Woman's Hour - Adoption, Female Gladiators, Novelist Pyae Moe Thet War

Episode Date: November 22, 2024

Adopted children may be allowed much closer contact with their birth families in the future as part of “seismic” changes recommended in a new report published earlier this month. At the moment family courts set out the level of contact the child will have with their birth parents, usually letters sent via an intermediary. But that could change. Anita Rani hears from two women who were adopted, who share their thoughts on what these changes could mean for adopted children, and Prof Beth Neil who helped to write the report. Gladiator II stars Paul Mescal as Lucius and Connie Nielsen returns to her role as Lucilla. The sequel also includes a female gladiator for the first time, Yuval Gonen plays the role of Arishat. Anita is joined by classicist and author Dr Daisy Dunn and the film critic Larushka Ivan-zadeh to discuss how accurate this portrayal is and the role women play in the film.'I Did Something Bad' is the debut novel by Pyae Moe Thet War. It tells the story of journalist Khin Haymar assigned by Vogue to get a scoop on Tyler Tun, Hollywood’s hottest movie star in exchange for a top job. But along the way a man ends up dead. Will the pair fall in love and can they get away with murder? Pyae joins Anita to talk about wanting to write a rom-com with murder set in her hometown of Yangon, Myanmar and why the novel features some serious social commentary on abortion, corrupt police and representation in film.Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Laura Northedge

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2, and of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme, peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Anita Rani and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Good morning and welcome to the programme. We'll be hearing the latest on the murder investigation into Hashita Brella, the woman whose body was found in the boot of a car last week, and we'll be discussing some of the issues that this case has raised. Also on the programme, Gladiator 2 is out, starring Paul Mescal and Denzel Washington,

24 years since the first Gladiator film. Here at Woman's Hour, it got us thinking. Were there any female gladiators in ancient Rome? We'll be finding out. A rom-com with a murder set in Myanmar. A little tease of the debut novel by PA Mo Thetwar. She'll be here to tell us all about it. And we're also discussing adoption this hour. There's been a lengthy review into the system to think about whether adopted children should have contact with

their birth families. What we used to have here is a closed system. So if you were adopted, you were with your family, and that was it. And it was only at 18 that you could find your birth families should you wish to. Then it changed to open adoption. And this is where contact would be set by the family court, but usually a letter or two a year. What's now being considered is whether there needs to be more contact between adopted children and their birth families. As usual, we welcome your thoughts on this and your experiences, particularly the text number 84844. You can email me by going to our website. You can WhatsApp the programme on 03700 100 444. And if you'd like to follow us on social media, it's at BBC Woman's Hour.

That text number once again, though, 84844. But first, just over a week ago, the body of 24-year-old Hashita Brella was found in the boot of a car in Ilford, East London. Police believe Ms Brella, 24, from Corby, Northamptonshire, was murdered by her husband, Pankaj Lamba. He is believed to have fled the country. Ms Brella's family said she and Mr Lamba, 23, had entered into an arranged marriage with a legal wedding held in August 2023. The couple had their traditional

Indian ceremony on the 22nd of March this year before they left for the UK around the 30th of April, settling in Corby. Well, I'm joined by Natasha Ratu, Executive Director of Karma Nirvana, a charity who supports victims and work towards ending honour-based abuse in the UK. But first, let's hear from Samira Hussain, South Asia correspondent for the BBC based in Delhi. Samira, what do we know about what happened to Harsheeta Borella? Well, when her family in India hadn't heard from her for a few days, they began to worry. And so through someone else that they know in the UK, they managed to get through to local police. And they went to her home to do a wellness check on her. And when they found that she wasn't actually there, the police actually started a missing persons investigation. Now, Harshita Borella

was actually known to the police because there was a domestic violence protection order that had been previously put in place for her. Now, it had expired by the time police were looking for her, but at least she was known to police. So when they did the wellness check that was November 13th, they started a missing persons report and they eventually found her on November 14th, dead in the boot of a car. And the post-mortem has shown that she died of strangulation. How did she get to be living in the UK? Well, as you rightly pointed out, she was entered into an arranged marriage with Pankaj Lumba, and they had a court ceremony in August of last year, and then they ended up having their actual

wedding ceremony in March of this year and ended up moving to the UK in April. Now, Pankaj Lumba was already based in the UK. He had moved there in about 2022. So that's how she ended up in the UK. What's the latest with the police investigation? Well, obviously, the police are looking for Pankaj Lamba. They have said that he is their main suspect. And, you know, the police now have released some CCTV footage that shows the last time that they saw the two of them. And that was on November 11th.

They were walking through a busy area in the evening. And so police are looking for anybody who could speak to them if they saw them at that time. And you've spoken with her family and what have they said to you? How was that conversation, that interview? I mean, obviously the family is absolutely heartbroken. You know, the last time they heard from her was November 10th and she was, you know, making dinner for herself and for Mr. Lumba. But the family got very worried when they didn't hear from her for a few days. And that's because, you know, from what they had told me about her life in the UK, based on what she said, you know, it was,

she was under a lot of control by Pankaj Lumba, that he controlled all of their finances, that the father said that he would call him and just talk about, you know, the fact that she was speaking too much with neighbors and she was speaking too much to people within the Indian community. So she was really very isolated. She had no control. She couldn't even go out and buy an ice cream if she wanted to. And so it was really a lot about tight control. And, you know, the father was lamenting that when she was in India with him, that, you know, she was simple and she wanted to be a teacher and she, you know, talked. But once she went to the UK, her life became very

