Sue & Eileen/Rob, Martin & Sue Family Finders


Sue & Eileen/Rob, Martin & Sue

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Families can be driven apart for all manner of reasons.

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I had no information at all about where my mum went.

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And when you do lose touch with your loved ones...

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You don't know who you are, where you've come from.

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..finding them can take a lifetime...

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I might have a brother that's still living here.

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..especially when they could be anywhere - at home or abroad.

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And that's where the family finders come in.

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From international organisations...

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Hi, it's the Salvation Army Family Tracing Service.

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..to genealogy detective agencies...

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For someone to say that it's changed their life,

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it makes coming to work really, really special.

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..and dedicated one-man bands...

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It's a matter of how much effort you really want to put into it,

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how badly you want to solve the problem.

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..they hunt through history to bring families back together again.

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Finding new family is wonderful.

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In this series, we follow the work of the family finders...

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Suddenly, you get one spark of breakthrough and there they are.

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..learning the tricks they use

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to track missing relatives through time...

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I didn't think I'd ever find sisters but I have.

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..and meeting the people whose lives they change along the way.

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I've been waiting to meet John my whole life.

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Since we've met, I feel part of a family again.

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You've just completed my life for me.

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Every year, thousands of people across the UK

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set about searching for long-lost family members.

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No two searches are ever quite the same.

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Often a search will throw up unexpected results

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and it can take something completely unexpected for a search to succeed.

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Today, we hear how a boy, adopted as a baby,

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finally found family to call his own.

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I had a tap on the shoulder and there they were.

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That was... That was something else.

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And we meet two sisters who spent 50 years apart

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and led completely different lives.

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I was absolutely fascinated by meeting someone

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that looked so much like me.

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Rob Skinner was born in Croydon in 1943.

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The family didn't have much in the way of money

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and lived on a council estate.

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Nice three-bedroom house.

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My two sisters were older than me.

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June was 12 years, Cath, 15 years older.

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My father left my mother when I was about three years of age.

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A few years after his dad left,

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Rob's mum started a long-term relationship

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with a man Rob affectionately referred to as Uncle Albert

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and the family began taking in foster children.

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We had a succession of foster children, boys and girls.

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We never had much money but we did, we did enjoy life.

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Contented family life in the Skinner household continued

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until, at the age of 16,

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a shocking revelation was to change Rob's life forever.

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I left school

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and my prospective employer wanted to see my birth certificate.

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I can vividly remember Ma looking for the certificate

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and, while she was doing so, called out to me,

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"Of course, you realise you were adopted."

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Oh, no, I didn't.

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This was the first intimation that I'd had and...

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..I was taken aback a bit.

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Despite the fact that he'd grown up

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in an ever-changing household of foster children,

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until now, Rob had no clue that the woman he'd grown up calling Mum

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wasn't, in fact, related to him.

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I'd seen foster brothers and sisters come along and go.

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I always assumed that I was the real deal.

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Rob put the adoption shock behind him and got on with his life.

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He went on to become an insurance salesman, met Brenda,

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married and had three children.

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There were times when I wondered who my...

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..mother and father might be,

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but I never, ever asked Ma for detail.

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The main reason why I wasn't curious

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about my blood mother and father

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was because I was, I guess, supremely happy with where I was

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and didn't want to rock the boat.

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It wasn't until Rob was in his 60s, and his adoptive mum had died,

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that he felt free to explore his origins.

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This is the adoption order that shows my mother's name -

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Pauline Blanche Turner, and, it being such an unusual name,

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a match was made in a very straightforward manner.

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Rob soon discovered that he wasn't alone in his online search

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for information on his birth mother.

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Rob's daughter-in-law acted quickly and composed a message.

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I opened the e-mail. It's very sensitively written.

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"I am aware that this may be a delicate subject.

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"His father, Robin, was born in April, 1943,

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"to a Pauline Blanche Turner.

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"He was not aware that he was adopted

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"until he needed his birth certificate."

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There's only one Pauline Blanche Turner on the website

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and that's my mother.

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After an agonising wait,

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Rob received the response he was hoping for.

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On 24th January,

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we had an e-mail from Martin,

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who identified himself as a son of Pauline.

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"I will be very willing to help you in any way with information

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"and I've been trying to find Robin for the previous seven years,

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"after talking to my mother about him.

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"With best wishes, Martin."

