North East Post Adoption Service - Adoption Narratives - Alex
erm, as I was saying Maureen phoned up and she says, ‘I’ve bought it’, I says, ‘ye what!!’ says, ‘I’ve bought it because it’s in Newcastle and it’s beside you. I don’t care, don’t know what the house is like and I don’t care. It could be four walls and a roof I’d be happy. And she has told a lot of people that. So Maureen moved over and we’ve been together constantly ever since erm, Maureen comes up to get away from the Granddad, to my home three times a week and erm we go out for a drink with her or we go to the club if there is any special dos on, and she’s really settled down and she is starting to get her Geordie accent back, not that bloody Irish thing. Willy’s happy, he’s had his operations and I’m happy I’ve got me sister but the sad thing is it’s come to the latter part of our years in life and we don’t know how long we are going to have each other depending on how the disabilities goes, what illnesses we have and anything but the best thing is I make the most of me sister and me sister makes the most of me. And we know the Granddad tells a stack of lies, he lies through his teeth because he was actually one of the cousins that had adopted me sister and he denied knowing me and he denied knowing me mother but now any chance he gets to come up and have a little bit tittle tattle well, putting it the blunt way, the sun shines out of my backside. But he’s 85, he’s a canny old man and anything he says I just take with a pinch of salt but I’ve had a varied, exciting life and the crème de la crème was when I found me sister and she still feels remorse for mam because she only missed mam by ten months and a year. So anybody that may be reading this or it’s going on to a tape for some of the disabled those who can’t read or hear take my heed, don’t give up, there’s always a light at the end of the tunnel.
It’s been a long journey for you hasn’t it.
It’s been a great long journey for us but it’s well been worth it. With it’s drawbacks because the drawback is I’ve got me sister but on secondary times I‘ve also got me mam because Maureen is me mam, a double. So keep your chins up, progress and search but never, ever give up.
How has the rest of your family, your children reacted, do they get on well with Maureen?
Ecstatic, they’ve got an aunty, got a new aunty and they’ve got cousins and they get spoilt but that’s family and I am glad to have me sister back, in Newcastle where she was born.
It’s a wonderful story isn’t it?
Tis. It is, it’s, the story, it’s a story which people would say it’s hard to believe but you believe me we’re both here and we are ecstatic.
And you didn’t have any other brothers or sisters after Maureen?
No Mam only had erm the two children, myself and my sister and that was happy enough for her and the remorse is that Maureen missed mam by a few months with which seems like a lifetime but now she’s got photographs of mam and she says, ‘who’s that?’ ‘That’s you Maureen’. ‘Where did you get that from? How long have you had that? That’s an old one’. But it’s not it’s mam. All the family are ecstatic and hopefully some of the family that don’t bother with us, like mam’s sisters, err, ye know, I just hope they are happy but I can definitely tell you I’m happy. I’ve got me sister.
