Broken Bonds, Fractured Lives<\/a> recommended the WA government notifies all adult adopted persons not already aware of their adopted status. A system of automatic notification would be the first of its kind in Australia.<\/p>\nAlthough no clear pathway for notification was outlined in the report, advocates say mandatory notification would tackle the ongoing harm to people who may find out the truth without warning or support, or are denied the truth about their origins for their whole lives.<\/p>\n
Merrilees Ritchie, aged about four.<\/p>\n
The recommendation was rejected by the WA government two months later due to its potential to \u201ccause significant psychological harm and distress.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bernadette Richards, associate professor of ethics and professionalism at Queensland University medical school, says while the argument about potentially traumatising unsuspecting people by telling them they are adopted is persuasive, doing nothing breaches adopted people\u2019s fundamental human rights. Not least their right to know their family medical history.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is also that risk there of benevolent paternalism,\u201d she says. \u201cTrying not to harm someone but taking away a choice. In reality, that\u2019s what has happened to these people, isn\u2019t it? They\u2019ve lost the right to know something important.\u201d<\/p>\n
However, Richards says comprehensive supports would need to be carefully planned to address the \u201creal risk of harm\u201d in implementing a mass notification system.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe age of these people must be respected, as must the fact that this is really something that goes to the core of individual identity and understanding of who they are and how they define that,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
Prof Daryl Higgins, a psychologist who has researched the impact of forced adoption, questions whether there is research to support the case for mass notification.<\/p>\n
Higgins, the director of the Institute of Child Protection Studies at the Australian Catholic University, says while adoptees have a right to know information about themselves, if they choose to, he is not convinced that all adoptees would welcome, or benefit from, being told by government authorities.<\/p>\n
Instead, he calls for a community awareness campaign \u2013 ideally a national initiative \u2013 to encourage people who have doubts about their birth status to access services that can help them find out in a supported way.<\/p>\n
If we\u2019d been given more time, I think she would have softened<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Merrilees Ritchie<\/p>\n
Dr Ebony White from St Bonaventure University in New York was a co-author of one of the few studies in existence about late discovery adoptees.<\/p>\n
White backs the idea of proactively notifying adults, but supports a national awareness campaign to prepare people beforehand. She too underscores the importance of providing counselling and support to those who suspect they may have been adopted and coaching for adoptive families on how to broach the truth with their adult children.<\/p>\n
She also warns that for many reasons some biological parents do not wish to be found, and mandatory notification could lead to distress for all parties.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s an issue also raised by Caroline de la Harpe of the WA government-funded Adoption Research and Counselling Service, who stresses the importance of considering other family members, including half-siblings.<\/p>\n
\u201cAbsolutely, [the adoptees] have the right to know information about themselves,\u201d she says. \u201cBut you can\u2019t just think about notifying that person because there\u2019s a whole raft of people who are going to be affected by that notification.\u201d<\/p>\n
The senior counsellor and psychotherapist says, for example, biological families would also have to receive support in advance of possible reunification.<\/p>\n
\u201cAre you wanting a relationship with them? Are you willing to at least meet them and get to know them? So at least when [adoptees] are notified, you\u2019ve got some information around their birth family and what the possibilities are for getting to know them.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018I\u2019m only sorry I wasn\u2019t told earlier\u2019: Merrilees Ritchie. Photograph: Claire Moodie<\/p>\n
So-called \u201ccontact vetoes\u201d, which are lodged by different parties to adoption who do not wish to be contacted by each other, would also have to be carefully considered, she adds, with separate management plans put in place to handle those cases. About 700 contact vetoes remained in place in WA at the time of the inquiry.<\/p>\n
For Ritchie, now 71, despite the fact that her reunion with her biological mother was imperfect, she is glad she knows the truth about herself.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m only sorry I wasn\u2019t told earlier,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
Although she managed to find her biological mother, Nola, she says too much time had been lost. Reconnecting with her biological mother at a younger age, she believes, could have brought them closer.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think she could actually deal with the fact that I was back in her life,\u201d she says. \u201cI feel quite cheated. If we\u2019d been given more time, I think she would have softened.\u201d<\/p>\n
They never hugged or had any physical contact, until six hours before her mother died when Ritchie was able to visit her in hospital in Perth.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just put my hand on top of her hand,\u201d remembers Ritchie.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t even know if she knew I was there, but I knew I was there.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/strong>To contact the Forced Adoption Support Service<\/a> in your state or territory, ring 1800 210 313. To contact the Adoption Research and Counselling Service, ring (08) 9370 4914<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Merrilees Ritchie describes it as an \u201cout of body experience\u201d. It felt as if she was watching from…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":115132,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4740,50],"class_list":{"0":"post-115131","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-australia","9":"tag-news"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114963877882752144","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=115131"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115131\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/115132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=115131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=115131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=115131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}