[sentimental music playing] [Sue Stalley] I was told to pack my bags, leave the baby in the nursery, and just go.

So, I didn't get to say goodbye.

To find out that we were actually together... it breaks my heart.

[Davina McCall] Every year, thousands of people come to us looking for missing family.

But last year, something unusual happened.

I believed for 19 years that my daughter had died.

And then suspicions came to light that my daughter may not have died and was stolen at birth.

[Davina] And then, another searcher got in touch, telling us a similar story.

to take babies Thefrom other people.ht No one has the right.

[Nicky Campbell] We realized we are facing one of our biggest challenges yet... [speaking Spanish] -Hello!

-Hello.

[Nicky] ...in Spain.

-[woman] Thank you.

-Bye.

-Good-bye.

-Bye-bye.

[Nicky] We follow the stories of British and Spanish mothers who have been living with agonizing loss... because of what might be one of the most shocking scandals Spain has ever seen.

[Davina] In recent years, a huge number of women have come forward who believe their babies were taken from them at birth and given or sold to other families.

[Nicky] We've discovered people searching for their children... [María Elena] But here, there should be two more little heads.

[Davina] Yes.

I miss him.

...searching for relatives... [woman in Spanish] Our day has come.

...searching for answers.

[Davina] So, what are you hoping?

I need the truth.

For me, just knowing that my child was alive and well would change my life.

It's literally unbearable listening to you.

I think-- -Oh, God bless you.

-Well, as a mother... I just can't bear it.

[opening music ends] [general chatter] When Ruth Appleby came to us, she had a question that stopped us in our tracks.

If the ashes I have, as I believe, are not my daughter's, then whose are they?

[Davina] What Ruth went on to tell us lifted the lid on an extraordinary story involving both Spanish and British wo Mother of two and grandmother Ruth is 60 and is a teaching assistant.

Today, she lives in the Yorkshire Dales, but in 1982, she was off on her travels.

I went to Spain, because my boyfriend said he wanted to go and teach English in Spain.

So, I said, "Yes, I'll go, but I'm only going for a year."

I ended up staying 24 years.

[Spanish guitar music playing] I absolutely loved it.

Everything was so different.

It just felt free and easy and... um... just a lot of fun.

[Davina] Ruth and her boyfriend, Howard, eventually settled in Galicia, northern Spain... and they got married.

When I found out I was pregnant, I was so overjoyed.

We were both really happy.

During the pregnancy, Howard and I had obviously thought about names.

We'd been told it was a girl.

And so, we'd chosen the name Rebecca for her.

The pregnancy was just idyllic.

I just wanted to meet my baby.

[church bell ringing] [Davina] Ruth has come back to the hospital in La Coruña.

[Ruth] I was admitted in 1992.

I was on the fourth floor and this end, because I remember that the window overlooked the beach.

It was a very prolonged procedure thated in having to have a caesarean with... with full anesthetic.

[Davina] Ruth's husband, Howard, waited anxiously outside until he heard the news.

He was told that the baby had been born and that the baby was settled in the creche area, and he saw her.

She was... He said she was absolutely beautiful... um... very healthy.

But after about five minutes, the nurse that was looking after the babies there said he couldn't stay and that he needed to go home, and that he'd had a long day.

And then, two hours later, he got a phone call from the hospital asking him to go back, saying that something had happened.

The doctors were waiting for him.

They told him in a stairwell.

They were sat on the stairs, and they told him that the baby had passed away.

After I came around from the operation, my husband came in.

And as soon as I saw him, I thought, "What's happened?"

And he had to break the news to me that he'd been told that Rebecca had died.

My whole world fell apart.

It was such a shock... um... and I just couldn't stop crying.

I'd never felt such sadness in all my life.

The hospital were putting a lot of pressure on both of us, actually.

They said that they would take care of everything, but it had to be a cremation.

And I said no.

I said I didn't want that.

