A Series by The Girl Speaks
This is the beginning of a multi-part series sharing my personal journey through forced adoption.
It’s a story of loss, survival, and truth — told piece by piece, memory by memory, as it happened.
“The UK remains one of the only countries in Europe where children can be forcibly adopted without parental consent.”
When I became a mother in my early twenties, I was naive to the world I was stepping into.
I had no life experience, no real-world understanding, and no idea how dangerous it was to be vulnerable in front of a system that didn’t want to help — it wanted to remove.
I was lost.
Confused.
Trying to survive inside a home that wasn’t safe, under the thumb of a mother who was cruel, narcissistic, and abusive.
The control she had over me wasn’t love — it was manipulation, brainwashing, and fear disguised as protection.
Social services watched.
For three years, they sat quietly at a distance, making notes, documenting every slip and crack, yet never stepping in to help.
No hand offered. No genuine support.
Just silent judgment, building a case behind closed doors.
One day, they gave me an “option.”
“Move out from your mother’s house, or lose your son.”
It was a simple choice.
“When do I move?” I asked, my heart ready to do whatever it took.
“Four months from now,” they said.
I replied without hesitation, “Good. Let’s do this.”
I moved.
I stepped into the unknown because I believed, truly believed, that I was saving my son’s future.
But just one week later, they came and stole him from my arms.
They didn’t come to help me learn to parent independently.
They didn’t offer the real support I desperately needed after escaping an abusive home.
Instead, they placed me into a so-called “supported” unit — six little flats, two workers tucked away in an office from 9 to 4, Monday to Friday.
I was invisible to them.
I didn’t fit in with the others — my son was older, my situation different.
They didn’t care to hear my story.
Sometimes, I felt mocked.
I had no life skills, no friends, no guidance.
Just meetings. Paperwork. Judgments.
And a love for my son that screamed inside me every single day.
I fought.
I fought with everything I had.
But it wasn’t enough.
I had no solicitor who cared.
No family willing to stand by me.
No internet to search for help or advice at the touch of a button — this was 2005.
I was a young mother fighting a battle I didn’t even understand was rigged against me from the start.
thegirlspeaks.uk 