An Australian Adoptee Uncovers Her Roots In Vietnam

Are You My Mother: As Australia announces a debate on re-opening international adoption, one woman tries to recover from her adoption trauma.

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During the Vietnam War, many children were adopted into Australian families. Forty years on, one adoptee journeys back to her homeland, revisits the past and looks to changes needed in Australia's adoption system.

Born into war, Sophie English was just 10 months old when her connections with her mother and motherland were broken. Now returning to Vietnam she meets Le Thi Can, a mother who relinquished a child. "I thought it was better for her to lose a mother than to lose her life", says Le Thi Can. "I hope you understand that as adoptees, we really do understand... we understand that it was the war, and that you did your best", Sophie responds, confronting emotions she had always repressed. Now, international adoption laws mean that those who would have been sent overseas in the past will stay in Vietnam. The Australian government wants to reopen adoptions from Vietnam but as advocate Deborra-Lee Furness warns, the focus must be on the child and their integration. "Every minute that that child is institutionalized or without a forever family they are being damaged." An exploration of the dangers and benefits of international adoption, this report is also a touching tale of a search for identity, and of making peace with the past.

ABC Australia - Ref 6437

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