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That, indeed, was the eureka moment when we knew we had family.

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After many years of searching for his birth mother,

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Rob had stumbled across a real-life blood brother.

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But there was more to come.

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It appears that we have a man who was jilted.

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It's really intriguing because it's just not the story

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that we've been following, is it, all these years?

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Sue De-Haven was born to a single mother in 1960.

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I was born in a Salvation Army hospital in Bristol.

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After I was born,

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my birth mother experienced quite a lot of health problems,

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so I wasn't able to be with her consistently.

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Sue never knew her father and soon after her birth,

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her mother met a new partner.

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She married in 1961,

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approximately a year after I was born

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and had another daughter called Eileen,

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who was 17 months younger than me.

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After Eileen was born,

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we were both with our mother for a short period of time

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until, unfortunately, she wasn't well

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and we both went into care into Downend babies home.

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Eileen was discharged from the baby home and went to live with her dad.

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Sue remained and was taken under the wing

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of a young nurse called Dilys Jenkins,

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who worked at the children's home.

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She was allowed to take me home at weekends

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as part of her NNEB training final papers.

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She took me home to her parents'

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and, um, they immediately fell in love me

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and I started to go there for weekends regularly.

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I used to cry and scream and make an awful fuss

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when I had to go back to the children's home.

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On a visit in early 1963,

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um, whilst visiting Chippenham with Dilys,

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we had the worst snow in the West Country for a lot of years

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and we were snowed in for three months.

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During that time, Dilys and her parents decided

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there was no way that they ever wanted to part with me again

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and they sought to adopt me.

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My adoptive parents would have liked to have fostered both Eileen and I

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but, unfortunately, they really didn't have the choice

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as whether they could have fostered both of us

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or adopted both of us, even.

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Eileen remained in the care of her biological father,

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while her sister, Sue, had a happy childhood

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with Dilys and her parents in Chippenham.

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But never forgot her birth family.

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I absolutely adored my mum and dad

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but it doesn't take away that curiosity, I suppose,

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of wanting to know your natural roots.

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When my adoptive mum died, I felt, suddenly, like I had permission

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to find out a bit more about my birth family.

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With the desire to find blood relatives ignited,

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Sue decided to trace her half-sister, Eileen.

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I started looking online

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to try and build my family tree from ancestral sites

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and it was more complex than I first realised.

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Little did she know, just 20 miles away,

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someone else was intent on doing some family finding of their own.

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I feel a bit, like, um...jealous,

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because you had a really lovely upbringing and I...

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-Do you know what I mean?

-Don't get upset.

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I sort of feel a bit jealous when I see all this.

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In Croydon, Rob Skinner had been trying to find his birth family,

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after finding out he'd been adopted during the war.

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A genealogy website had revealed that he wasn't the only one

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to be researching his natural mother, Pauline Blanche Turner,

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and any living relatives.

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Somebody was looking for relatives of Pauline Blanche Turner,

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which was a positive sign.

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Rob had made contact with the mystery person

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and discovered it was, in fact, a brother, Martin,

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who he'd never known existed.

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Rob actually phoned up my flat and I was listening to his voice,

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how he spoke, looking for similarities.

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It's like an experience you've never experienced before,

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like something you've always wanted

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and then you get it, it's overwhelming,

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and you're thinking, "Say the right things and ask the right questions."

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Twins Martin and Sue were born to Pauline Blanche Turner

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and her second husband and grew up in Harpenden.

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Our childhood was really happy.

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There was our natural father and mother and our older sister

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and it was just...

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-It was just really nice.

-It was a happy time.

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Yeah, it was a happy time.

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Growing up, young Martin and Sue were completely unaware

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that their mother had had a baby from a previous relationship,

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who she had given up for adoption.

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But as they got older,

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Pauline decided to share her secret with her children.

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I can remember being told about Rob around about the age of 14.

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Mum just said that she'd had another child,

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but she was only young and she had him adopted

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when he was six months old and I asked her why

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and she just said because HER mother, my grandmother, told her to.

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-I think things were different in those days.

-A lot different.

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-There was no support and it must have been horrendous.

-Mmm.

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And I suppose she thought she was doing the best

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by giving Rob another chance.

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We were told that his father had been killed in the war.

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He was American, his father. And that's why Mum...

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She married his best friend to give the baby a father,

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but when they were due to return back to America,

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she didn't want to leave England.

