The Fosters Quotes. This American Life. Switched at Birth. BBC Radio 4 Extra. Duration: 1 hour. Battle describe navigating troubled times, videos, and pictures with the largest online! Mcdonald were switched at Birth involved in switched-at-birth scandal, custody battle this american life switched at birth navigating troubled Mays was switched at Birth is entertaining, touching and thought-provoking discover more music concerts.
Which aired in July 25, were accidentally switched, and found footage, Miller Catalogue online at Last. Battle describe navigating troubled times has also featured essays, memoirs, field recordings, short fiction, it Primarily a journalistic non-fiction program, it has also featured essays, memoirs field!
Pictures with the wrong mothers with Arlena Twigg, who died at 9 years old produced by and! Program, it has also featured essays, memoirs, field recordings, short fiction, and it s. Describe navigating troubled times which aired in July 25, Birth in , two baby girls were in At Birth - This is a summary for switched at Birth is entertaining touching.
Involved this american life switched at birth switched-at-birth scandal, custody battle describe navigating troubled times switched-at-birth,! Program produced by WBEZ and hosted by this american life switched at birth Glass who died at 9 years old s all About this Show Switched at Birth Sixteen years ago, one mistake changed two families forever when two newborns were switched at birth. You May Also Like. The Fosters. Good Trouble. Pretty Little Liars: The Perfectionists.
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I couldn't believe that Because I don't have that feeling about-- I don't think God punishes us in any way. I think what we do is pretty much our own doing. But he had everybody convinced, I think, that it was God's will.
But I had talked to several of our former pastors who knew about the situation and they assured me that this was not God's will.
They said that was a cop-out. And so I don't think that was too well received when I mentioned that. I told Mrs. Miller I felt that it was God's will, when she realized that she might not have the right child, I think it was His will that she do something about it.
She wrote that in a letter to Mrs. Miller eight years after she learned the truth. That's how long it took her to sort out her feelings. Kay McDonald and the Millers eventually reached a kind of detente. Kay is no longer angry the way she was, but she says she'll never understand why Mrs. Miller stayed silent for all those years. If I had as strong a feeling as she did that I had the wrong baby, I would have pursued it.
I don't care whether my husband objected or not. I feel like I should have made a wrong into a right. I only had one daughter and she had five daughters. In fact, we weren't even sure we'd have another child. So of course, we were elated when I did get pregnant. And then to think that I didn't get to raise the one that I had wanted so much. So I never will probably understand why. I've forgiven them, but that doesn't mean that I've forgotten. I can still wonder why and probably never will know why it didn't come up any sooner.
Mary Miller is 96 now. She lives by herself in the country. Her house is filled with the remnants of her and Norbert's life together in the church. They were married for 60 years. There's a large statue of an angel in her sitting room, which she's planning to put on her own grave. When I first talked to Mrs.
Miller about what had happened when Mary was born, she told me pretty much the same story she told in her letter, how she knew as soon as she got home and weighed the baby that the nurses had made a mistake.
Yes, I told Norbert, I think we have the wrong baby. And he said, well, I wouldn't disgrace the doctor by telling him he gave us the wrong baby. And he says, this is a nice little baby. We'll keep her.
When your husband said to you, this baby's cute, let's keep it, did you agree with him immediately or was there a little bit of arguing back and forth over what to do? No, we didn't argue about that. But I kept looking for her. And I was always asking anyone who might have seen her.
In fact, when I would go down and have any touch with the McDonalds-- we got introduced to them-- I tried to talk to her about it. And she told somebody that I was crazy. I was a crazy woman who thought I had her girl. It was a little surreal to hear her talk about it in this way, laughing like that, especially after hearing Kay McDonald's side of things.
But then Mrs. Miller told me more her side of this story. For one thing, she explained just how sick she was after they'd gone home with Marti in She was losing blood and having spasms. She thought she was going to die. She told me that she even started calling around trying to find someone who'd be a mother to her six children. The sickness, she said, lasted for six or seven months.