[Davina] Instead of cremation, Ruth and Howard arranged for Rebecca to be laid to rest in the local cemetery.

After I'd been discharged from hospital, we obviously went home.

From then on, I had to get back into a normal way of life.

[Davina] They went on to have two more children.

Years later, in 2004, they divorced.

Ruth returned to England, but the pain of losing Rebecca never went away.

There isn't a day goes by when she isn't in my head... in some way.

[Davina] Then, in 2010, Ruth decided to bring Rebecca's remains home.

[church bell ringing] Rebecca's coffin lay here, in this cemetery, overlooking the Atlantic Ocean in northern Spain.

I used to come here very regularly to put flowers for her, and it helped me, it helped me to grieve.

[Davina] Ruth arranged to have Rebecca's remains cremated to take back to England.

She was accompanied by her solicitor, who had helped make the arrangements.

I was here... and... there were some cemetery workers over here, and they took the coffin out to place into the chest that the crematorium had sent, because by law, a coffin has to be transported that way.

And... to my great shock, the coffin was too big to go in the chest that they'd sent.

Without a word of warning, the cemetery workers took a crowbar, opened the coffin... The remains in that coffin were intact, though complete skeleton, and the skeleton was that big.

It's impossible that that was a newborn baby.

[thunder crashing] [Davina] Ruth was convinced that the remains in the coffin were not Rebecca's, but those of an older child.

It's an image that I will never, ever forget.

It was something from a nightmare.

I didn't put things together at that time.

I was just doing everything to stay on my feet, because the shock was so physical and emotional.

Years later, I realized everything that had happened there was completely wrong.

[Nicky] Ruth didn't know it yet, but there was a chance she was part of something much bigger.

I've come to Madrid to investigate a story that shocked Spain to its .

I want to get to the bottom of an extraordinary scandal that broke in 2011... which the Spanish press would go on to call the "Stolen Babies Scandal."

This is from La Vanguardia newspaper in January 2011, and it says that the first so-called stolen baby case came to light in Cadiz in 2010, a baby that had been born in 1974.

Very quickly, this escalated to 62 cases in Cadiz alone, and that led to the creation of a class action with 300 alleged cases of baby theft.

[crowd cheering] This shocking story began over 80 years ago, under right-wing dictator General Franco, who ruled Spain from 1939 until his death in 1975.

In those years, it's believed that babies were taken at birth from couples who opposed or threatened Franco, or even so-called "unsuitable" parents, like single mothers.

Stolen babies were given or sold to childless couples the regime did approve of, a practice about which the Church had knowledge.

[film reel spinning] Even after Franco died, it's now thought the practice continued into the 1990s, with doctors, priests, and nuns taking babies from new mothers and selling them.

But when DNA technology became widely available 20 years ago, suddenly, people who suspected this had happened to them had a chance of getting proof.

And soon, one newspaper reported the first case to be solved by DNA.

It says that the mother had been told her baby had died in 1971 and was given a death certificate.

And then, in 2011, the mother discovered that her daughter was alive and well, and they were reunited.

[Davina] Back in London, another case came to our attention.

Just a month after Ruth contacted us, a mother and daughter got in touch.

Like Ruth, they told us a shocking story that happened in a hospital, this time in Madrid-- the story of a mother who lost not one, but two children-- twins.

María Elena and her mother, Ana, live in Clapham, South London.

[María Elena] I've lived in London since 1987.

[speaking Spanish] This is very good, Grandma.

This cleans your whole body.

[both laugh] Is that what you like, to eat a banana?

[María Elena chuckles] In 2010, my parents came to live with me, and then my dad passed away in 2012.

And my mom has been with us here since then.

I was born in February 1960, but two years earlier, my mom had come to the hospital to have a birth.

[Davina] Today, they have traveled to Madrid.

At the age of 93, Ana is going back to the site of the hospital for the first time since that day.

In 1958, Ana already had three children, and her pregnancy with the twins had been normal and healthy.

[speaking Spanish] Well, there, on that corner.

