity as mothers and as human beings. It will be up to us to provide the evidence. No one is going to rescue us. We have to empower ourselves.

Social Research

The adoption of newborns as we know it, has only been around since the late 1940's early 1950's. Comparatively few babies were being surrendered for adoption prior to the 1950's, and abandoned mothers were being offered help not adoption.

Social workers took over the control of unmarried mothers in the early 1950's and began a reckless campaign of promoting adoption to society as a "wonderful community service for childless couples," while labeling our babies as being "unwanted children." Immediately, childless couples began demanding only newborns: so much so that by 1972, six month old babies were considered "too old" for adoption.

We need to dig through old literature, adoption industries archives, social service training manuals, any source you can think of -- and find all the evidence we can of this organized crusade. Evidence has already been found in the United States, Britain, and Australia. Canada had precisely the same system.

We need to find sources like Australia's Child Welfare Act (1939) -- which stated that: "A mother giving a consent must be fully aware of the import of her action and, must be emotionally and mentally able to appreciate all the implications of such consent. A consent should not be taken if there is any suggestion of indecisiveness or that she has not given sufficient consideration to the matter."

We will not be on trial. If Canada had similar laws and they weren't followed, then a crime has been committed, but not by us.

If our laws did not clearly state concern for our welfare, then we will ask them to investigate why we were not considered. We were young, vulnerable Canadian citizens -- the government had an obligation to protect our rights. We're no longer young; we're not longer vulnerable, but we are still Canadian citizens. Let's hold them to that obligation, however belated.

Don't let proponents of adoption continue to get away with the propaganda that other than a "small" number of aggrieved mothers -- all others were happy with their "decision," willingly surrendered their babies, and happily got on with their lives. This fallacy may make them feel comfortable, but we know this not to be the case. With an investigation here, in our country, we all have the opportunity to do something for our children, ourselves, and each other.

All you have to do is tell the truth - that had we been given any real choice, had we been given our rights, had we not been made to feel so disentitled to our own children, had we not been lied to about adoption being in our children's best interest, had we been supported instead of being expected to do the most unnatural thing demanded of any mother - to surrender our own babies to strangers forever - they could never have taken our babies from us.

Origins Inc. states: "...by remaining silent we had inadvertently become the 'keepers of the lie' and we knew that until mothers began speaking out publicly about our abusive and inhumane treatment - the myths, lies and deceit upon which adoption has thrived would continue to harm the emotional well-being of our children, and we as their mothers, would be colluding in our own abuse."

You've been telling these truths to each other in support groups, now tell it to the people who can do something about it. It is time to express our natural, maternal outrage at being separated from our children. It is time to demand that our government and society acknowledge the enduring damage adoption has perpetrate in our lives. It is now time to take action!

Write down your relinquishment experience; we can help each other with this painful task. Provide copies of your records. And, submit them to our database for use in the investigation.

Contact as many mothers as possible, and tell them about this effort. You won't be badgering them to participate; you will be giving them an opportunity to empower for themselves.

We'd also appreciate everyone's help with research for the evidence that we'll have to supply ourselves. We can't trust the government or it's agencies to do it for us.

Get involved. Become an Origins Canada member or coordinator in your province. Help organize mothers and collect this data.

"But I Signed the Consent ... "

Yes, and because no alternatives were offered and some mothers were not allowed to leave the hospital unless they signed, so did the vast majority of us! But many didn't sign and unless they had parental support, they didn't get to keep their babies either. Their signatures were either forged, or they were hounded day and night for months after leaving the hospital, or their babies were hidden in foster care until the mother could be charged with abandonment and her signature received anyway.

Its clear by the evidence we have received, that taking our signatures without proper counseling and legal representation was simply a formality so the transaction would appear legal. That does not mean we agreed to the adoption. Because we were unmarried, young and inexperienced, and because we were all unsupported, our babies were put at risk and our fates were sealed.

Many of us think we "made a choice" when in fact coercion, fraud and deliberate withholding of information were techniques used on us by "adoption professionals" in order to obtain our babies. See Losing Our Babies: Were You Coerced? to find out if you were subjected to coercion, fraud, or uninformed consent. See also "Not by Choice" by Karen Wilson Buterbaugh for information on the mind control techniques commonly applied on maternity "home" inmates.

We are not accusing the people who adopted our children of taking them from us. We are demanding that the system acknowledge and take responsibility for exploiting us. It is an issue solely between the mothers and the adoption system. It is about the way in which the system waged a methodical campaign against young unmarried mothers in order to obtain their babies.

"Blaming yourself for having given your baby up and/or surrendered because you were led to believe adoption was in your child's best interest would be like blaming the Jews for not putting up a fight as they walked straight into the gas chambers - conned into thinking they were being deloused - they too accepted their fate without a struggle." NSW Origins

No one is going to demand equity for us. We have to do that for ourselves. We will no longer be "keepers of the lie." Let us stop colluding in our own condemnation. Just as the Australian mothers empowered themselves, let Canadian mothers also cry out for acknowledgment and restitution for the traumas that we are experiencing as a result of improper practices for acquiring our babies for adoption.

Due to our traumatic experiences, we have felt disempowered and oppressed. This is our chance to be heard, for the truth to be told as only we can tell it, to say that had we been given any real choice, had our legal rights been protected instead of ignored, had we not been made to feel totally disentitled to our own children, had we not been lied to about adoption being in our child's "best interest," had we been supported instead of expected to do the most unnatural thing demanded of any mother - to surrender our own babies to strangers forever - the adoption industry, by its social workers, could not have taken our babies from us and society would have accepted single motherhood 30 years earlier!

• File a Complaint to the United Nations
  
  
• Join Origins Canada support group or the Origins Canada Mothers Action Group
  
  
• See the "Coercion Checklist" to find out if you were the victim of coercion, fraud, or uninformed consent
  
  
• Interested in participating in a survey?
  
  

" . . . England differs from the United States in that society, in the form of the agencies which help unmarried mothers, expects the mother to keep her child and considers it her duty to do so." Adopting A Child Today, Legal Consultant, by Rael Jean Isaac with Joseph Spencer, copyright 1965

"There is no country that has such a high rate of adoption as the United States. It is not encouraged to such a great extent in Europe, although many children are cared for by their mothers or relatives, who are helped by welfare assistance." Counseling the Unwed Mothers, by Helen E. Terkelsen, copyright 1964