Anitha Clemence on the family secret: If this came out, it would be a scandal

Entrepreneur and media personality Anitha Clemence has spent most of her adult life wondering about her adoption.
When she was 26, she went to India with her then-boyfriend.
There, she began to unravel her past, even though it was difficult.

Anitha Clemence was actually worried about what she would find out about her biological family.

– I was really scared. I had a boyfriend in high school who was adopted from Chile. When he went back, he found out that his mother had been a prostitute and drug addict, so I was scared of what I might encounter, says Anitha when we meet at the Soho House members' club in Stockholm.

Anitha knew that she had been found on the street outside a hospital in the city of Kottayam, just a few days old. It was the summer of 1978 and nuns had cared for her inside the hospital.

In this strictly Catholic region of India, it is very common for children born out of wedlock to be left outside the hospital, as the mother otherwise risks social death and exclusion.

Called the "Daughter of Sin"

– They use it as a kind of contraceptive, unless the children disappear. Every year 44,000 children disappear in India. I was called the “daughter of sin” in the media, she says and takes a sip of coffee.

However, most abandoned children end up in orphanages and not in the hospital like Anitha did.

– I was an exception, but why?

It was also strange that Anitha managed to turn two and a half years old before she was flown to Sweden under anesthesia, as the adoption process had been postponed several times citing the fact that there was another family involved.

When she was 26, she went with her then-boyfriend to Kerala, India, while he was filming a television production. During the trip, Anitha met a nun who pulled her aside in the convent and whispered that she knew more about Anitha's biological mother.

Anitha didn't hear whether the nun said her mother had been an air hostess or a hostess.

– I thought she was probably a prostitute. Who would have been a flight attendant in India in the 70s? It was very radical in such a conservative environment.

Shame and family secrets

The next day, when Anitha wanted to know more, the nun was as if swallowed by the earth, but it was clear that the adoption had been surrounded by shame, scandals and hidden family secrets.

20 years after the first trip to India, Anitha has put together most of her family puzzle and it has now resulted in the book Family Secrets.

In the book, she describes not only the search for her biological family but also an unsafe childhood with sexual and psychological violence.

– My father was horrible and tyrannical. He groped me from the time I was three years old. When I was four he tried to kiss me. When I was nine I had enough and resisted. That's when it stopped. When I was 16 I more or less moved out of home, she says.

Anitha believes her mother knew about it, but chose to turn a blind eye.

– I was very angry with her growing up, but now I realize that she did the best she could. Dad was really a controlling tyrant towards her too. I am so sad that I came to this realization after my mother passed away. I would have liked a more dignified ending with her.

Anitha always felt different from her adoptive parents. She has always thought, pondered, and wanted to discuss things, unlike them.

– I always felt like a replacement. I wasn't from their tribe. I may not have thought about it much growing up, but I see it so clearly now that I have biological children of my own. I see that there is a spiritual connection in a way that is undeniable. That said, I absolutely believe that there are happy adopted children, but that wasn't me.

A couple of years ago, when both of Anitha's adoptive parents had passed away from Alzheimer's disease, she realized she was left alone.

Anitha Clemence

Age: 46 years.

Family: Children Penny, 13, and Tom Allan, 9. Large family in the USA.

Lives: In an apartment on Lidingö.

Occupation: Entrepreneur and media profile.

Current: With the book Family Secrets (Forum)

No one could tell her story anymore and she herself had to unravel the mysteries surrounding the adoption.

Found relatives in the USA

Anitha had now made several trips to India without results and decided to take a DNA test. This resulted in her finding her cousin Paula in New York and her quintuplet Reina in Orange County outside Los Angeles.

– Reina got completely into this and we started digging together. Her parents were there in Kerala and they are also helping. They went to the monastery and showed me pictures. They went to the hospital and asked a lot of questions. They also met with journalists and lifted every single stone.

At the same time, news broke in Sweden that thousands of Chilean children were kidnapped and sold for international adoption during Augusto Pinochet's military dictatorship in the 1970s and 1980s.

Anitha began to wonder if that might have been her fate too. Could the other family, mentioned in her adoption papers, actually have been her biological mother?

– The kidnappings in Chile were orchestrated by nuns in combination with doctors and lawyers, and it was much the same way as for me in India, she says.

A year ago, Anitha went to India again.

– I had to dig deep to keep from going crazy.

It turned out that Reina was related to Anitha on her mother's side and Paula on her father's side. The DNA clues now revealed a tragic love story in which a young married doctor fell in love with a young flight attendant. Both were from wealthy families in India, where an illegitimate child would definitely not have been an option.

Two police officers had found Anitha in a bush outside the hospital and she had been about three or four weeks old.

"I was covered in ants and they ran with me to the emergency room. The police saved my life," she says.

The police wanted to find the child's mother and heard through rumors about the flight attendant who had been secretly pregnant. They arrested her and took her to the hospital. There she was confirmed to be the mother and asked if she wanted to keep her child. She did not want to.

But the ghost trail with the other family was the hospital's way of trying to postpone the adoption in the hope that the mother would come back.

Dad cheating on mom

Anitha shows me pictures of the doctor and his family, her biological father. She marvels at the similarities to her own children, facial features, eyes. But she doesn't get any closer than that and we're not allowed to show the pictures in the newspaper.

Mom logged out when I called.

The father is now a successful doctor with three children and many grandchildren. The wife is a high-ranking judge in India and if this were to get out, it could be a major legal scandal, she says.

– So he was cheating on my mother.

Shortly before our interview, Anitha also found her biological mother, thanks to her relationship with Reina. She shows me a photo on her phone of a young, beautiful Indian woman.

– That's me, the whole shape of my face, the chin, the mouth, and the lips, says Anitha and smiles.

Anitha's biological mother has turned 65 today.

– She lives a kind of identical life to me. Her husband died a few years ago. So she's just out and about, going to parties and running races.

When Anitha contacted her mother on Facebook, however, she was met with a cold hand. “Who are you? How did you get my information?” she wrote angrily in large letters. Anitha explained how everything was connected and sent pictures of herself and her children, but the mother logged out.

How does it feel?

– I understand her reaction, it's like she thought she had hidden a body for 46 years and then the body calls. Anyone would have reacted that way.

Anitha can also understand her life choices.

– I don't think she could have had a professional career with me. She would have been ridiculed and it would have cost her too much. I'm not mad at my mother in the slightest. I'm not mad at my father either. They had an affair. What can I say? She was really pretty, a flight attendant of that time who walked catwalks and graced fashion magazines.

Anitha rather thinks it's nice to understand how everything is connected.

– They are two rich families who have hidden me. I am not a poor child who has had to live in an orphanage. That is why I had to live in the hospital. Everything has been explained. I was a secret, she says.

Whatever happens to Anitha's biological parents, she has found a brand new Indian family in the United States, who have welcomed her and her children with open arms. A family who love to discuss politics and society...

– I have always felt a strong sense of loneliness. But for the first time I feel that something in my body has changed. The void has been filled and it feels amazing. I have a family.