The Daily Mail recently told the heart-rending stories of five mothers, which were reproduced on Adoption-net, who each gave a child up for adoption and are happy to report that one of the birth-mums featured has now been re-united with the daughter she gave up 28-years ago as a six-month-old baby.

Here, they tell their stories starting yesterday with the adopted child, and continuing today with the birth mother...
by Angela Carless

The Birth-Mother - Page one of two
Retail worker Anne Butler, 50, lives in a three-bedroom terrace on a Reading housing estate with her partner David Hartley, 39, who works for the local authority. She's been married and divorced twice and has raised four daughters - Kelly, 24, Leanne, 22, Holly, 16, and Jessica, nine. She gave Tina and another daughter, Katrina, 31, up for adoption.

When I heard Tina wanted to meet me I felt as if I'd won the lottery. My heart began to pound, my head started spinning and my knees gave way beneath me. It felt completely unreal. I'd dreamed of being reunited with her ever since I gave her up as a baby. I was desperate to find out if she'd had a good life and if having her adopted had been the right decision.

But while I longed to hold her in my arms and to explain I had always loved her, I was terrified that our reunion may go horribly wrong. What if she resented me for giving her up? What if she had endured a terrible childhood and just wanted to say she hated me? I'd tortured myself for years with thoughts that I'd ruined her life.

Maybe I should have tried harder to keep her. Perhaps there could have been a way out. But as I think back to those bleak days when I was a single mum with two babies and no hope, I know I had little choice.

I was 18 and pregnant when my first marriage to David Spiller ended after just three weeks. I went home to my parents' cramped three-bedroom semi and Katrina arrived exactly nine months later. I adored her, but found it tough raising a child outside a marriage. Still only 18, I felt trapped and yearned for freedom like other young girls.

When Katrina was 18-months-old I began dating and at 20 fell pregnant again. Dad number two was David Butler, 19, a railway worker and having children wasn't on his agenda.

He was not at all supportive and because there was no room for me at home, my parents packed me off to a mother and baby home when I lived with five other single mums.

David would turn up on his motorbike, but when I gave birth to our daughter I was alone. Tina - who I originally called Janine - was born on 7 November 1973.

With golden hair and blue eyes, she looked like her dad. But he never did develop a sudden rush of paternal love as I'd hoped. I ended up living with my babies in one tiny room in a bed and breakfast hostel.

I had to have the children dressed and out by 8am. I wasn't allowed back until 6pm. I spent the day walking the streets and survived on Income Support. It was the lowest time of my life. If it was just me I could have coped, but walking the streets with two babies made me feel like a tramp. The council did not give single mums homes in those days, you had to acquire housing points over several years. I stood no chance.

With no childcare, I couldn't work. With no job there was no money. I felt guilty I could not give my children a proper home and I resented Tina's dad for not supporting me more.

I became desperate. So when my former husband, Katrina's dad, offered Katrina the chance to stay with one of his relatives until I was back on my feet, I agreed.

But it still left me walking the streets with the baby, so I approached Social Services for help. They said the best thing was to have her adopted. I'd never considered adoption, but it was the only option they gave me. There was no attempt to give us a home so my little family could stay together and it seemed so callous. Yet there I was living in one room in a B & B with nothing. I couldn't give my children a better life than the appalling one I was living.

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