different and very difficult. And it's an ongoing investigation. And so I'm sure we will be coming back to you to find out what happens as more information comes out. Samira Hussain, thank you so much for speaking to us from Delhi. I'm going to come to you now, Natasha. Natasha Rattu, who's the executive director of Karma Nirvana. Obviously, we can't discuss the details of this particular case, Natasha, but what was your reaction when you heard about the discovery of Harshita Brella? My immediate reaction was just one of deep sadness and anger because Harshita was a young woman seeking help. She was recognised at being at high risk of domestic abuse. She was put into a refuge. She did everything that we urge women to do,

reach out for help, engage with the system and yet her life was taken. And the sad irony Anita is that I've come away from another meeting to do this interview and that meeting is a domestic homicide review for another young woman who was murdered last year. And these reviews are meant to help us to learn lessons to prevent future deaths. And yet here we are on the show discussing yet another preventable death. And I think what this highlights is the national crisis that we're facing in the UK. I'm just so fatigued by the number of reviews that we attend where the same lessons are being discussed that we need to learn from repeatedly. I think we know what we need to do, but there's such a lack of implementation and accountability. It's costing lives.

So my immediate reaction to this was just deep sadness and anger. I think lots of people listening might have questions around what protection she was actually given. I mean, she was deemed to be at high risk, having been placed in a refuge. And, well, you can explain that, because I'm sure you know a bit more about that and she was referred to uh marac which is a multi-agency risk assessment conference so the system appeared to be working for her safeguarding her but was it

like what and obviously again it's tricky because we need to talk about it but without discussing the specifics but you know what what is provided for a woman who might be in her situation when she is referred to MARAC? So when a person goes to the police, they should do a risk assessment with that person and they will grade the level of risk that they deem that person to be at risk of. And when we're talking about at risk of, we're talking about serious injury or homicide, that's the risk that's being predicted. So Harshita was put into a refuge she was graded as high risk for domestic homicide and a merit conference was

convened so where you're perceived at being at high risk your statutory agencies sit around a maric which as you said stands for multi Multi-Agency Risk Assessment Conference. And they all bring information that they have about that person to see how they can mitigate that risk and what safety plans can be put into place. And I think what Harshita's case shows us is that there are still real significant gaps in how the system works. Because, you know, in the reality in this case, it didn't work. That's what we have seen. The other thing that is really important to highlight in Harshita's case is that she was here. You know, English was probably not her first language. And there were lots of barriers that she would have faced, like many migrant women do. Yet, despite those barriers, she reached out for help which for us at

Carmen Havana signals that you know she really needed that help and she recognised her own risk and indeed the systems that we have in place corroborated that she was at high risk yet this wasn't enough to save her life and that's deeply worrying. Have you come across that before? We have I mean sadly we're sitting currently in four domestic homicide reviews and we have come across that before. We've come across scenarios where we've reviewed a risk assessment that an officer hasn't accurately predicted the risk and that's resulted in, you know, potential preventable death. Or we've had cases like Hosh Eater's where actually the high-risk warning signs have been there. And like I said earlier on, we're predicting high risk of homicide

and then that homicide has actually happened. So you're currently, as you mentioned, attending a domestic homicide review, which is you've stepped out to come and speak to us from. So what are these reviews meant to do? So the reviews are meant to identify missed opportunities and systemic failures and they're supposed to lead to change but what we're seeing in the reviews that we're sitting in are the same themes you know agencies not communicating, risks being underestimated or action being too slow or insufficient and without accountability that

the things that we're seeing are changing then the reviews in my view just become a bit of an exercise in futility because we can't sit in one review after the other. Anita I was sat in a review two years ago for a lady called Abida Karim that review is due to be published next year and I'm sat in another review a year and a half you know down the line and we're saying the same things. We actually met last week with Jess Phillips the Minister for Safeguarding and Violence Against Women and Girls and I met her with the mother of Fosia Javid who was murdered in very similar circumstances. And Yasmin and I raised these concerns. And, you know, we really commend the government

for its commitment to halving violence against women and girls in the next decade. But we're quite disappointed that every week we're reading about another case and also disappointed that the recent budget didn't mention how financially the government intend to fulfil this ambition, because without proper resource, these are really just empty promises.

Well, as you mentioned, the government is committed to halving violence against women. How confident are you that these issues are being taken seriously? I mean, Jess Phillips, in my view, is the perfect minister for this portfolio, because she's worked within the sector she understands the issues um so she gets it what we need to see now is that accountability on every level we need to see it across departments we need to make sure that's trickling down so that the agencies are you know for example one thing i would love to see is where you've had a review and there is an action plan of the things that need to happen are in that action plan there needs to be accountability

and not just at a local level but at a government level and actually there needs to be consequences for where there is failure to implement these action plans because failure to implement it means another life lost. Well just on that Northamptonshire Police has referred itself to the Independent Office for Police Conduct because of its previous contact with her. So that's just to bring us up to speed with that. Carmen Ivana, you're a charity that has been working in this field for a long time and you have direct contact with a lot of these women. What kind of stories do you hear when women get themselves in these situations or family or friends are concerned for their welfare? Do they ever contact you directly? We do. We get thousands of contacts from victims affected by these issues every year. And sadly, where there's been a domestic homicide, we're also now supporting