There.

Where the other building is.

That's where it was.

[Davina] When Ana was a young woman in the 1950s, most Spanish hospitals were run by the Catholic Church.

The nurses working in them were usually nuns.

And in a maternity ward, Ana believes something terrible happened to her.

[speaking Spanish] I don't know, I don't like it.

[siren blaring] [María Elena] When she got there, she told me that she was taken to a room that had, like, blankets.

[Davina] Ana says she was put in a storage room on her own, and there, one of the nuns gave her some kind of sedative.

[María Elena] They put her an injection.

And she said that when she woke up, one nun told her that she had had a boy and a girl.

[Davina] But some time later, the same nun returned.

The next day, she came, and she said they'd passed away.

My mom asked them how to arrange the funeral.

They said, "No, no, we do everything."

So, my mom said that, in a way, she felt grateful to the hospital.

[Davina] Soon after she was told her babies had died, Ana was discharged, and she went home.

Gradually, she and her husband rebuilt their lives.

In total, they had seven children together.

But more than 50 years after they thought the twins had died, their world would be turned upside-down.

[speaking Spanish] That is a lie... [speaking Spanish] They lied about everything.

They put what they wanted.

[Davina] Ruth Appleby always had doubts about what happened to her baby daughter, Rebecca, who she was told had died at birth.

Hi, good afternoon.

How are you?

[bartender] Very well.

[Ruth] Could I have a glass of Albariño?

[bartender] A glass of Albariño, yes.

[Davina] But Ruth wasn't alone.

All over Spain, women were coming forward with similar stories.

Then, in 2011, Ruth would discover she wasn't the only one with suspicions.

A Spanish friend came to visit me.

And the reason for her visit, I found out afterwards, was because the scandal of stolen babies had broken in Spain at this point.

She described one of the big cases that was in the news, and you could have changed the mother's name to my name.

It was identical.

It was mind-blowing.

And... [sighing] I didn't know what to think.

[Davina] By now, news of the Spanish stolen babies scandal had reached the UK.

In 2011, I used to work for the local authority, and I came back home, and my dad and mom, they were both in the kitchen.

They were reading a newspaper.

My mom said, "Look at this article," and it was talking about babies being stolen in some hospitals in Spain.

[Davina] When the scandal broke, allegations emerged about implausibly high infant death rates at particular hospitals in Spain in the '60s and '70s.

Ana and her family now realized that they may have been lied to, and that the twins might still be alive.

So, we went to Madrid to ask for documents, and that's how we started to look for them.

[Davina] Ana and María Elena have collected hundreds of documents and newspaper articles.

[speaking Spanish] María was one.

Terrible.

[Davina] Although Ana gave birth to the twins during the Franco dictatorship, they think the babies were stolen for financial gain.

I don't think it was political.

It was just, "Oh, these people, they have too many kids."

Somebody was asking for babies.

They were prepared to pay.

So, it was unlucky.

[Davina] Ruth thinks she was targeted because she was a foreigner.

I think it's due to the fact that we didn't have any family around.

It was just me and my husband, so there was no extended family to ask awkward questions.

[Davina] Ruth's baby, Rebecca, supposedly died in 1992.

It wasn't until 19 years later that Ruth thought Rebecca might still be alive.

I've come to Madrid to ask Ruth what she did next.

So, the scandal broke in 2011?

Yeah, a Spanish friend came to see me.

I will always be grateful for her.

And I'd had a file in my attic of everything from that pregnancy.

I opened it up, and the first thing that we opened was an envelope that I'd never opened.

An was the license to have her buried, and it wasn't filled in.

So, the police in North Yorkshire requested the hospital report for me to look at, and there are at least three and maybe four different times of death.

-Oh, wow, God.

-Should be one time of death.

Yeah, of course.

There was an appointment card... for a check-up for the baby six weeks after.

Why would you make an appointment for a dead baby?

You've literally had to turn detective, haven't you?

