A SOUTH African man who was switched at birth has revealed he resents his mum for not swapping him back because he grew up dirt poor while the other kid was rich.
Robin was raised by Sandy Dawkins, a single mum struggling to make ends meet living on the outskirts of Johannesburg, while Gavin was raised by wealthier parent Megs Clinton Parker in Pietermaritzburg, after they were switched at birth in 1989.
The error was discovered in 1991 after a dispute over Gavin’s paternity led to a DNA test that showed Megs was not his birth mother.
A check of hospital records then revealed Megs’ biological son, Robin, was actually being raised by Sandy.
But confronted with the possibility of swapping their birth sons back, Megs and Sandy chose instead to keep the kids they had raised since birth, reports 60 Minutes Australia.
Robin has told how he wishes Megs had fought to swap him back, describing his meagre life with Sandy as "not easy" and saying he would not wish the ordeal on his “worst enemy”.
Speaking at age 15, Robin told the programme he resented that Gavin “gets things easy”.
“If I’ve ever wanted anything, I’ve had to work towards it, I’ve never just had it come towards me," he added.
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Robin and Gavin were the only two children born in Nigel Hospital in Johannesburg on the day in summer 1989 and were accidentally given to the wrong mothers by the nurse.
After discovering the error in 1991 but deciding against swapping the kids back, Sandy and Megs embraced each other like sisters.
Gavin at the time said he was “happy” with the life he landed accidentally and that he did not feel sorry for Robin.
“Saying I thank my lucky stars every day would be wrong but at the same time I was given a life which I’ve now lived and I’m still living and I don’t regret anything," he said.
But Megs was missing her biological son and in 2004, encouraged him to move halfway across the country into her home with Gavin – leaving Sandy without a child.
“I just want to know she’s really happy with what she’s achieved,” Sandy said at the time.
“I mean she’s ruined people’s lives, there’s just no other way to look at it… she’s ruined mine for starters.”
'IT'S NOT WHO I AM'
Megs said she “could understand that” and would have been “devastated” if the same thing happened to her, but added: “I’m not sending him back because she’s sore.
“I’m not going to be sorry because I won. I’m damn glad I won.”
But the image of one happy family soon started to breakdown because of Robin’s attitude to his new school and Megs’ high expectations of him, turning the house into a “war zone”.
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Robin said the high pressure environment turned “me into a dragon”.
“It’s not who I am," he said.
"It was like I was in a bottle and the lid was closed… For me to try and change in two, three years to suit Meg or to keep her happy, I tried and I thought I could do it, but I couldn’t.”
At 18, Robin dropped out of school and hit the road, moving to Louis Trichardt in northern South Africa where he found a job building safari rigs.
The move devastated Megs, breaking apart the already fractious family.
“When he left, I almost died. I can’t tell how it hurts, because I worked so hard for it and I wanted it so much. Then when it failed, it never occurred to me that it failed,” she said.
When he left, I almost died. I can’t tell how it hurts, because I worked so hard for it and I wanted it so much.
“When you wanted all the right things for all the right reasons but they just didn’t fit into place.
"When he left, I just stopped living for a while.”
Meanwhile Gavin said the sudden abandonment made him want to “kill” Robin.
“It’s the fact that he hurt Megs. I mean she felt extremely betrayed and really hurt when he walked out,” he said.
“She had given him a home for three to four years, she was looking after him, providing for him. And he walked out just throwing everything back at us.”
Years later, the family have finally reunited with Robin, his wife Liesel and their son James, and are starting to rebuild their relationship.
And Robin now says he understands why Megs and Sandy chose not to swap the babies back.
“If I was to find out he wasn’t mine, there’s no way I’d give him back,” he said.
“I would make the decision that I’m not getting to know the other child because what I’ve got is good and keep it that way.
“I wouldn’t want him to know, I would keep it a secret and just leave it that way.”
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