Bessborough survivor Cindi Bonny on the death of her baby Zoei in 1994

"They put the pressure on while I was pregnant."


"But after, it was like, he'd be better off without you, and he
deserves better. He'd end up with some lovely family that could
bring him up and look after him and he could become a doctor one
day.


"... I was constantly told that a mother like me, a person like
me, shouldn't have a child. Because at the time I would have had
Indian ink up my arms and stuff like that."


Cindi Bonny was just sixteen but she had already experienced
homelessness, drug addiction and an abusive relationship when she
first entered Bessborough in 1993, pregnant with her son Kevin.


Adamant that she wouldn't give him up for adoption, determined to
breastfeed her baby, she was kept from him for six weeks as the
pressure mounted to give him up.


Eventually she left with Kevin and returned to her abusive
boyfriend – only to fall pregnant a second time, returning to
Bessborough in 1994.


Her second stay was different, but ended in tragedy with the
sudden, shocking death of baby Zoei at just two days old.


Zoei was the last baby to die under the care of Bessborough.
Unlike so many others before her, she has a grave her family can
visit.


Cindi shared her story in the Irish Examiner earlier this week in
an impassioned plea to authorities for a full investigation of
burials at Bessborough, and for a memorial there instead of the
planned apartments.


Cindi is today's guest on The Deirdre O'Shaughnessy Podcast.


Read her article here: 'Do not bury our history beneath
concrete', mother of last baby to die at Bessborough tells
Government


The Deirdre O'Shaughnessy Podcast: Paving over Bessborough's
missing babies


The Deirdre O’Shaughnessy Podcast: Dominic Finn’s story of being
adopted from Bessborough


 


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