The story behind this search
That day in 1977
That 20th November 1977, the day I was born, my mum went into labour and had a cesarian section, therefore she was sedated. And she didn't know she was giving birth to two children. During all her pregnancy, her doctor told her she was carrying only one child. So on that 20th November, a nurse broke the news of two babies to my dad. He was baffled. Some minutes later, the doctors came to him to report first that the baby boy was born with problems, and some time later, they told him the baby was born dead. They advised him not to see it (it was very unpleasant to look at, it had deformed limbs, blah blah...). And above all, they strongly recommended not telling my mum about it, so she could "focus on the baby girl and therefore reduce the risk of her suffering from post-natal depression". More blah blah... With the confusion, the sadness of losing one baby and the worry about the other baby's health -according to the doctors, I came with serious health problems-, my dad didn't pursue this any more.
The 'weird things' carry on for a few more days
In the meantime, I was kept at the hospital for about 10 days. The neonatologist, Dr. Quirós, went to my parents with a different story every day, about how delicate my health was, first with one problem, then with some other thing he would worry about. However, my dad spent hours staring at me through the glass that separated him from the incubators room, and wondering in awe how I could be so ill when I was eating and behaving like normal healthy baby. He couldn't see any of the problems the doctor talked about. Another 'coincidence' in all this story is the fact that the senior nurse in charge of feeding me during those 10 days was the wife of that very same neonatologist, which coincidentally also assisted at my mum's labour.
When my parents finally took me home, they were absolutely convinced that those 10 days at the incubator room had just been a excuse to justify an astronomical bill.
The doctors
A month later, when my mum went to see the neonatologist for a routine check-up, and enquired about the dead child (as my dad finally told her a few weeks later), she got a surprising reaction from the doctor. In a very vehement tone, he told her to forget about it, to delete it from her mind, not think about it anymore. After all, she was very lucky to have a babygirl and now, along with her elder son, she had a beautiful 'couple'. So she should feel grateful and content.
On the other hand, the gynecologist that treated my mum had a great reputation at the health insurance company (Sanitas, the best in Spain at the time). Considering that my parents had decided to go private (public healthcare has been commonplace in Spain for the last 50 years), that guy's reputation had to mean something... Which in this case, it was just him using his authority and status to belittle my grandmother (with years' experience as a midwife in her village), only because she dared suggest during my mum's pregnancy, since she had a huge belly, that she might have been carring two babies instead of just one, as he claimed. This renown doctor used a rigurously scientific argument to refute my grandmother's: "Madam, do you really think you know more than me? I AM the doctor and there's only one baby!"
33 years later, confirmation of a lie
In 2011, the media in Spain started reporting cases of stolen babies, cases since the Spanish civil war (in the late 1930's) to the end of the 1990's. More and more cases surfaced everywhere, in the press, the TV, the radio,... and the stories all sounded too familiar and similiar to the one lived by my parents, whom by then firmly suspected that they also were victims of this macabre child-trafficking business. My dad started his own enquiries, counseled by ANADIR, one of the main associations in Spain involved in the subject of stolen babies and illegal adoptions... And soon after he received an official confirmation that there was no trace of a dead baby. Therefore, that baby had been stolen.
My twin brother is alive and he's out there
We want to find him, wherever he is. We want him to have the chance to meet his real parents, his siblings, and the rest of his family. And above all, we want him to know that he was never abandoned.
We have no intention to reproach anything to his adoptive parents, as we believe that they were probably misled as well. We just want them to put themselves in our shoes for a moment, and understand the pain, the emptiness and the uncertainty this situation is causing.
The story, told by our dad
Video (in Spanish) of the TV programme "Más se perdió en Cuba" on Intereconomía TV (30th April 2011)