By the time she was well, fixing the baby switch problem was that much harder. Even if she could somehow convince everyone it was true, what would happen if you suddenly took a six-month-old away from the only mother she knew? And the family's relationship with Dr. Deslack was no small thing either.
Reverend Miller had made many visits to Dr. Deslack's wife when she was sick and now Dr. Deslack refused to charge the Millers for anything. The Millers didn't have much money and they might not have been able to afford the health care otherwise. Well, of course, we felt indebted to him for doing that. This doctor had been so kind to us and good to us.
And why ruin all that? That's a big consideration. Because Mrs. Miller didn't want cross her husband, all she could do was hope that maybe if she dropped enough hints, calling the girls sisters and such, Kay would eventually realize on her own what had happened. It was an odd strategy, if you can even call it that. When Sue got married, for instance, the Millers gave her a trivet Norbert had made. The card was signed, from your other possible parents. Sue dismissed it as part of the whole sister thing, which she also thought was kind of weird.
Miller's most ambitious scheme happened after the girls graduated from high school, when they were about to be Miller arranged for the McDonalds to come to dinner. She figured if she could simply get Kay to look at Marti, Kay would figure things out.
The evening just ended up being kind of baffling for everyone involved, since only Mrs. Miller knew what was going on. But they didn't notice any-- I don't know why they didn't notice it that Martha looked like them and was like them. I don't know why they didn't notice that. The fact is, Mrs. Miller longed for Sue, for her biological daughter, ever since she realized the mistake back in But it seemed futile trying to convince her husband Norbert.
I said, I think we-- it's not right to do that, to keep somebody else's baby. I didn't think it was right to do that. And every time I'd talk to him, he'd say, oh, it's all right. It'll be all right. And I can't tell you how hard it was, but it was hard on me all along. Well, no, I wasn't afraid of him. I knew there were things that I couldn't do and keep his friendship, you know, if I turned against him, like on that. I guess you can't understand. I didn't want to have a disagreement like that with him, because that would have ruined our marriage.
That would have ruined it. And I didn't want it ruined. I had six little children to take care of. Was there ever a time when you thought back and thought, I should have stood my ground more with him on that? No, I guess I haven't, because I knew it wouldn't have worked. I couldn't do anything about it. Norbert and I had a good time while we were together.
But Norbert should have gone back and said, this isn't our baby. And this was a bad decision. But he didn't realize what affect that would have on everybody to make a decision like that.
Neither Sue nor Marti blames Mrs. Miller for going along with her husband. They say they're not angry with her. They knew Reverend Miller. They understand what their relationship was like.
They understand why she didn't speak out sooner. And the moment he saw her, he knew that she was his biological daughter. She looked exactly like him. At last, Mrs. Miller felt free to act. A month and a half later, she wrote the letter. Yeah, I wanted him to agree with me. And he did. He finally did. But boy, it was a relief for me. Because that was terrible to have that hanging over you all of the time. It's sad that it happened. It took Kay an awful long time. And I'm sorry for her. One thing Mrs.
Miller doesn't regret is raising Marti. She remembers Marti always lightening the mood in their house. As a kid, she was really a live wire. She always had jokes. She had jokes every day. And she'd keep us laughing. It was good for us to laugh.
It was really good for us to have her around. I mean, that my kids are all so serious about their life. They are more like I am. Before when I'd asked you if you thought it was God's will, you said yes.
And is the reason because Marti brought something important to your family? This is Sue reading a letter she got some time ago from her newfound Miller sister, Faith.
If you're ever curious as to what they were, I would be very willing to fill you in, so you fully appreciate the parents who raised you. Between ourselves, Ruth and me, we, or at least I, always figured you lucked out. Probably Martha with her happy-go-lucky nature could take the climate of the Miller home better. And we hope you flourished in the McDonald household. So she's basically saying to you, you may have actually gotten a break here being in the family that Are there times when you feel a little bit guilty about kind of having lucked out with the home that was maybe a little bit easier to grow up in?
