Show The Salt Lake Tribune NATION All Sunday March 15 1998 ftish Adoptees in America Track Origins ft?1-- To Homeland Birth Parents Siblings eyeglasses Um 2200 went to abusive or unstable homes For years concerns that rejectees of the US adoption system were turning to Ireland for children went unheeded 4 J j t Eventually Milotte said there were protests BY KARYN HUNT prompting the church to conduct at least cursory the associated press background checks Whats more mothers werent always informed FRANCISCO Every day Larry Petrs that they were signing their children away for life the car drive past his office window with a Some thought their babies were simply going into redheaded boy strapped in the seat next to foster care until they married and could raise them t ' Jgjf mother respectably Every day Petre walked to his window admire So great was the sense of shame about ihe process aa boy wondering who he was and where to he got his that the nuns often told adopting families the chilcolored locks j$trot dren were As a result there is little or no orphans met Petre had the surprise of his life tWhen they documentation of many adoptions and locating birth STl? hy was a nephew Petre never knew he had the parents or offspring isnt easy ster nobody ever told him about of Adoption-right- s campaigners are pressing the govre s haPPy ending had a sad beginning like at ernment to set a national registry but questions up 2200 other American citizens who were born of how much information can be withheld to protect wedlock in Ireland between 1949 and 1973 ifil shipped the privacy of parents and children remain tied up in off to the United States for adoption so legal challenges woucd not have to live as outcasts in their home- Neither the Irish government nor the Catholic church has formally apologized for what happened decades later many of them are 's50w' trying to although some officials have expressed regret track their birth parents The question of an One Church siblings is a difficult one apology 3srganization the Sacred "We didnt have to learn to be brother because in many cases Heart Adoption Society the children were better receives as many as 200 and sister even though wed never met off in the United States The minute we saw each other we requests a year for birth because Ireland was very information And one bonded We clicked poor at the time said reservice counseling John Lawton head of ceived some 1500 inquiconsular services for the Petra Larry ries in one recent year Irish Department of ForIrish adoptee The Ireland of the time eign Affairs was rigidly Catholic forIts not all black and bidding premarital sex white he added and artificial birth control As many as 2000 chilor wrongly the people who were involved dren were born out of wedlock each year most of inRightly this at the time felt they were doing right by the them in secret at Catholic charity homes where their children njothers were sent in shame before their pregnancies Petre agrees He grew up in a family in Texas with became noticeable no regrets about the way his life turned out iSShere the young wpihen gave birth and faced Still he feels sad about what his mother went 3fessure to put their Mfants up for adoption so they through: She had nine children and gave up every Jypuld return homeith their reputations intact and single one marry properly Petre found out the truth about his birth after his Unfortunately there werent enough homes in adoptive mother went to Ireland in 1981 to find his for all of them so the Catholic church looked to natural mother for him States Ue Uniteddemand They eventually met but there was no mention of outstripped supply and many famsiblings ilies were willing to make large donations in exThen three years later he answered the telephone change for a child said Mike Milotte author of Banand heard a woman with a soft brogue introduce ished Babies The Secret History of Irelands Baby herself as Breeda Whitmore Export Business Im your sister she said Life in the mother and baby homes as they were After talking they realized that they lived just 12 called in Ireland could be miserable The women miles apart in New Hampshire cleaned and scrubbed for their keep The nuns My God you could have picked me up off the showed little sympathy and the mothers werent alfloor Petre now remembers lowed to spend much time with their newborns Their friendship was instant and Petre is now godSome tried to nm away but guards invariably father to Whitmores second child a daughter Tocaught them gether they found all but one of their siblings and In some cases the women stayed as long as two several of them have now met We didnt have to learn to be brother and sister years breast feeding and bonding until their children were taken from them with hardly a goodbye even though wed never met Petre said At first there was little outcry about sending the The'minute we saw each other we bonded We children to the United States even though 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