the families of those people and what they share with us. You know, we work with quite a few different families is that for them, every case like Harsh Eaters that they're reading about is just a reminder of their own loss. And, you know, Yasmin, Fosia's mum talks really openly about, yes, the perpetrator has a prison sentence, but the families are living with the life sentence. And, you know, the life sentence of grief and unanswered questions, they want to see that real change so that other families don't suffer in the same way. And I think what's really frustrating for them is, you know, being part of processes like IOPC will do an investigation or the DHR will do a review but then we're not seeing any reduction in the rate at which women are dying at the hands

of domestic abuse so it's really painful really painful for them to be seeing that after losing loved one. Obviously we can't speculate on the circumstances of Rashida's case how easy is it for women who find themselves in these situations to get the help that they need? It's so difficult. I mean, we heard earlier on from the correspondent that there was a lot of control, that she was isolated and cut off. And I think what we also need to acknowledge is that for victims like Hashita, migrant victims face really unique barriers and fears that, you know, actually add another layer to that difficulty of getting the help that they need. Such as?

So, for example, as a migrant victim, you might not necessarily have recourse to public funding. You may not be able to go into refuge or go into refuge with ease. Your language is a barrier barrier there are all these things that are in your way um and this is why Carmen Havana alongside the whole of the women's sector are calling on the government to reform policies so that any woman affected by domestic abuse no matter what your status in this country has redressed to help that's so so important and that message needs to go to every woman that is coming into the country too so that they know that help is available thank you very much for speaking me to me this morning taking the time

out from that review um thank you natasha that was natasha ratu executive director of karma nirvana a charity who supports victims and who have been working towards ending honour-based abuse in the UK. 84844 is the number to text if you'd like to get in touch with us about your opinions and thoughts on anything you hear in the programme today. Now, adopted children may be allowed much closer contact with their birth families in the future as part of a seismic change recommended in a new report published earlier this month. The Public Law Working Group, which is led by the judiciary, suggested the changes after a four-year review into the current adoption system.

At the moment, family courts set out the level of contact the child would have with their birth parents, usually letters sent via an intermediary. But could that now change? Shortly, we will hear from two adopted women with their thoughts on these proposed changes. But first, let me turn to Professor of Social Work at the University of East Anglia, Beth Neal, who helped write the report. Professor Neal, welcome to Woman's Hour. Tell us more about this report and why it came about. Okay, well, I think you mentioned earlier that the adoption system used to be very closed and

then we had more open adoption with letters i think what people have learned over the years is that this form of open adoption is actually not very open at all um so if you imagine how difficult it might be to write a letter to the adoptive parents of your child or to the birth mother of your child when you've never met to talk about, you know, what do you say in that letter? If you add on the fact that a lot of birth parents might have literacy problems, they might not have a stable address. It's a really difficult way to stay in touch. And I think everybody over the years has kind of come to realise that this is not the answer, letterbox contact. It can work really well in some cases, but it often fails. It fails more often than it succeeds. So we still have a group of children who become adults who don't know very much about their birth family, who don't have the answers to identity questions. So I think there's been a real welling up of support for change around this. And the report is recommending not a change in the law,

but kind of a sea change in professional practice. So the most senior judge in the family court in England and Wales, Sir Andrew McFarlane, supports this report, but says that no new laws are needed how then are these suggested changes going to happen if they do? So the report recommends that every child's situation is looked at individually that doesn't sound very radical but I think what we've had is a cut and paste type approach to contact planning you know the thinking is this child's going to be adopted, we'll set up letterbox. And so the main route for change is through social workers actually looking much more carefully about what is possible and considering a wider range of options.

Now, face-to-face contact with the birth family always has been an option, and some children have had that form of contact. It's been a minority of children. So the report is suggesting we should consider that in a greater number of cases. It's not saying it's the right thing for everybody. That form of contact, it has to be safe. It has to be safe it has to be meaningful so the report suggesting thinking not just narrowly about the birth parents contact is sometimes not safe with birth parents but is there a grandparent is there an aunt or uncle are there brothers and sisters living elsewhere

who the child can stay in touch with so So it's considering a wider range of people and a wider range of options including actually meeting up. I'm going to read a couple of messages out because lots of our listeners are getting involved in this topic. Meeting your biological parent may not work for some people. I met my biological parent for the first time when I was 35. She was very warm initially, but as time went on, she wanted to control me and made it clear I was a disappointment to her. Need to tread very carefully when reuniting adopted children. And another one here that says,

it can't be one size fits all policy, unfortunately. Lovely if it can be made to work for some children, but the birth family of my friend's adopted child were horribly abusive. My own daughter's birth mother didn't want any contact, didn't give a photograph of herself, could barely be persuaded to give her a name by all accounts and only wrote her a scrappy note. The question for my daughter is whether her curiosity and yearning to know more will overcome the fear of further rejection. Such a complicated issue um and yesterday i actually spoke to two women who were adopted under the closed adoption system they didn't have contact

with their birth families until they reached 18 years old so we're going to play a couple of their thoughts um beth and then and then we'll discuss this further first up is claire she was adopted when she was two weeks old and didn't meet her birth parents until she was in her 20s. Her niece and nephews were also adopted and she found it difficult to keep in touch with them. I asked her what she thought about the proposed changes. I'm really, really happy that these changes have been put forward. I think it's been a long time coming. There needs to be a good reason why a child shouldn't have some contact in place with a member from their birth family. And whether that's a grandparent or in my case, I'm an aunt and my nieces and nephews were adopted.

