What I Found Out
	I found out about my mum from my records. I found out that her name was Mabel Lucy Cooper. I was called after her. Her surname before she married was Staines. She was labelled as 'feeble-minded' in the records. She married a man called Cooper. The papers said that her parents were of 'superior standards' whatever that means. Posh! I had a sister called Margaret who went to Barnardos, but there are no records about her. We tried to find out more, but we couldn't. Nobody seems to know. I found out from my records that my mum was begging on the streets of London with me as a one month old baby. The police took me away from my mum and put me into the Easneye Nursery. They put my mum in Darenth Park Hospital. She ran away from this place in December 1944. She has not been seen since. I have not seen my mum since that time. All this I know from the records. I also found out from the records that Easneye Nursery was just the first home I went to. There was plenty more. I went there in September, 1944, just four weeks after I was born. When I was a bit older I went to Stowlangcroft, wherever that is, and then to Ashford in Kent. For some reason I was sent to Mariston House boarding school in Devon. The records say I went there on 28th February 1955. Why Devon? I don't know. The records say that I lived for a time at St Etheldreda's children's home in Bedford. I never knew its name before, but I remember the place. It was a home run by nuns, with bars at the windows. After that I was sent to Hutton Residential School near Brentwood in Essex. This was all news to me. Six homes, and the only one I remember is the one in Bedford. I went to St Lawrence's from the children's home in Essex. I only know that from the records. I also know the date now; it was the 21st November 1957.
		I've talked to my family as well. I've talked to Marjorie. She says different things. She says my mum was not 'feeble-minded'. She went to a good school. She may have had difficulties because of living on the streets. She was thrown out of her parents' home when she met up with Cooper. He was not good enough, or so they thought.
	Marjorie says it's because she was living on the streets that she got how she was. She was not born like that. She could do everything. Her father wouldn't allow her back in because she married Cooper, and then mum went off with somebody else so, in them times, it was a disgrace and, of course, specially to my family because they were all so strict and well-to-do. These are two different stories! But I've enjoyed finding out. I've enjoyed it, it's just that mum's not here to tell her bit of it. A lot of things have happened in my life but I'm who I am. I'll always be what I am, always! I will never change from what I am. You have to be hard. I've been in care since I was four weeks old so, for me, being in care doesn't bother me. I think you have to be a lot harder in the hospital where some of the staff were tough. I had no trouble with them because of Eva, (one of the nurses) but I think, if I hadn't, they could make life very difficult for you. These are some of the things the records said about me when I first went to St Lawrence's: I was an 'imbecile'. This really hurts. I was 'educationally very backward'. I was 'ignorant of the four rules of numbers'. I was 'dull and slow in response' and that I did not seem to have any general knowledge at all. I was 'not able to learn to tell the time'. You see, for me, it did upset me for them to say I wasn't teachable. I think if someone goes around and says something like that are you going to learn? You are not! And then they turn round and say 'Oh, you're not teachable'. And for them to say, you know, that I need to be looked after, trained for life. I don't know who made that decision, or who makes those assumptions. Who were they to make these assumptions?