Well... Like, for example, this one.

This is supposed to give details of the relative that was present when the baby was identified.

-[Davina] Nothing.

-Nothing, absolutely nothing.

I don't have one single paper that doesn't have something strange on it.

So, what are you hoping?

Well, a very simple answer, in one word.

Well, two, sorry.

The truth.

I need the truth.

If my baby did die, as I was told, it should be very easy to prove.

And if she didn't die... the dream would be to find her.

If that were to happen, would they want to meet us?

I've always hoped that if... If she was found and didn't want to, I would respect that.

For me, just knowing that my child was alive and well would change my life.

And... it might sound drastic, but it would.

It would totally change everything for me, because... I'm sure that I'd still feel robbed, but... it's that protective thing.

You just want your children to be happy and well.

It's literally unbearable listening to you.

I think I... -Oh, God bless you.

-Well, as a mother... I just can't bear it.

And I am amazed with the burden that you continue to carry and try and live a normal life.

Like, I just feel such great compassion for you.

[Ruth] Oh, thank you, Davina.

That's... [Davina] Terrible.

It's terrible.

[church bell ringing] [chanting in Spanish] We want justice!

Cradle robbers!

[Nicky] Like the thousands of Spanish women who are victims of the scandal, our searchers have fought tooth and nail for justice.

In this country, Ana and María Elena have contacted Scotland Yard.

Ruth has taken her case to Yorkshire Police, to Interpol, and as far as the European Parliament.

I believe that there are approximately 1,500 reported crimes of babies being taken at birth.

[Nicky] But in spite of everything Ruth and Ana have tried, they've both hit a brick wall.

That's why they came to us.

Long Lost Family's expert researcher, Ariel Bruce, has been looking into their cases.

Hi, Ariel.

Nicky.

So, these people have come to us, and they think their babies were stolen from them.

They've been to the police.

What can we do for them?

Really difficult searches.

When they've managed to get documentation or where they have had documentation, it would appear to have been falsified, inconsistent, incorrect.

So, what are the next steps that we need to take?

Both Ruth ana have undertaken DNA tests.

It's going to be the only way possible.

I can't think of any other way of doing it.

And so, now, the search begins.

[Davina] In recent years, a terrible scandal has emerged in Spain.

Nearly 2,000 people have come forward, questioning what really happened to babies they'd been told had died at birth.

Ana, along with her daughter, approached us for help finding her baby boy and girl, who today would be in their mid-60s.

When Ana had her twins in 1958, she was told they had died, and she accepted that.

But when the scandal broke in 2011, nearly 50 years later, it threw everything she thought she knew into doubt.

[door buzzing] I'm going to meet them here in Madrid to learn what they've been able to find out since then.

Thank you, gracias, for talking to me today.

Please, will you just apologize to Ana if this is difficult to talk about?

[speaking Spanish] She says she's sorry if this is difficult for you to talk about.

No.

No.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ana.

-[Ana laughs] -Thank you, darling.

So, when did Ana start thinking that something didn't feel quite right?

So, when she saw them in the newspaper.

It really was a very happy moment, but in a way, sad moment, because it was like they are alive.

And then we started to request all the documents.

We asked for the records in the Almudena Cemetery, because that's where they should have buried them, and they sent us a document where it said there are no records of these babies being buried here.

Also, the ba had to be baptized.

There is no record of those babies being baptized.

So, they weren't baptized, and there's no record of them at the cemetery?

[María Elena] No.

What's your opinion on all the different documents that all say different things?

Why is that?

Because everything is a lie, it's all contradictions.

[Davina] It's interesting when you're a young woman and something terrible happens, how we just put faith in the people that deal with us.

In those times, you wouldn't question nuns, doctors.

They don't have a right to take babies from other people.

No one has the right.

Does Ana have hope?

She says, do you have hope?

Very little.

-Not many.

Not much.

-Very little.

[María Elena] No, because, really, it will be really a miracle.

What keeps you going?