And we went from having contact with them, which we didn't call contact because it's just a relationship. And we saw them about once a month, a sort of average amount that you'd see. Nieces and nephews had great relationships with them. And then this went down to annual letterbox contact. So I don't know if anyone listening has had letterbox contact but it's really rubbish you know explain explain what that is so letterbox contact is um one letter that you send per year and in that you you can write a letter to your relative just kind of sharing any news but bear in mind that that could be redacted depending on whether or not it's got

personal information there so you have to keep it very kind of generic and you can put photos in but again you don't know if they're going to make it to the other end and how and how was that so yeah it was really it was really heartbreaking I mean I'm not I'm not going to say I think the most devastating thing that can happen to any parent is to, you know, lose a child to adoption. But from our point of view, it was still very heartbreaking to lose my nieces and nephews. Having to have a final visit was very, you know, very, very heartbreaking, not knowing if we'd ever see them again. And going from, you know, being able to hug, read stories with each other, have days out, spend Christmas together, birthdays. And suddenly, you know, you're kind of just this person in a system, you don't know if your letters are making it to the other end.

One of my nephews, when he reached 18, I actually had to reach out and say, okay, so what happens now? Because I've been writing these letters for 18 years and they were kind of really surprised as if nobody had ever made it to the 18 year milestone like they didn't even know what to suggest like what happens now one thing that happened in our situation is that when my niece was seven her adoptive parents found me on Facebook and reached out and asked if we could take the relationship away from the letterbox contact organised by social services. So obviously we were delighted. My mum and I went to meet her with her adoptive parents.

And that was an amazing experience. Obviously, as I said, we didn't know if we'd ever see her again. And she's how old now? She's in her 20s now. Right. Yeah. It's been wonderful to still be in touch and have more of a natural kind of free flowing relationship rather than this kind of very stilted official situation that we were offered by social services. So did you have a, so you continued to see your niece?

It was the nephews that you had letterbox contact with? Yeah. Yeah. I guess the twist in your story is that you also were adopted, but you had a closed adoption. So what was the impact of finding your birth parents, having had no contact with them at 18? What was that like on your life?

Yeah, so I'm from the kind of closed adoption era, as you say. So we didn't have any information at all until we were 18. So I don't think I even knew my birth mother's name. So that was quite a big deal, going to get my files at 18 and going to get my original birth certificate. And yeah, it's had a big impact on my identity, kind of only finding that information out as an adult and then kind of having to piece all that together it's been said or suggested that

these new rules might put people off from wanting to adopt do you agree with that um i agree with it and i think that's not a bad thing because i think if you are if you think it's okay to you know cut children off from their original family, whether it's aunts, uncles, grandparents, foster carers, I know play such a big role. And, you know, to break those connections is such a huge deal for these children and to expect them to then have to kind of start as if that didn't happen and those people don't exist. I think that some adoptive parents have said, you know, that it's awkward or it's not very convenient to maintain contact. But actually, I would argue that it's very awkward and inconvenient to have to do all this stuff when you're a grown up. So actually, all you're doing is putting off that inconvenience for your child to then deal with by themselves when they grow up, which I don't think is very fair.

Well, that was Claire's experience. I also spoke to Karen Bartholomew, who's a playwright and actress. She wrote Giving Up Marty, a play about adoption reunion, which focuses on an unwanted reunion initiated by a birth family. The play is not her story, but it draws from her experience of being found by her birth family in her teenage years. I also asked Karen about her thoughts on these proposed changes. Adoption is so variable and obviously everyone's journey and so forth is completely individual.

So I have some feelings from my own personal experience. I do question how it can be actually, how they can actually carry it out. I mean, they talk about safety and so forth, you know, the practicality of that. how it can be actually, how they can actually carry it out. I mean, they talk about safety and so forth. You know, the practicality of that, how they're going to resource that sufficiently to look after the adopted person. From your own experiences of your birth family making contact with you first when you're a teenager,

how can it impact you as a person? How did it impact you? Profoundly. And the the thing is if you're adopted you sort of live almost two identities whether you have contact with your birth family or not because then you'll have like the the sort of fantasy version of what may have been but if a family and I'm the closed adoption, but if they come back into your life later on, on their premise and not on yours, given that people make decisions for adopted people

rather than adopted people making their own decisions, then that has a profound effect because a decision was made to relinquish you. A decision was made to connect with you again. And when that is out of your control, the impact, or even within your control, there will be a massive impact. I don't want to sound patronising, but I think people underestimate the enormity that will have on the core of your personal being. And you have to navigate a path between two families who have a lot of emotion about you and a lot of people feel ownership.

And you have to navigate that. It's enormously difficult. Because it can also be extended family that wants contact, not just the parents and that's a whole nother relationship to navigate which I imagine isn't easy either it's it's massive and it's always talked about mainly the birth mother which that society always putting it on the woman but it may just be that but if you do have a a big family, which I do have, you have to navigate and manage all of those emotions and feelings. It's a tremendous pressure. And myself included, I think adopted people are incredibly courageous.