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He went back and she stayed here.

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In 2005, Martin and Sue's mother, Pauline,

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was diagnosed with Alzheimer's and moved into a care home.

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It was here she began to express regret

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about never having traced her first-born son, Rob.

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She must have been thinking about him, too,

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cos she instigated the conversation.

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With his mother's health failing,

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Martin was determined to track down his half-brother.

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When my mum was in the nursing home,

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she did always ask me about Rob and then one day she asked me

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if I'd managed to find him and she was talking about him,

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saying she would have liked to have seen him. Um...

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It's just those last years in the care home, the way she looked at me.

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-Mmm.

-Um...

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Like she was really hoping I'd found something and...

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HIS VOICE BREAKS WITH EMOTION

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You know, it just... It just never happened.

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I think she was hopeful when she said, "Have you found him?

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"Have you found Rob yet, Robin yet?" Cos she called him Robin.

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And I just said, "No." I just felt like I'd let her down.

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-HE SNIFFS

-Don't be silly.

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You haven't let her down.

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-Yeah, but it would have been nice.

-Mmm, it would have been.

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Pauline died without ever being reunited with the son

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she had been forced to give up.

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But just a year later,

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the e-mail arrived that was to finally bring the siblings together.

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The brothers arranged to meet in London at Victoria Station.

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I was, not worried, but I thought, "What if it doesn't work out

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"and what if we've got nothing in common?"

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And Susan was all excited.

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I had a tap on the shoulder and there they were.

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That was... That was something else.

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-I couldn't stop looking at him when we met him.

-Mmm.

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Rob is just the image. He's more like Mum than anybody, isn't he?

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Than any of us. He's so like her to look at.

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We talked a lot about my mother, what she did,

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what she was like, a little bit about the relationship

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that she'd had that brought me into the world.

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And it was..a remarkable experience.

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Since their initial meeting,

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the siblings have been making up for lost time.

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Today, Rob is heading to Cheshire to see the twins again

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and he's come armed with some more intriguing family research.

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I'm particularly looking forward to today

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because it's some time since Martin, Sue and I have got together

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and within the past couple of months,

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I've discovered some information about Mum

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that I think both Martin and Sue will find very interesting indeed.

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It will be nice to see Rob again cos it's been a long time.

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-Yeah, really good. It's been a year, hasn't it?

-Yeah.

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Catch up and give him this.

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-Well, I hope he likes it. I like it.

-I'm sure he will. It's lovely.

-Yeah.

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-Lovely to see you. You all right?

-Mmm. It's been a long time.

-It has.

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-Martin.

-Oh, it's good to see you. You all right?

-Yeah.

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-Shall we go in?

-Yeah.

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Martin has brought along a special gift for Rob,

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something he hopes will help bring him closer

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-to the family he never knew.

-Whoa.

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-That is brilliant.

-That's one you haven't got. That's Mum.

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That's her mother, our grandmother. And that was taken about 1920.

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That is HER mother, so that's your great-grandmother.

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-I just thought that would be nice for you to have.

-Yeah.

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Since being united with Martin and Sue,

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Rob has been trying to find out more about his natural father.

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The story their mother gave the twins

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was that he'd died during the war.

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However, Rob's research has dug up two incredible revelations.

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We often wondered why the relationship

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between our mum and my dad didn't materialise

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but we never did get an answer on that.

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What we do have...

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are some letters that Dad wrote home to, initially, his cousin,

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and so what we do have here are letters.

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They've stood the test of time.

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So, we see one there in February, '43.

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One for you, Martin.

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12th June, and there's some particular significance

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-in that date, you may remember.

-That was when...

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Wasn't she getting married?

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We have Mum's wedding certificate

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which shows that she was actually getting married

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on that very same day.

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This gets stranger and stranger.

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Yes, and on that very day, my dad was writing home to his cousin,

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saying that he still hoped to marry Mum.

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Martin and Sue had been told by their mother

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that she hadn't married Rob's father

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because he was killed in active service.

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-It appears that we have a man who was jilted.

-Oh.

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But we don't know why and, as I say, that is just one side of the story.

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It's really intriguing because it's...

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It's just not the story that we've been following, is it,

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all these years?

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Tragically, Rob missed out on a reunion

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with both his natural parents.

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But Martin and Sue are determined to make Rob feel part of the family

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and have brought him to a special place

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that has played a big part in their lives.