Because it's a lot of work.

[María Elena] Because it's the right thing to do.

They say forget.

No, I don't forget.

-Ana doesn't forget.

-[María Elena] No, no.

She says, you don't forget, right?

You don't forget them.

No.

I'd like to know how they are.

[María Elena] She says she would like to know how they are.

[Davina] It's a basic right to know how your children are.

-I'll show you a photograph.

-[Davina] Oh, yes.

[María Elena laughs] -This is a photo of my family.

-Oh, wow!

This is my mom.

[speaking Spanish] A very bad photo.

What did she say?

She said it's not a nice photo.

She never likes the photo.

[laughter] -[Davina] She looks great!

-[Ana] No.

Yes!

¡Sí!

-[María Elena] This is my dad.

-[Davina] Oh, wow.

María Elena.

[Davina] Is that you?

So sweet.

But here there should be two more little heads.

[Davina] Yes.

They are missing.

[Davina] So sad.

[Nicky] To try to understand how the practice of stealing babies became so widespread in Spain, I've come to meet Professor Soledad Luque, who's pushing for new legislation to help solve stolen baby cases.

-Soledad, hi.

How are you doing?

-[in Spanish] Nice to meet you.

-Hi, Clare.

-Hello.

Hi, nice to meet you.

We're joined by Clare, who's translating for us.

Thank you very much for seeing me today.

I think the really key question-- how many stolen babies are there?

[in Spanish] I think the key question is, how many stolen children are there estimated to be?

[in Spanish] We can't determine how many stolen children there are, but we do know there are thousands of reports.

-A lot.

-[Soledad] Very many.

-Yeah.

Yeah.

-[Soledad] Very many.

In the UK, there's a real culture of putting your DNA onto a DNA database.

Not so much in Spain.

Might there be a campaign to say anyone who was adopted put their DNA onto a database?

[in Spanish] There isn't a free national DNA bank where people can freely go to leave their DNA fingerprint.

And this is a problem, because a lot of people can't afford a DNA test.

In regards specifically to the stolen baby law that we are trying to pass, we are asking for a free national DNA bank.

This is such a quest for justice.

So, this whole issue, it started under the dictator, General Franco.

Was this a deliberate policy by the State?

[in Spanish] Absolutely.

It was a deliberate policy by the State.

The Church and the State acted as one unit.

[Nicky] In 1939, the law was even changed to allow authorities to issue birth certificates with adoptive parents' names, in place of a child's biological parents.

It's so difficult to understand how men of God can justify this wickedness.

Well, the first thing that one has to understand is that... they don't usually justify it, because they don't recognize it.

They don't recognize it.

However, some nuns who were accused, one in particular, when she was asked about the case itself, in which she was accused, she maintained that what she did was always for the good of those children and following the instructions of her superiors.

Therefore, we are almost certain that these people didn't act thinking that they were doing something wrong.

Unfortunately, they thought that they weoing good.

Immorality masquerading as morality.

[in Spanish] Exactly.

[Nicky] The practice of stealing babies didn't only impact parents, but the children, too.

A Spanish woman revealed to us the shocking amount her adoptive mother told her that she'd been sold for.

[in Spanish] 25,000 pesetas in 1953.

It was a lot of money.

You could buy a house.

[Nicky] Ruth and Ana came to us as mothers searching for the children they believe were stolen from them.

We're shining a light into a dark corner of Spain's history.

And it's a history that has devastated entire generations of not only parents, but also children.

70-year-old retired secretary Irene Meca Mateo lives in north Madrid with her husband.

She has two grown-up daughters.

[in Spanish] My daughters have already left home.

We're already retired and living peacefully at home without many problems.

[Nicky] Irene was born in 1953 and adopted as a baby.

Three years later, her father died, leaving just Irene and her mother.

[in Spanish] The memories I have of my childhood are not very pleasant.

I've never had a good relationship with my mother.

The feeling that you're missing something.