It's just not realised. It's misunderstood. What do you worry about for the generation who will experience this form of open contact rather than the closed contact adoption that you went through? Well, I mean, I don't know. I would like to hear from young people as well and what they think about it. But I think even from closed or open adoption, you're still going to face those same difficulties. And no matter what safety is put in place or for the benefit of the child and what everybody else thinks is brilliant for the adopted person, you're still going to have to live with navigating two families. I worry about the proposed safety. And I mean, going back to closed I could see the benefits once upon a time for clarity that that clarity gave me 18 years of a foundation and a safe upbringing and a secure upbringing that was completely shattered by my birth family finding me because I never

and it's true some adopted people don't want to look people forget this some people just don't want to know and they came to they found you yeah yeah and it's had a profound impact on my life and it will go to my grave that's how enormous it is it's been said Karen that these new rules will put people off from wanting to adopt what do you think about that yeah I suppose it will really because and that's where I go back to and I hate this word but there's ownership is is involved in a way because there's high emotions from people feeling well you're you're mine you're mine you're mine you're mine you're mine you know and that's difficult for them I I also think in a way that adoption won't really exist. Because to my mind, if you have open

contact as frequent as you want, and you're kind of involved in both families from the word go, which is good for some people, and some people will want it, I'm not knocking that, they will need that connection and that identity and all of that. But if it does go down that route, I would call that open fostering. I can't see how that would be considered adoption because you are effectively living, maybe not, you know, in the same household, but you're living with two families. And I think it will, I think it's a challenge for people's mental health. And adopted people need to support all their lives because it will change when they meet a partner, if they get married,

or if there's different sets of beliefs between the families. It's devastating. It can shape people's foundations. I think without the lack of clarity, it's difficult. But I also understand people who feel like, no, I really want contact from the beginning. But if you're talking to a three or four year old, what the heck would they know anyhow? So two very different stories there Claire and Karen I guess Beth they highlight just how complex adoption is but I just want to pick up on something that Karen said that she said if it was to be open contact it's essentially

fostering and not adoption or what do you make of what she said? Well, I think when open adoption started to be introduced, which was actually many years ago now, 30, 40 years, this was one of the main fears that adoptive parents wouldn't feel really like the parents of the child or that the child would be confused and wouldn't feel part of the adoptive family. I think, you know, the research that we've carried out at the UEA and a number of other research studies around the world shows that that's not really the case, that adopted children, you know, we've interviewed children and teenagers in our research,

and what they say is your mum and dad are the people you live with who bring you up, who take you to school, who put you to bed. Seeing your birth family or having letters from your birth family does not change that. Adoptive parents, yes, often are quite anxious about this connection with the birth family, but actually experience does not bear out their fears. So if we think of an open adoption where there might be some face-to-face contact, a lot of adoptive parents might have this worry that they take the child along to see their birth mum and that child would, you know, go running up and they'd

be out of the picture, as one mother said in our study. But that's not the case. You know, children are relating to the people they live with as their parents. What about the safety of allowing contact when a child has been adopted because of a violent home life? Who will be monitoring contact? I don't think anybody's recommending contact in that type of situation. I think people need to be really clear about this. This is not a free for all. Everybody should be having contact. You know, children sometimes get adopted in very difficult circumstances. Sometimes they do need to have all contact cut off with their birth family.

The report is not saying everybody should have that. How has social media and our ability to find people over the internet influenced this report? I think that the idea that a closed adoption is possible, people now realise that's not the case because adopted teenagers and birth family can and do look for each other on social media. Now, where that happens, we've studied that in our research, that is predominantly in the context where there has been no contact or the contact plans have failed. So there's unmet needs. You know, the child has questions and they want to know about their birth family, so they go looking. So I think people are thinking more about planned ongoing contact, almost as a preventative measure to stop this unplanned and often unsupported, sometimes potentially disturbing contact happening. So the idea is that the child is doing this with their adoptive parents.

It's something, you know, it builds the alliance between the adoptive parents and the child. They're doing it together. The parents are helping the child to work out their feelings about their birth family, to feel safe in this connection, to work out what it means to be part of two families. They're doing it together rather than the child going off and doing it by themselves or being contacted by the birth family. Okay, Beth, thank you so much for taking the time to speak to us about this. That's Beth Neal, who's a professor of social work at the University of East Anglia. Lots of your

thoughts coming in. An anonymous message here saying, I first met my birth mother in my early 30s. It was a huge relief to discover why I'd been rejected and abandoned as a baby. I had a very happy adoption and adored my parents and was so fortunate to be given to them. However, my advice to anyone looking for their birth parents is to go slowly. Initially is so much euphoria and excitement in meeting them but this new family are total strangers and it's not love i have forgiven and accepted what happened but keep a degree of distance with these relationships and another anonymous message

here saying i have three adopted children and when we took on the boys in 1992 we had to do face-to-face contact with the birth parents until it was proved to be detrimental. The boys were already neglected and traumatised and this forced contact where we had to take them just made the situation worse. 84844. I must say that if you have been affected by anything you've heard on the programme this morning, then you can visit the BBC Actionline website, which has details of places you can find support. I'm Sarah Trelevan, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who's faking pregnancies. I started like warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the

deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in. Available now. Now, on to my next guest. I Did Something Bad is the title of the debut novel by P.A. Mothet-Warr. It's a rom-com with a bit of a murder thrown in, set in Yangon, Myanmar, where P.A. was born and raised. The novel tells the story of freelance journalist Kin Haymar, assigned by Vogue, no less, to get a scoop on Hollywood's hottest movie star,

Tyler Tun, in exchange for a top job. The dream. While it's a love story, it also has some serious social commentary on abortion, corrupt police and representation in film. Pia, welcome to Woman's Hour. Thank you. Thank you for having me. Congratulations. Debut novel. It's no easy feat to get a book published.

