The first thing they did was give her medication to dry up her milk. After all, the very last thing the nurses wanted was for Margaret to breastfeed her new baby. To bond with her. To form any type of emotional connection.
That, you see, couldn’t be allowed to happen.
At a time when every new mother needs nurturing and comfort and support, staff at Sydney’s now defunct King George Hospital were anything but. They ummed and ahhed when Margaret asked to see her beautiful, perfect new daughter Abbie, giving a range of excuses as to why they couldn’t bring the newborn into Margaret’s room.
In those hours, days, after giving birth — when new mothers are fragile and hormonal, when all you long to do is kiss and cuddle and simply breathe in the baby you have given birth to – Margaret found herself surrounded by a wall of resistance. Of silence. Disapproval.
You see Margaret was single. And in 1973 Australia that simple fact made her ‘unfit’ to be a parent.
So instead what the staff did when Abbie was born was fill out forms which said Margaret was agreeing to give up her baby for adoption. All they needed was for Margaret to sign her name.
“Just sign here, Margaret,” I imagine they said. “Your little girl can live with a nice family. You’re a single mother. You can’t give her what she needs. Just. Sign. Here.”
But she didn’t sign. Thank God. Margaret was thirty-years-old and somehow had the strength to stand her ground.
Today Abbie is one of my closest and dearest friends.
I’ve heard this story several times over the years – Abbie and I both horrified at the judgement her mother faced. The pressure put on her — even at THIRTY – to give Abbie up. But it’s only been in recent years that I’ve realised the true horror of what unfolded for decades across Australia.