Lorraine Sinclair never knew her mother. It was only last year that she saw a photo of her for the first time.
“We have a face that we needed for over 60 years, to say goodnight to.”
She and her sister Cindy Munro are both survivors of the ’60s Scoop. They were taken from their family as children and were in the same foster home for a time before being separated. They found each other again as adults, along with some of their seven other siblings who were taken, but their mother and one of their brothers had passed away before they could reunite.
“We knew her first and her last name, we thought,” Lorraine says of searching for her mother’s grave. “We didn’t know her middle name. We didn’t even know the day she died.”
Even now, at age 61, she grieves for the childhood she lost.
“(Cindy) cried one day, and she said, Lorraine really needed mom. And I did, I really needed mom. And she was gone.”
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More than 3000 Indigenous children from Manitoba, and between 10,000 and 30,000 across Canada, are estimated to have been forcibly “scooped” from their families from the ’50s to the ’80s. They were adopted out to mainly white families across Canada and around the world.
Ten years ago, former Manitoba premier Greg Sellinger issued an apology in the legislature for the province’s role in the scoop. But many survivors feel it didn’t go far enough.
Fifty-six-year-old Cory Enns described being adopted out and returned to CFS by two different families, and feeling unloved and unwanted throughout his childhood as a result. He says he’s had little support in trying to heal.
“I have felt that we have been left out and forgotten,” says Enns. “They have acknowledged things, and they have apologized for things. But don’t forget, we are still here, and we are still suffering.”
At an event hosted by Anish Healing Centre marking the 10th anniversary of the provincial apology, survivors put out the call for mental health supports and financial help for families to reunite. Advocate Coleen Rajotte says they need resources even to determine the actual number of survivors.
“We don’t even know how many of those kids are still out there,” says Rajotte. “So, we need to do research, and we need to reach out to these now adults, and say we’re here, we want to help you get home.”
In a statement, families minister Nahanni Fontaine says, “Our government is on the path of jurisdiction, restoring the care of children and families to their Nations back where they rightfully and inherently belong.”
She adds the government hired a dedicated employee in April to help survivors navigate services for former children in care and adoptees, and their team was present at the Anish Healing Centre’s ’60s Scoop gathering last year to connect people with adoption record services.
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