My life as a Forgotten Australian

13 Nov 2009, 2:31 pm   -   Source: SBS - Shalailah Medhora
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Caroline Carroll, Chairwoman of the Alliance of the Forgotten Australians, was a baby when she first entered into state care, where she was abused and neglected. She talks to SBS about her harrowing experiences, and how it has affected her life.

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Caroline Carroll, Chairwoman of the Alliance of the Forgotten Australians, was a baby when she first entered into state care, where she was abused and neglected. She talks to SBS about her harrowing experiences, and how it has affected her life.

"I was put - taken, I'm not sure - into care when I was 14 months old. I was one of eight children, but I didn't know that at the time obviously, and I didn't know that till I was almost 15.

"I moved around NSW from several institutions and about five to six different foster placements. They were all fairly abusive - some were better than others, but most were pretty awful.

"I had my name changed everytime I went to a different institution; sometimes we were called by numbers.

"They (the institutions) didn't educate me, they didn't take care of my health needs. And my story is the story of so many other Forgotten Australians. It's not unique.

"When it was time for you to leave these institutions, they often took you in the middle of the night, or took your friend in the night, because they didn't want to have a drama, or because they didn't want emotion showed.

"They didn't encourage friendships in these places. And if you were friendly with someone they would put them in a different dormitory or a different part of the institution to break up friendships. I suppose it was that divide and conquer stuff... It wasn't just one loss, it was continual losses.

"I was 15 or there abouts (when I left care). They told me when I was 15 that I was old enough to look after myself. After taking my education, my family, my self-esteem (I was) pretty much put out on the street to cope with life on my own.

"I met my brother at 15 when I was just about ready to leave care. I think Welfare had arranged for him to come and see me. And he just walked down the road to the institution I was in and asked for me.

"I was really shocked because I didn't have a visitor in all the time I was in care. He lived in a small country town in NSW, and after I got out of the institution... I don't know whether I planned it or it just happened, but I ended up going to this small town. I stayed there but he (my bother) had left, and that's probably what saved me, because it was a community, and for the first time I felt part of something. Not a family exactly, but a community. I think that was my saving grace.

"I've met two siblings since - that brother and a sister. The others I haven't ever met.

"I did meet my parents when I was 15, but that didn't work. They came to the institution just before I left, and I was told to kiss them hello and go and sit in the garden with them, total strangers. I don't know myself or they were more relieved when it was time to leave. Really, there was nothing there. When I met them, I was really disappointed.

"I suppose, when I had imagined a family, I imagined a perfect family, and they were far from that. Being 15, what would I know? I just dismissed them, pretty much. I regret that, because I never found out what happened and why we were all split up and why didn't make more effort.

"When I got my ward record, they (my parents) had written and tried to find where we all were, but they were never given the opportunity to connect with us either.

"(My siblings and I) were never in the same institution. There was no effort made to keep siblings together, in fact, it was the opposite. In my file, when a sister (of mine) had written trying to find me when she left care because she was trying to find her family, she got a letter back saying "they're happy, leave them alone, you don't need to know".

"I don't understand why Welfare took us from what they claimed was neglectful or dysfunctional families and put us through more violence, more dysfunction, more heartache and grief and neglect than what we probably would have had to deal with in our birth families.

"People who have tried to get compensation (from the institutions), the statute of limitations says you need to put in a claim before you turn 21. Well, most of us could hardly read or write... we didn't know what the big wide world was about, let alone trying to deal with legal issues.

"When the Senate inquiry happened (in 2004) I put a submission in, and that was the hardest thing I have ever done, to write all this down and talk about the abuse.

"It's been a long journey. It's been full of frustrations, but also full of great joy, and I think the apology is a joyous occasion, and even though it will re-traumatise some people, and talk about the pain and the hurt, but it will also celebrate that people survived and pretty much did it on their own.

"I'm hopeful for the future. I think you never get over a childhood like this... but I think, finally, our government is acknowledging what happened to us was wrong, and certainly it should teach people that this can never happen to another child in Australia, and we need to put all the support we have behind kids in care today.

"Yes, I am hopeful that this apology will be part of the healing for so many people."

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