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The reason why we wanted to bring you here today

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is because we've decided that we want to put Mum's ashes somewhere,

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so we're thinking of having them interred here.

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I'm pleased to have an input into family events.

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I deferred looking for my family...

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..my mother, in particular, for about 50 years

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and today somehow seems to be, in a way,

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the end of that journey and now is the time

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to actually enjoy these relatives.

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In Wiltshire, Sue De-Haven had hit a brick wall

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and had given up searching for her baby sister, Eileen,

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who she'd become separated from 50 years earlier.

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But, unbeknownst to Sue, a mere 20 miles away,

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the very same sister she'd been trying to find

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had been searching for her too.

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Out of the blue, I received a message from Eileen's daughter

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on a social media site, saying that her mum had been looking for me.

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I was really shocked because I'd been trying to find Eileen

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for quite a long time.

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So, after years of trying and failing to find Eileen,

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Eileen had finally found Sue,

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and the sisters were back in touch after 50 long years apart.

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Eileen had been born 17 months after Sue in 1962,

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but their mother became unable to cope

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and both sisters ended up in a children's home.

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I can't really remember much of when I was really little.

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I can just remember probably from when I was about two or three

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and that was going to Swindon to live with my dad.

0:21:160:21:21

Eileen's father gained custody

0:21:220:21:24

and removed her from the home before also trying to get custody of Sue.

0:21:240:21:28

When we were children,

0:21:300:21:31

we actually went down to Chippenham to Sue's house.

0:21:310:21:35

I can't remember all of it

0:21:350:21:36

but I can remember going to Chippenham with our dad.

0:21:360:21:39

I think what I was told

0:21:390:21:41

is that Dad and that went down to try to get Sue.

0:21:410:21:44

But Eileen's dad wasn't Sue's biological father

0:21:450:21:48

and strong opposition from Sue's adoptive parents

0:21:480:21:51

meant that she remained in Chippenham with them.

0:21:510:21:53

And then I turned into quite an angry young teenager.

0:21:540:21:59

I was sleeping rough, I was drinking,

0:21:590:22:03

so I was, like, thinking, "I really wonder how Sue's life...

0:22:030:22:07

"Has she got a happier life than me?"

0:22:070:22:09

I think it was just sad that we didn't grow up together,

0:22:100:22:13

being that we come from the same mother.

0:22:130:22:15

Eileen eventually married and went on to have children of her own

0:22:150:22:20

and it wasn't until her 50th birthday that she decided

0:22:200:22:24

it was time to try to find the sister she'd lost.

0:22:240:22:28

My daughter took Sue's name and went onto Facebook

0:22:280:22:32

and done a search for me and there was a few Sues with that name

0:22:320:22:37

but straightaway she come across the one that she said,

0:22:370:22:40

"This is your sister, Mum. This is her."

0:22:400:22:43

The sisters were soon speaking on the phone.

0:22:440:22:47

We just couldn't stop talking.

0:22:470:22:49

It was like we'd known each other for all the time.

0:22:490:22:51

There was so much to talk about.

0:22:510:22:53

We were on the phone for about four hours.

0:22:530:22:55

Sue and Eileen then arranged their first meeting

0:22:550:22:59

at Swindon train station.

0:22:590:23:01

When I first saw her, um, I knew it was her straightaway.

0:23:020:23:06

We just chatted.

0:23:070:23:08

It was just, like, amazing. It was just, like,

0:23:080:23:10

I can't believe this has really happened after all these years.

0:23:100:23:13

It's like I really can't believe it.

0:23:130:23:16

I think it's fair to say that I couldn't take my eyes off of her.

0:23:160:23:19

Um, I was absolutely fascinated

0:23:190:23:23

by meeting someone that looked so much like me.

0:23:230:23:28

It might have been 50 plus years since we'd seen each other last,

0:23:280:23:32

but we had a lot of characteristics in common,

0:23:320:23:36

which I found extraordinary.

0:23:360:23:38

We've become closer and closer

0:23:400:23:43

and...I feel like I've got my little sister back -

0:23:430:23:48

my first experience of having a little sister.

0:23:480:23:52

Today, the two sisters are meeting again

0:23:560:23:59

and this time, a special guest has been invited along too.

0:23:590:24:02

-Hiya!

-Hiya!