It's not the relationship that I have now with my daughters.

I noticed that something wasn't right.

She got remarried when I was 11 years old.

And that was... absolutely painful and... with very ugly parts.

One day, during those many fights at home, my stepfather came in and spat in my face that I had been adopted and that it wasn't... and it wasn't my family.

[Irene, voice over] It's a brutal slap in the face.

[Irene] Hi.

Can I have a decaf, black, please?

You can imagine, at 15 years old, having that bucket of cold water dumped on you.

That's very rough.

You think you know what your life is, that you know who your family is... and, suddenly, you realize that you've been living a lie.

[general chatter] [Nicky] To make matters worse, Irene's adoptive mother wouldn't talk to her about the adoption, but she did admit that she paid a huge amount of money for her.

[in Spanish] They paid for me.

It's just like going to the market and buying a chicken.

It's the same thing.

[Nicky] After hearing that shocking news, Irene became determined to get to the truth of her identity.

[in Spanish] I'm legally an adult.

So, I go from counter to counter, anywhere they said I could find papers related to my adoption, to grasp at straws and find some paper that would tell me something.

[Nicky] Little did Irene know, she had taken the first steps towards finding her roots.

[dog barking] Irene grew up with the name Irene Mecha Mateo.

But when the documents came through, she was in for a surprise.

After Irene was told she was adopted, she obtained her adoption records, and they showed a different name.

Here it is: "Irene Sanz Alonso."

And there's more.

In her official birth certificate, where the birth parents' names should be entered, there's no "Alonso."

In fact, there are no names at all.

It's all blank.

It's a pattern that is seen in thousands of similar scenarios, including Ana's and Ruth's.

But it doesn't stop them looking for the children they believe are out there, somewhere.

I have promised myself I will never stop searching for the truth.

People may lie, but I will search for the truth 'til my dying day, if needed.

[Nicky] Whilst Ruth and Ana wait to see if putting their DNA online has results, I'm going to see Irene.

She was sold off as a baby, and as part of her search for her birth parents, she'd also taken a DNA test.

Suddenly, a coincidence happened... [Nicky] Irene was then put in touch with a woman called Rocío, who lived in Madrid.

...my cousins.

It's like, suddenly, the day I find out that I have this family, wanting to go outside and stamp my feet, fixing myself to the ground, like, "Now I know who I am.

I know where I come from."

[Nicky] From finding a cousin, it would be a short step to uncovering Irene's true identity.

Irene, thank you very much for seeing me today.

Your story is so incredible and so moving.

The first time you met your cousin must have been... wonderful.

[in Spanish] At this point in my life, at 70, finding my family has been... incredible.

Tell me what has happened.

A cousin that I found through DNA, Rocío, took me to what is my town, where I was born, in Ambite.

We went to the civil registry, and there in the birth records from 1953, they found a girl born from a single mother at that time, born March 23, 1953, and that girl was me.

[Nicky] In Ambite, a small town outside Madrid, the birth record showed there was only one female baby for the right date.

Then a local man told Irene he was related to the mother of the baby, and he agreed to give a DNA test, which proved the match.

The baby was Irene, and Irene now finally knew the identity of her birth mother.

And was that a moment that your life, in some ways, started to make sense?

[in Spanish] Absolutely, because, up to that point, you're completely up in the air.

You don't know who you are.

And if, on top of that, the new family welcomes you, it's a wonderful feeling.

When you saw your mother's name and you found out who she was, you must have had so many questions.

[in Spanish] The first question I had: "Where is she?"

And she was no longer there.

She died two years after I was born.

So there are still a lot of questions.

[Nicky] Irene's mother died outside Madrid in 1955, in a sanatorium for the treatment of psychiatric patients.

[in Spanish] I know who she is, I know her name.

I saw her picture.

Can I see the photograph of your mother?

[Irene, in Spanish] This is her.

[Nicky chuckles] Sí.

Yeah.

-She looks like you.

-[in Spanish] Yeah?

