360: Switched at Birth

This American Life

Society & Culture, News, Politics, Arts

4.6 • 88.8K Ratings

🗓️ 25 July 2008

⏱️ 59 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

On a summer day in 1951, two baby girls were born in a hospital in small-town Wisconsin. The infants were accidentally switched, and went home with the wrong families.

Host Ira Glass introduces four characters: Kay McDonald, who raised a daughter named Sue, and Mary Miller, who raised a daughter named Marti. In 1994, Mary Miller wrote letters to Sue and Marti, confessing the secret she'd kept for 43 years: The daughters had been switched at birth and raised by the wrong families. This week's entire show is devoted to the story of Mary Miller's secret and what happened when both families finally learned the truth. (6 1/2 minutes)
Act One: Reporter Jake Halpern tells the story of Marti Miller and Sue McDonald, the daughters who were switched at birth, and the many complications that came with learning the truth. Jake is a writer of several books and creator of the comic, "Welcome to the New World.” (26 minutes)
Act Two: Jake Halpern tells the mothers' sides of the story. At 69, Kay McDonald had to cope not only with the news that her daughter wasn't her own, but that another mother had known the whole time. And Mary Miller explains why she was tormented by her secret but unable for decades to share it. (26 minutes)

Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.org

This American Life privacy policy.
Learn more about sponsor message choices.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	This message comes from Revenued. Revenued offers fast, flexible funding for businesses,
0:05.8	up to $250,000 for the highest revenue category, with approvals in as little as one business day.
0:12.2	Funds are made available on demand, and the cost of capital is based on a fixed factor rate applied to the amount you draw.
0:17.9	There are no application fees, no draw fees, and no maintenance fees.
0:22.4	Apply now at getrevenued.com and be ready for whatever comes next. Back in 1994, this is back in the
0:30.7	days when people still delivered big news to each other by mail. Two women who barely knew each other,
0:35.7	Martha Miller and Susan McDonald, got a letter from Martha's mom.
0:39.9	Dear Martha and Sue, have you ever suspected or been told that we took home the baby that belonged to Kay and Bob McDonald, and they later took home the baby that belonged to us?
0:51.6	That's Martha reading. And the purpose of this letter is that Mrs. Miller is breaking the news,
0:56.0	43 years after the fact, to Martha and Sue, that she took the wrong baby home from the hospital.
1:01.9	That Martha and Sue were switched at birth, that she's not Martha's biological mom.
1:06.4	She sues.
1:07.8	And what makes it so strange is that this wasn't the sort of thing where Mrs. Miller figured this
1:11.3	out to her surprise after decades of wondering and pondering and paid and staking detective work.
1:16.1	No, no, no.
1:16.9	She knew it the day she got home from the hospital in 1951, that she had the wrong baby, a baby born
1:23.5	to a woman named Kay McDonald.
1:25.6	And she kept it quiet all those years.
1:29.6	Here is how Mrs. Miller explained that in the letter. The other daughter in this baby switch, Sue, who was born to Mrs. Miller,
1:36.4	the woman writing the letter, but raised by Kay McDonald, the other woman, reads,
1:42.3	I had complete anesthesia, so was asleep when our baby was born.
1:46.8	The nurse weighed the baby and must have left her in the delivery room until after Kay's
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from This American Life, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of This American Life and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.