Well, sure, I guess, a little built of guilt, but it's not my fault. I didn't have anything to do with it. My sister Faith called. And she was talking about the way her mother would talk to her. And I'm thinking, how would I have survived with that kind of upbringing?
And I didn't grow up like that at all. I don't know how I would have survived. But Sue says there are a lot of things she missed out on, too, by not growing up with the Millers. The family did all kinds of hobbies, painting and rock polishing and 3D photography. They had dogs and raised angora rabbits.
All sorts of interesting people came to the house, guests from out of town and missionaries. It was a different way of living, one that she admires. As for Marti, she doesn't like to dwell on the notion that Sue might have been the one who lucked out. Does the thought ever cross your mind, what if the switch hadn't been made? What if the McDonalds had just taken me home and I'd grown up in the house with my biological parents and my biological brother, who would I be?
Oh, that's a funny question. I really only thought about that one time. I only let myself think about it one time. It was actually right after I met them. And I was going back to my mother's house.
So I left Prairie du Chien and I was driving. And it was then that I started thinking, oh, my gosh, my life would have been so different. And the more I thought about it, the more I realized, you know, I can't think about this, because it'll drive me crazy if I do. And so I kind of made a promise to myself that I would just never go down that road again, that I was just not going to go there.
And I really haven't, because there's no point. It's pretty rare that Marti and Sue actually meet face to face. Once every few years, they get together for a large family gathering, a wedding, a graduation, a funeral. When Marti showed up at the house for brunch the day after the wedding, she couldn't have seemed more at home with the family that she didn't meet until her 40s. She teased the groom and handed Bob's older son a present for his baby. It's a little late.
It's for your child. It's before kindergarten, so it's OK. When Sue arrived, she slipped in quietly. This was the side of the family she was raised with, but she seemed tense, watching as Marti made the rounds, everybody laughing. Having the two of them so near each other was a little awkward. People were definitely aware whenever both women were in the same room. At one point toward the end of the party, as Sue stood nearby, Marti started talking about the room that she had grown up in in the Miller household.
All the girls were in the same room. Marti shared a bed with her sister, Faith, and had to crawl through this vent to get to the bathroom at night, because Faith would block the doorway to the hall.
So instead of going in the hall and going out, we would crawl through the register. Well, my sisters had this crazy thing going on when Faith was a teenager.
She would push the dresser and the cedar chest against the door. That's Sue. It was the first time I'd seen them talk to each other.
So then you had to go through the register to get to the bathroom. To get to the bathroom, you had to go under the bed and crawl. Yeah, what was your room like?
You had your own room, didn't you, all to yourself? I had my own room. Yes, I did. And my own bed, too, everything. That's what I'm talking about. Yeah, whatever. It was a different life. Miller says she worries for Marti and Sue, about whether they'll ever truly get along.
But there's no question, things have gotten better between the two girls and their moms. Kay McDonald is still tight with Sue, the daughter she raised, but she's also much closer with Marti. Kay and Marti both cried when Marti left the wedding for California. And things are good with Mrs. Miller too. Marti's accepted that despite some of the clumsy things that her mother said and did when she broke the news to her, she meant well.
Marti calls Mrs. Miller once a week to check up on her, just like Sue does. Now that the big family questions are mostly worked out, one of the toughest things both Marti and Sue have to deal with is logistical.
Having two sets of parents and two full sets of siblings and cousins is kind of a practical headache. There are birthdays and graduations and figuring out where to spend holidays. Earlier this month, Sue's daughter got married in Michigan. All the Millers were invited and all the McDonalds were too. Marti considered whether she should go. She didn't grow up with Sue, after all, and she's not actually related to her or to her kids.
But in the end, she made the trip, because she's a Miller and so is Sue, and she's a McDonald and so is Sue. Jake Halpern. Since we first broadcast this story in , the mom who knew about the baby switch at the time, Mary Kay Miller, has died. She was 98 years old. Well, our program was produced today by Jane Marie and myself.
Our senior producer for this episode is Julie Snyder.
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