-Yeah.

-[Irene laughs] I don't know.

Yeah, I think so.

Sí.

[chuckles] Sí.

[in Spanish] It's incredible.

It's my mother.

[Nicky] Today, Irene's cousin, Rocío, wants to show her a special view of the town where she was born 70 years ago.

[Irene in Spanish, voice over] When you spend 70 years not knowing who you are, and, suddenly, you find the whole family... A miracle.

For me, it's been a miracle, obviously.

[sentimental music playing] [Irene laughs] [Rocío, in Spanish] Our day's come.

[in Spanish] What a beautiful day.

It's a beautiful day.

-Hi, cousin.

-Hi, cousin.

[Irene] Come on.

[laughs] -[Rocío] I wanted to see you... -Yes.

...in these surroundings.

Well, then.

-How are you?

-Good.

It's wonderful that you're here today, that we're together, sharing this wonderful day... -[Irene laughs] Yes.

-...and that... and that thanks to... well, life, to everything... [Irene] Thanks to you, always.

But I couldn't do it without you, Rocío.

I'm very aware of that.

It's a pleasure for me, because... [Irene] I love you, cousin.

I love you too.

Everyone... [both laugh] [Irene laughs] It's my town.

I was born there.

One of my cousins lives in the house where I was born.

We were all born there.

And now I have everything.

[Nicky] Like Irene, Ana and Ruth hope DNA will reunite them with their lost family, their children.

Ariel Bruce has been looking into their cases.

So, Ariel, what have you been able to do in Ana and Ruth's cases?

Well, you know, they both put their DNA onto all of the sites, and, unfortunately, there've been no proper connections, nobody that could be either a child of theirs or a grandchild of theirs, and that's what we would be looking for.

This is devastating for Ruth and Ana, isn't it?

We've told them off camera, and they are sad, but understand the situation.

I think, for both of them, they were realistic that this was always going to be a terribly difficult search.

I'm hopeful that, in the future, more people will test, and they may get the answers that they so hope for.

[Davina] Sadly, most birth mothers who believe their babies were stolen are left frustrated looking for answers.

But there can be comfort in talking to other people who've been through the same ordeal.

I've arranged to introduce Ruth to Ana and María Elena.

I'm going to leave yuys to it, actually.

So... and they speak Spanish perfect.

-Thank you very much, Davina.

-I hope it goes well.

-Thank you.

-Alright, take care.

-Thank you, you too.

-Alright.

Bye now.

[in Spanish] Hi.

Good afternoon.

I'm Ruth.

-[María Elena] Hi, Ruth.

-Hi.

A kiss.

-It's a pleasure.

-I'm so glad.

I am too.

-Hi.

-Hi.

I'm so happy.

I'm so happy to meet you.

The same for me, truly.

[in English] Thank you, thank you.

[Ruth, in Spanish] Thank you.

[in Spanish] I'm older than you.

I'm older.

I'm 93.

[Ruth] But you look great.

[laughter] No, really.

[María Elena in English] Did you know about our case?

[Ruth, in English] So, what happened?

[in Spanish] A nun told me, "You've had a boy and a girl.

What do you want to name them?"

And the next day, she came and said, "They've died."

I presume, like myself, that your mother believed what the doctors said.

[in Spanish] She says, like her, that you believed what the doctors said.

[in Spanish] Yes.

[Ruth laughs] Aw!

[Ana, inaudible] I'm so sorry.

[in Spanish] I'm so, so sorry that they stole... It's... There are no words, right?

No.

[Ruth] But you have to have hope.

[in English] I'm really grateful to speak to you, and I would like to stay in contact.

-Me too.

-Yeah, and maybe we can... [María Elena] Meet.

Yeah, meet and help each other.

[Ana] It's easier with a picture.

[Ruth, Spanish] Yes, I know, but sometimes miracles happen.

[in Spanish] -The same boat.

-[Ruth] Yes, yes... [end music playing]