Somebody’s Daughter

On our final episode of the season, we resume our conversation with Queensland adoptee Michael Costello, whose quest to unravel the truth behind his horrific childhood has left him with more questions than answers.
We hear how after reuniting with his mum, they embarked on a fight to turn back the clock, overcoming a mountain of red tape in order to be legally recognised as mother and son again.
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LINKS
Follow @somebodysdaughter_podcast on Instagram
Follow @somebodysdaughterpodcast on TikTok
Follow @megannorris_author on Instagram
Follow @moyramajor on Instagram
Visit Origins Australia originsaustralia.org
Visit Origins Australia facebook.com/groups/originsaustralia
Email us somebodysdaughterpodcast@gmail.com
Email Megan megan@newscoop.com.au
Follow @woodworkpodcasts on Instagram and TikTok
CREDITS
Hosts: Megan Norris and Moyra Major
Guest: Michael Costello
Mobile Podcast Recording and Digital Content Production: Ben Wood at Wood Work Digital Studio
Enquiries: ben@woodworkdigitalstudio.com.au
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

When Michael Costello made his debut at the Women’s Hospital in Brisbane in August 1970 he was immediately separated from his teenage mother before she could even hold him and spent the next three months in the hospital nursery crying and alone in his crib.

A sickly infant who had never known what it was like to feel a mother’s love, Michael was transferred to a children’s home and it would be another year before he was placed with a foster family who later went on to adopt him.

Amazingly, though other youngsters in the family’s care were subsequently removed by the authorities, Michael remained behind, trapped in a nightmare beyond anyone’s wildest dreams.
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LINKS
Follow @somebodysdaughter_podcast on Instagram
Follow @somebodysdaughterpodcast on TikTok
Follow @megannorris_author on Instagram
Follow @moyramajor on Instagram
Visit Origins Australia originsaustralia.org
Visit Origins Australia facebook.com/groups/originsaustralia
Email us somebodysdaughterpodcast@gmail.com
Email Megan megan@newscoop.com.au
Follow @woodworkpodcasts on Instagram and TikTok
CREDITS
Hosts: Megan Norris and Moyra Major
Guest: Michael Costello
Mobile Podcast Recording and Digital Content Production: Ben Wood at Wood Work Digital Studio
Enquiries: ben@woodworkdigitalstudio.com.au
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The heady romance that blossomed between Cameron Horn and his high school sweetheart, Mary was a real-life Romeo and Juliet love story with an equally tragic ending.

When the 20-year-old university student discovered the love of his life was expecting his baby, the lovebirds agreed they would marry and raise their love-child together, living the dream on Sydney’s northern beaches.

Sadly, those dreams came crashing down when eighteen-year-old Mary’s strict Catholic father found out about the baby. In a fit of rage, he banishing Cameron from Mary’s life and she spent her entire pregnancy locked in her bedroom where she was told that unless she gave her baby up for adoption, the family would turn their backs on her.
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LINKS
Follow @somebodysdaughter_podcast on Instagram
Follow @somebodysdaughterpodcast on TikTok
Follow @megannorris_author on Instagram
Follow @moyramajor on Instagram
Visit Origins Australia originsaustralia.org
Visit Origins Australia facebook.com/groups/originsaustralia
Email us somebodysdaughterpodcast@gmail.com
Email Megan megan@newscoop.com.au
Follow @woodworkpodcasts on Instagram and TikTok
CREDITS
Hosts: Megan Norris and Moyra Major
Guest: Cameron Horn
Mobile Podcast Recording and Digital Content Production: Ben Wood at Wood Work Digital Studio
Enquiries: ben@woodworkdigitalstudio.com.au
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Between 1949 and 1990 more than 150,000 babies were systematically stolen from young vulnerable mothers in hospitals and maternity homes around Australia under the Government’s historic forced adoption policies.

In 1969, seventeen-year-old Wendy Pankhurst’s beautiful newborn baby was one of them.

Distressed and sedated, the grieving teenager was separated from other mothers at the small country hospital in NSW where, heavily sedated, she was pressured into giving her up for adoption.

Today, Wendy joins us from her home in country NSW, reflecting on the heartache of the lifelong suffering that continues to dog the lives of thousands of survivors who are victims of a crime Australia tried to hide.
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LINKS
Follow @somebodysdaughter_podcast on Instagram
Follow @somebodysdaughterpodcast on TikTok
Follow @megannorris_author on Instagram
Follow @moyramajor on Instagram
Visit Origins Australia originsaustralia.org
Visit Origins Australia facebook.com/groups/originsaustralia
Email us somebodysdaughterpodcast@gmail.com
Email Megan megan@newscoop.com.au
Follow @woodworkpodcasts on Instagram and TikTok
CREDITS
Hosts: Megan Norris and Moyra Major
Guest: Wendy Pankhurst
Mobile Podcast Recording and Digital Content Production: Ben Wood at Wood Work Digital Studio
Enquiries: ben@woodworkdigitalstudio.com.au
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In this episode we welcome adoptee, Colleen Barnard who was born in the same Magdalene Home in Brisbane where last week’s guest, Lily Arthur, was incarcerated for the crime of being pregnant and unwed.

Colleen describes her adoption journey as a Magdalene baby, the challenges of finding her own identity in a manufactured family and how the search to find her mother took her halfway around the world – only to find that her mum was living in her own backyard in rural Queensland.
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LINKS
Follow @somebodysdaughter_podcast on Instagram
Follow @somebodysdaughterpodcast on TikTok
Follow @megannorris_author on Instagram
Follow @moyramajor on Instagram
Visit Origins Australia originsaustralia.org
Visit Origins Australia facebook.com/groups/originsaustralia
Email us somebodysdaughterpodcast@gmail.com
Email Megan megan@newscoop.com.au
Follow @woodworkpodcasts on Instagram and TikTok
CREDITS
Hosts: Megan Norris and Moyra Major
Guest: Colleen Barnard
Mobile Podcast Recording and Digital Content Production: Ben Wood at Wood Work Digital Studio
Enquiries: ben@woodworkdigitalstudio.com.au
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.