Why did you want to write a rom-com thriller? Well, I'm, as a reader, I've always been just a massive fan of the romance genre. I'm currently doing a PhD as well. And I'm doing an Austin adaptation. So more romance there. And yeah, I just I love the genre, but I wanted to write something where the stakes were higher. And so when I was coming up with the idea, I was like, what if what if I threw a little murder into it and see what happened? Why was it important for you to set your novel in Myanmar? Because you don't live there anymore. You did. You're in America and the UK. Yeah, I live here now. I moved to London a couple of months ago. You know, I get asked this question a lot. And the honest answer is truthfully that it was the easiest and that I was kind of lazy

because when I was thinking of a setting, I was like, where do I know the best? And it was like, well, my hometown. And so, yeah. And so if, you know, it would be like if a writer who was born in London just sent their book in London to me. That's what it was, was just like writing it. I would not say that's lazy, though. I would just say that's smart. And also give us somewhere different. Give us an insight into somewhere people might not know about.

Yeah, definitely. And because I was very cognizant of the setting, I mean, obviously it's published in in the English language by like Western publishers, the majority of readers would be Western based. So I was conscious of I didn't want to exoticize the setting in any way I was like, I wanted to present Yangon as any big city that it could be. Even when we were talking about covers, my kind of goal was I told my publishers, I don't want a cover that looks essentially like it could be a travel guide cover. Like I wanted to present Yangon and Myanmar as just a big country, a big city that just happens to like, be somewhere that most readers might not have been. So not only did you not want to exoticize the setting, you also smashed a few

kind of stereotypes and tropes of southeast asia yeah as well in your main character yeah so who inspired kin haymar she's a freelance journalist enlisted by vogue to get this scoop on this hollywood heartthrob tyler tun yeah um so the name i actually named her after one of my best friends called kin who is just like one of the coolest people i know so when i was thinking of, who is just like one of the coolest people I know. So when I was thinking of this character, I was like, who's the coolest person I know? And so I was like, how flattering. Yeah, I was like, can I just use your name? And she loved it. And I actually used to be a journalist. So when initially the character Kin, she was going to be

a bodyguard. But then I was like, I don't know anything about bodyguarding, but I know a lot about being a journalist. So then I ended up making her a journalist. I can't imagine her being a bodyguard. I instantly respected her actually, because she seems so self assured right at the beginning of the book where she's negotiating, she's being offered the job. And she asks for more money. She does. Without even knowing how much she was getting paid. Yeah, she does. She was getting paid. Yeah, she does. She knows her worth. Yeah, she does. Why was it important to give her that kind of personality?

Well, I think for me, it was, you know, going against that stereotype that to be fair, a lot of authors, a lot of Asian authors are like smashing that stereotype of, you know, like the very quiet, demure Asian, Southeast Asian women. But unfortunately, you still do see that a lot. So I just wanted to present her as this really cool, confident woman who's always like, oh, well, I who, you know, goes into a meeting, asking for more money before knowing what the number is. And like, that's just who she is. And I just wanted her to just like from the get-go the reader to get a sense of okay this is someone who will not stay quiet who won't like who isn't scared and will actively just be like give me more money I know you have it I know what I'm worth um whilst I was reading it there's a lot of comedy in the novel and I got a sense that this is someone who really enjoyed writing this it's a real page turner. For example, you know, you mentioned Tyler's crow feet. You even nod to your love of Taylor Swift.

Yeah. Did you enjoy the process? Oh, I loved it. I loved it. This book, I wrote everywhere. I wrote it when I was on holiday. I remember I wrote, like I was working on it when I was on a plane once, which I never do.

I absolutely loved it. And I love books. I love reading books that make me laugh. So when I write a book, once, which I never do. I absolutely loved it. And I love books. I love reading books that make me laugh. So when I write a book, I'm like, this book has to make me laugh. So were you on the plane typing away, chuckling? Do you love Kin? I love Kin, yeah. I think you've kind of got to love your leading lady, haven't you?

I mean, it has all the markings of a rom-com, but it also has some really serious social commentary under it. In particular, I mean, there's a couple of things you say, but I'm going to start by the markings of a rom-com, but it also has some really serious social commentary under it. In particular, I mean, there's a couple of things you say, but I'm going to start by the subject of abortion, which is highly restricted in Myanmar. Why was it important for you to introduce this into the book? Well, I think, you know, this ties back like kind of going outwards, it's, I think a lot of people who don't read romance still dismiss it because it's a primarily female fan base, like dismiss it as like, oh, it's just fluff when it's like, no, actually, a lot of romance authors, a lot of good romance authors these days have really serious themes in it. So, you know, I'm not doing something revolutionary in that sense, in terms

of the genre. But this was a topic that has always been, you know, as a woman growing up in Myanmar, I have a lot of female friends. And this is just something that we've always been aware of. And it's just like a conversation that we have of like, what would you do if you got pregnant as a teenager, or just if you didn't want one. And, you know, unfortunately, this, when I was writing this, that was a very relevant topic. And unfortunately, it is still very relevant now when the books come out, especially if you see what's happening in America, and just not even just America, just worldwide. It's just like, so I was like, well, this, this was just,

this just felt like something that personally spoke to me. And I think for the character of Kin, this was just something that she was really passionate about. And I suppose you can make a serious comment about what's happening in countries around the world through fiction in a way that you can't. Yeah, definitely. Otherwise. Another bit. She's a journalist and a slight spoiler. Yeah. She's seriously assaulted. Yes. By a white man who ends up dead.

