Did anyone see the TV program yesterday on forced adoption?

Bring an unmarried mother in those decades was a really shameful thing and it was often the parents who insisted that the baby should be adopted. Pregnant Girls were sent away from home to have their babies in a mother and baby unit, of which there were many, but afterwards there was no financial support or housing provided so if the parents didn’t support their daughter there was little choice for them other than to agree to adoption.
If parents did support them the baby was sometimes passed off as the parents child and a brother or sister to the actual mother. Family shame was a massive issue at that time.
The fathers of these children were not judged or expected to support their child at all and just carried on unless there was a ‘shotgun wedding ‘where the young couple were ‘encouraged’ to marry by the girl’s parents.

What TV channel was this programme on Kadinsky?

I think this is such a difficult area. I spent a number of years in my working life involved with young children who had remained with their birth mother and were damaged both physically and emotionally as a result, because their mothers didn’t have the maturity to meet the needs of a child.

Their mothers did love them in terms of emotional attachment and wept and were devastated when the children were eventually removed from them. But, in spite of support, were very often unable to put the child’s needs before their own.

I wasn’t involved in the initial decisions at birth or the later ones. I was involved with the consequences.

My daughter was born in 1971.

Whilst in hospital in a ward with about 8 other young mums, there was one young mum who gave birth to the most beautiful baby daughter, and for 3 days she held her and cried. I assume some sort of baby blues, but on the fourth day, 2 women came and took the baby away. That young mum was utterly bereft, as was most of the ward. It upset us all terribly.

My birth mother was forced to give me up for adoption by her mother, and was sent away to give birth to avoid disgracing the family. She wanted to marry my birth father but being only 18 was refused permission. At 21 they were able to marry and went on to have more children and a long marriage.
I’m privileged to have been able to get to know my birth mother and siblings a little.
I can’t begin to understand how she must have felt all those years ago.

I worked as a social worker in a maternity hospital in the the 1970s. Unmarried mothers were the staple of my caseload.
Mother and Baby homes were very much still around but used very sparingly, and the outcome was not necessarily adoption. They were mainly used as a safe haven for girls from some ethnic minorities where we knew that when the girl said "My father will kill me if he finds out", they meant it literally. The homes were a safe haven for these girls.
There was no encouragement towards adoption from social workers or medics ...but there often was from the families. Our job was to listen to what the young mother wanted and to try and facilitate this. We supported lots of young mothers managing on their own.

They were not forced to give up their babies because they were unmarried; they had to relinquish them because were totally unable to support their child. The father usually refused to take any role in support,'because' I don't know that it is mine' , no paternity tests available. Parents were reluctant or unable to afford supporting a new baby and its mother, and it was very difficult for the mother to work as there were few nurseries and very little child care available. And of course, no benefits, so no income.
The mothers who kept their babies had the support, financial and practical, of their families.

Very sad.

I suppose ‘forced’. isn’t the right word as plenty of unmarried women had children in the 60’s & 70’s & kept their babies - but immense pressure was put upon others yes.

A friend of mine had her baby in a mother and baby home. She wasn't forced exactly but tremendous pressure from her parents made her give the baby up. She said she always remembered one young mother running up the drive of the home,screaming and sobbing as her baby was driven away in a car by social workers.

Well, times have changed in official terms of what public bodies can get away with doing to other people. Behind closed doors, I imagine it's not all that much different.