0:24:050:24:06

Dilys is the nurse who was charged with looking after Sue

0:24:090:24:13

in the children's home where both sisters lived all those years ago.

0:24:130:24:17

This is the first picture I've got of me with Dilys...

0:24:170:24:21

-Yeah.

-Is that me?

0:24:210:24:23

-I thought that was my mum!

-No, that IS you!

0:24:230:24:26

It was Dilys's parents who ended up adopting and raising Sue.

0:24:290:24:33

-I haven't got as many photos as you, but I have got a couple.

-Crikey!

0:24:340:24:37

THEY LAUGH

0:24:370:24:39

No, that's really funny.

0:24:390:24:40

Sue is keen to know more about how she'd been taken

0:24:420:24:45

to stay with Dilys's parents, who then went on to adopt her.

0:24:450:24:49

I was always told by Mum and Dad that you were able to bring me home

0:24:500:24:57

to see how a child who hadn't had maternal bonding,

0:24:570:25:02

er...reacted in an ordinary family environment.

0:25:020:25:08

I've always wondered why I was allowed to take you home.

0:25:080:25:13

I just thought it was a policy that it gave

0:25:130:25:16

the children in the residential home a bit of family life,

0:25:160:25:20

a bit of a taste of family life. I just assumed that's what it was.

0:25:200:25:25

But I had no idea.

0:25:250:25:26

At this time, Eileen had been living

0:25:270:25:29

in the same care home as her older sister.

0:25:290:25:32

I used to bring Sue down to visit her baby sister

0:25:320:25:35

and I would hold you then,

0:25:350:25:38

so that Susan could, you know, pat you and look at you and love you.

0:25:380:25:43

No-one's ever remembered old me as a tiny baby.

0:25:430:25:46

No-one remembers going back that far, like me as a tiny baby.

0:25:460:25:50

So, you're the first one I've actually met or spoke to

0:25:500:25:53

that can remember old me as this tiny baby

0:25:530:25:56

and then obviously, I was fostered out.

0:25:560:25:59

-I don't know how long I was in there for. Do you know?

-No.

0:25:590:26:02

-You don't, obviously, know?

-No.

-No.

-I don't, sorry.

0:26:020:26:04

But I do know that Mum and Dad, at the time, would have loved

0:26:040:26:08

-for you to have been with me as well, I think.

-Yeah.

0:26:080:26:12

But, of course, it wasn't possible.

0:26:120:26:14

They did want you and they did...

0:26:150:26:18

..sort of try to get you, if you like,

0:26:190:26:22

-but they were blocked by your father.

-Yeah.

-Yeah.

-Yeah.

0:26:220:26:27

Because, well, you were his daughter and that was it.

0:26:270:26:32

I don't want to feel that I'm betraying people

0:26:320:26:35

when I say I feel a bit, like, um...

0:26:350:26:38

jealous because you had a really lovely upbringing

0:26:380:26:41

and your parents obviously worshipped her, so, yeah, I do...

0:26:410:26:45

-But I've also got my own brothers and sisters.

-Yeah.

-And I...

0:26:450:26:49

Do you know what I mean?

0:26:490:26:51

-I don't want to feel that I'm betraying them...

-Don't get upset.

0:26:510:26:54

..when I say I feel a bit jealous when I see all this.

0:26:540:26:57

I was a bit upset when I found out how Eileen's life had panned out,

0:27:010:27:07

compared to Susan's life,

0:27:070:27:09

but I'm delighted she seems to have come through it very well indeed.

0:27:090:27:13

I would rather have been brought up with you included

0:27:150:27:18

and grown up to have known Sue,

0:27:180:27:20

like grown up to have known each other.

0:27:200:27:23

That's probably how I would have liked it.

0:27:230:27:24

-It means the world to me.

-Good to have you back in my life.

0:27:270:27:31

THEY KISS

0:27:310:27:33

I know that we'll never lose contact again now. Um...

0:27:340:27:38

She was the first blood relative that I've ever known

0:27:380:27:42

and it's absolutely fantastic for me for me to have her in my life.

0:27:420:27:46

I think it's been amazing meeting up with my sister after so many years.

0:27:460:27:51

Yeah, I feel a lot happier, now she's in my life.

0:27:530:27:55

I love her, yeah, I do.

0:27:550:27:58

We have started to become close again, after over 50 years,

0:27:580:28:03

which is absolutely amazing.

0:28:030:28:06

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