This 65-year-old woman is suing the authorities after finding out that she was swapped with another baby in a maternity ward and was raised by a family that was not hers.
The incident took place in the Maly Naryn locality in the in Dzhydinsky District of southern Russia’s Republic of Buryatia and has only just been reported in local media.
Nina Poddelskaya, 65, was born in the local maternity ward along with an another girl on the same day, a rare occurrence in the small locality.
Three months after being taken home by her family the woman who had given birth to the other girl came to Nina’s home and told her mother that the baby’s had been swapped in the maternity ward.
According to reports, Nina’s mother Maria, who is no longer alive, told the uninvited guests that it was not possible the girls had been swapped and said they were not going to give their daughter to anyone. The other family then went away and Nina continued living with her family.
Reports state she grew up with people telling her “you are not theirs” as she did not have the typical characteristics of her family, which are those of the Buryat people who are tall with wide cheekbones.
Nina was a short girl with blonde hair and green eyes but continued living her life with her family.
However, three years ago Nina asked her aunt about the rumours and she told her about the other girl. Nina then began searching for the other family and found a woman named Maya who had been born into the family.
Nina carried out a DNA test with the woman named Maya in February 2020 and the results showed that Maya was her little sister, showing she had been swapped in the maternity ward.
Maya said that before her parents died, her mother in 1991 and father in 2017, both of them told her: “You need to find your sister.”
The girl Nina was swapped with, named Viktoria, has reportedly refused to give any comments on the incident as she still does not believe the story.
Maya said: “Together with her kids, she closed all her social media and does not respond to unknown phone calls. To be honest, I also did not really believe the story but when I saw Nina, I froze – she looked so much like our mother.”
Nina recently reported: “I found a large family, my sister Maya, two nephews, cousins on my mother’s side, which is wonderful, but I will always love the family where I grew up.
“Yes, I lived a good life, but a stranger’s, not mine. And so now I want to sue the Ministry of Health of Buryatia. For the fact that all my life I was tormented by doubts, someone must answer for it. Both the sisters with whom I grew up and Maya will join the lawsuit.
“I only have a version of how they might have replaced us – the nurses did not manage to put tags on me and Viktoria, then they put us next to each other and then they accidentally mixed us up, giving us to the wrong mothers.”
Nina’s parents who she lived with in Buryatia are no longer alive, her father passed away in 1978 and her mother in 2000.
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Story By: Gheorghi Caraseni, Sub Editor:  Joseph Golder, Agency: Newsflash
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