And she says to another character, I won't give that away. We both know what happens when brown people kill white people. Yeah. What did you mean by that? Well, because, you know, especially because, I mean, this is also a slightly spoilery territory, but not by too much. It's self-defense, like because she gets assaulted, self-defense. And, you know, you would think, especially because they're in Myanmar, they're in her home country. But she's like, she is, and especially as a journalist, she is very aware of how these things play out. That was one thing that I was thinking of when I was

working on this novel, because I think lately in books, you have a lot of books now about women who commit murder, like do terrible things. The theme of, quote, women's wrongs is really popular. But a lot of these times, they're all white women who are doing these. They're white protagonists. And the stakes are very different when it's a brown person and when the victim is a white man. And Kin knows, like, the chances of it being like, oh, it was self-defense, that's not enough. Like, as a journalist, because she's seen cases, she's, like, followed up on cases like this. She's very aware of that. So instantly, she's like, well, no, it's not all like cut and dry.

I can't just be like, I killed someone. It was self-defense and get away with that. She's following a film star desperate to make a movie in his home country, and he's found success in America. What is it about the idea of Home for you that you wanted to write about this book? I mean, honestly, it was like a love letter. It was a love letter to many things. It was a love letter to friendship, to journalism, and to Yangon. And I kind of wrote this honestly with the intention that, okay, if this is the only

novel, the only romance novel I ever get to publish, what would I want this to be? And so I just like, I was like, well, I want this set in my what would I want this to be? And so I just like, I was like, well, I want this set in my hometown. I want to portray my hometown the way I see it, the way I grew up in it, the way my friends grew up in it. And yeah, cause like that's just home for me. Well, it's a brilliant read.

I want to congratulate you. What's your PhD in? It's in creative writing. Yeah, I'm doing it at Newcastle University. And yeah, it's just, it's really fun. Yeah, the Northeast is really fun. Well, thank you so much for taking the time to come and talk to me. Thank you for having me. PA's book is called I Did Something Bad, and it's out now. Page turner. Thank you. A couple more of your messages coming in on adoption we have adopted have an adopted son now 13 years old and we've had the privilege and opportunity to know his brother and sister in

their own adoptive families it's been a huge support for our family and those relationships between siblings I think will assist the feelings around the possible meetup with the birth parents when they're older and one more my husband and I adopted two young children. I've just written the letterbox contact letter for the birth family for this year. During the adoptive process, a meeting was organised for us to meet the birth parents. Although it was incredibly emotional and challenging for us, we went for the sake of our adopted children.

The birth parents did not turn up to the meeting. I agree with what this new report says, but it should always be with what's best for the child. They should always come first. Now, are you planning on heading to the cinema this weekend? One of the films on offer will be Gladiator 2. Ridley Scott's sequel is hotly anticipated by many, but it's received mixed reviews. The film follows Lucius, played by Paul Muskell, an enslaved but noble warrior. Connie Nielsen returns to her role as Lucia, the mother. What makes the sequel different, however, is there is a powerful woman alongside Lucius, Arishat,

played by Yuval Gonan. And while she's not exactly a gladiator, she's an archer, her role of female warrior can be seen as progression from the passive wife of Russell Crowe's Maximus in the first gladiator film. So how common were female gladiators and warriors in ancient Rome and how accurate are the female characters in this blockbuster? To discuss, I'm joined by author and classicist Dr Daisy Dunn

and film critic Larushka Ivan Zadeh. Larushka and Daisy, welcome. Larushka, I'm going to come to you first. I should warn people at this moment there may be some spoilers, but tell us about the film. 24 years since the first one. Has it progressed? Well, fans of the first one won't be disappointed in that the second one is very much a carbon copy of the first one, but with more stampeding rhinos and mad baboons and more spectacle. And you were alluding there to the new character in it.

I did feel that perhaps we had moved on in this one because there's a spectacular opening sequence which sees the Roman army mounting a naval siege on Numidia, which is on the North African coast. So we start off, like Gladiator does in fact, with a spectacular battle scene where we see Paul Mescal, who is the new Russell Crowe character, strapping on his wife's body armour, straps on a kind of chest plate. And you see her, you know, getting her bow and she's fighting alongside him on the ramparts. This has got Team Woman's Hour very excited. We're there. There's a woman alongside him. Brilliant. Tick.

Yes, exactly. And I was like, oh, my goodness. Almost I wasn't even noticing the naval scene. I was like, my goodness, we've moved on. I'm so excited that there's this woman walking outside him. And within five minutes, and I know this is a spoiler, but it is in the trailer, she is dead. Oh, no. And I was like, oh, maybe we haven't moved on so much after all, because in the first film, Russell crowe's wife is only seen in

flashback yeah and she's highly silent so this one at least got to strap on some body armor i think she has a few lines before she is also dead and has exactly the same role as the russell crowe's wife in the first film and that she's mainly a motivation for vengeance for the gladiator character to carry through and exact his revenge on r. Well, Alicia was powerful for the five minutes that she was in the film. I'm going to bring you in, Daisy. Were there really, were there gladiators in ancient Rome, female gladiators? There were female gladiators,

and this is why it's such a pity to actually like to see a lot more of those in the film rather than sort of men riding on rhinos. I think that would have been a much better scene. I mean, they were not common, but that was the point of them. Romans were always interested in what was novel and exciting and different. And that's why you have emperors putting women into the arena, because it just wasn't what they did on a daily basis. Women were very sort of cloistered, typically. They were living quite sedate, sedentaryary lives but then you get these amazing

