Adult Adoptee Movement
My mother was a teenager when I was born in the early 1970s. She was so young that my existence was illegal. Maybe I was a mistake. Maybe I was the product of rape. I don’t know. Either way, that sits heavy. I like to think that she was doing her best in impossible circumstances. […]
An apology is not the end, but the beginning. It is important in changing public understanding away from a mother giving her child up under social pressure, to them being taken by a state-funded and sanctioned policy run primarily by the church and voluntary organisations.
I admire those who are able to watch the special ‘mother and baby home’ episodes of Long Lost Family, and I applaud the people who are bringing these stories to light, but I just can’t. Like many adoptees, I find the show emotionally manipulative, ‘trauma porn’ (or worse, adoption propaganda). My life, the information that […]
I had my culture, heritage, history and family removed from my life by adoption and a phone call to an ineffectual, unfit for purpose therapy service isn’t going to fix that.
Adoptees deserve more than to be “mentioned.” We deserve pathways. We deserve services that recognise adoption as lifelong. We deserve to sit in therapy and be understood, not minimised.
We’re adding this page to direct you to news and resources relating to the adoption apology protest, due to take place on Wednesday 16 July. The protest has been organised by adoptee advocate Zara Phillips along with members of the Movement for an Adoption Apology (MAA). 17/7/25 Here are some of the media reports we’re […]
We received the following reply to our open letter and have sent a further reply, see below. 17 April 2025 To whom it may concern, Thank you for your recent open letter, which has been forwarded to the Adoption Policy team for response. Thank you for sharing the research from the United States, which we […]
OPEN LETTER FROM ADULT ADOPTEE MOVEMENTTO JANET DABY, MINISTER FOR CHILDREN AND FAMILIES 10 April, 2025 Dear Minister, Shocking new research on outcomes for adoptees and first (birth) mothers calls for immediate action. The preliminary findings by Dr Lynn Zubov of Winston Salem State University indicate: Furthermore, adoptees and first mothers suffer higher rates of […]
Why is information collected about adoptions, but not about adoptees?
I have been asked to write about my personal AAM highlight of 2024. We have many emails from adoptees enquiring about records and searching. The state hasn’t made it easy for us to trace our relatives. We looked at what was out there and noticed that no one was offering workshops to help adoptees on […]