“The 12-Year-Old-Mum: My True Story.” That’s the arresting title of Tressa Middleton’s autobiography, a story of the resilience and determination of a young girl whom life has been cruel to, who becomes a young woman embracing a much more positive future.
The event that changed the course of Middleton’s life happened in 2006, when she became Britain’s youngest mum at age 12. Her pregnancy at 11 years of age was the product of rape. The rapist was Middleton’s own brother, Jason, who was 16 at the time.
Determined to look after her infant daughter, no matter how she was conceived, Middleton raised her for two years, and kept the father’s identity a secret.
Tressa Middleton talks to ‘This Morning’ on ITV. Post continues after…
When the truth was discovered, the toddler was removed from her mother’s care, against her will, and officially adopted out in 2008. The adoption was, and continues to be, a source of loss and grief for the young mother.
Speaking to the Daily Mirror, Middleton, now 24, said, “Not having my daughter with me still affects me every single day and I thought I was being punished for what happened with her, for letting her go.”
Although she wasn’t given a genuine choice, Middleton naturally feels enormous guilt about her first daughter. Her book details her struggle with addiction in the years that followed the adoption, and the tumultuous family life she had experienced until that point.
When she was four years old, Middleton was taken into care amidst dire poverty and neglect. Soon after she was reunited with her mother, her brother began abusing her when she was just 7-years-old.
But knowing that the secret would destroy the mere semblance of a family which she desperately held on to, Middleton wouldn’t expose her brother’s abuse until she was finally forced to. That revelation led to her daughter being taken away from her.
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Not having read her story in full, I can’t help but wonder how her child was adopted out rather than going into foster care. By the sounds of things, due to circumstances beyond Middleton’s control, she was unable to provide a safe environment for her child (or at least it was a high risk one) but that shouldn’t necessarily mean she’s adopted out and stops seeing her. It sounds like tragedy on top of tragedy here.
In NSW at least, when a child is removed due to high risk circumstances, the child goes into crisis and/or short-term care while the parents have the opportunity for restoration by addressing their risk factors, whether that’s getting help to find housing, employment, to get off drugs, gain parenting skills, separate from an abusive partner etc.
If they fail to meet these conditions - a process that usually takes at least a year - then final orders are given to place the child into long-term foster care (if a long-term carer can be found - and unfortunately there is a desperate shortage of foster carers).
There is a legal requirement that the child still maintains a relationship with their birth family (however that is appropriate in the circumstances) which benefits both the parents and the child in the long run.
Foster parents can apply for adoption down the track (except in the case of non-indigenous carers with an indigenous foster child). But adoption isn’t necessarily a ‘better’ option than foster care.
I wonder if Middleton’s story would be different had her child been placed into foster care instead.