women coming out having to to fight each other uh a lot of the bad roman emperors are the ones who actually put the room their women on display what would they be doing how what how does it compare to to the men it's it's they were doing a range of different things. Some of these women were actually fighting beasts. In other cases, they were fighting by torchlight. The Emperor Domitian put women in the arena under torchlight, fighting each other. They were performing in games,

and they generally got quite a bad rep for taking part. It was seen to be one of the historians tastis says that these women absolutely disgraced themselves by taking part in these games um i want to discuss one of the other female characters in the film larushka uh can we bring in uh is it lucia the mother now when you say some of the other characters female characters in the film there is literally literally one female character in this film, and she's exactly the same as she was in the first film. She is Lucilla, who is played by Connie Nielsen,

who they brought back. I mean, I'm not exaggerating here. She's literally really the only woman after the wife has been killed off that is in this film. But given she is the one woman in this film, it is terrific that she is Lucilla, played by Connie Nielsen. I mean, she is defined by, in the first film,

being the daughter of Marcus Aurelius, who's the emperor at the time. She's the sister of Commodus in the first film, who's played by Joachim Phoenix. Here she's the mother of Lucius, who is the new hero played by Paul Mescal,

and the husband, the wife of Pedro Pascal, who is the new Roman general. We're very happy about the male casting, though, I must say. Yes, exactly. I'll just put that in there. Very good. You won't be disappointed.

But, you know, she's also smart, she's wily, she's intelligent, she's a survivor, she's in the middle of Rome, she's trying to machinate a political uprising in Rome to reinstate the Republic. So she has got a proper role and, you know, proper screen time and is shown respect by the film but there is no getting away from the fact that she really is the only woman in the movie yeah we've spotted it ridley we we can see um daisy what role did most women have

during this period in history what were their lives like well they were it was a different sort of time it's interesting women are starting to get a little bit more uh alpha was probably too strong a word but i think sort of historically they've been so limited in what they can do there's sort of no vote there's no sort of political position for women and that's still very much the case but with women like lucilla who was a historical figure you see her actually pulling a lot of strings behind the scenes. She was one of the people who was trying to overthrow the emperor, Commodus. And all the way through, actually, if you look behind the scenes, the emperor's wives, emperor's daughters, they are there and they're a lot more powerful than we actually think. Often their roles aren't really accurately recorded by the men who were describing the historical times.

So it was quite sort of mixed. I think it's elite women particularly who seem to have a lot more freedom to be able to do things. Forgotten women in history, men taking all the glory. How unusual. Different historians, Daisy, feel differently about this. Do you like films to be true to the historical time they're reflecting or do you allow a bit of artistic licence?

I think there's a danger of being too po-faced about this and being a bit curmudgeonly and being a bit dull and sort of over-analysing everything. It just takes the fun out of these films. On the other hand, I know a lot of people watch films and it might be their only exposure to that particular historical period. So I think it actually can be very, very dangerous to push the story too far away from the facts.

So maybe I sound like I'm going a little bit down the middle, but I think, you know, on balance, I like something to be historically accurate. I like people to have actually made an effort and actually read some history books before they actually make a film. OK, good. Daisy, we'll read the history book and then go and see Gladiators. We're going to move into modern day now modern day Gladiators I understand you're both you're a fan Daisy of the BBC TV show reboot of a 90s ITV show. I watched it in the 90s and I've watched a bit of the revival I quite like it I mean I think obviously more lycra more climbing walls than you

had in the original gladiatorial games. But I like it. They have crowd pleasing stage names, noisy arena. And crucially, Daisy and LaRushka, women play an equal role, don't they? That's right. Has there been a move towards developing female characters more generally in action films, LaRushka? Yes, I think so. I mean, if you think the first Gladiator was in 2000, we have moved on a lot since then. In fact, I was thinking Robin Hood,

which was directed by Ridley Scott, which starred Russell Crowe as Robin Hood. There's a scene in that where, you know, Robin Hood's fighting this mystery knight and he flips up the visor and finds Cate Blanchett underneath. And she was this, you know, really sword swinging, argumentative maid marion that we hadn't seen before and uh also shot at the same time as gladiator was lord of the rings now

i know that's fantasy but that was such a boy's own club obviously the lord of the rings and now we've got the prequel the rings of power and there are so many more female characters in that that were in lord of the rings the movies so i think you know that it's just that expectation because obviously myths they're retold for each new generation in a way that reflects the time in which they're made. Well, progress is being made. And, well, we know it's being made because one of the brilliant actresses who's starring and doing amazing things in cinema, Michelle Yeoh, was on Monday's programme. Nuala interviewed her. And if you missed that, you can catch up with that interview in Weekend Woman's Hour tomorrow.

Thank you, Daisy. Thank you, LaRushka. And thanks to all of you. Join me tomorrow. That's all for Weekend Woman's Hour tomorrow. Thank you Daisy, thank you LaRushka and thanks to all of you join me tomorrow. That's all for today's Woman's Hour, join us again next time. How's it feeling? Constipated. your only world. Where panellists use sound clues to work out what's going on. Guess how this dog's feeling. Constipated.

Yes, definitely. Step, what am I doing? Is that a hand dryer? Is this the same dog? You heard it here first with me, Chris McCausland. Why are you so familiar with that sound? From BBC Radio 4.

Listen now on BBC Sounds. I'm Sarah Trelevan, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started, like, warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy.

And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in. Available now.