I am the child of a stolen child.

It's been 50 years since my mother, aged three, was stolen from the arms of her mother in the north-west NSW town of Bourke.

It's been 50 years, but that moment has reverberated through the decades, and I live with its consequences every day.

The stories of people like me — the children of the stolen children — are largely untold.

But let me help you walk a mile in my shoes. Let me tell you how the theft of my mother from her mother all those years ago completely derailed my understanding and experience of my own culture, family, language and history. Let me do that, not to make you feel guilty — but so we keep learning how to walk together.

Amanda's maternal grandmother was murdered before Amanda's mother could reunite with her. ( Supplied )

My mother never learnt how to love

I missed out on a lot growing up, including my right to a mother who knew how to love.

When my mother was stolen, she was separated from her 11 brothers and sisters. They too were stolen and sent to foster homes all over the country.

Not only was my mother robbed of relationships with her siblings, but she never developed a maternal bond with her foster mother.

When she tried to track down her biological mother, she found out she had been murdered some time after they were forced apart.

As a result of the immense trauma my mother experienced — and a lack of maternal nurturing from her foster mother — she never had a chance to learn how to properly love me or my sister.

Meeting my family for the first time

I was nine when we were contacted by one of my mum's sisters, who had also tracked down some of her other siblings. We had a week-long family reunion in Walgett, where I got to know my biological aunts, uncles, great-aunts and great-uncles.

Amanda with a cousin who she first met at the 2001 family reunion in Walgett. ( Supplied )

I felt more grounded on the red dirt of Kamilaroi Country than I had ever before in my life. My soul yearns to get back to where my ancestors once roamed.

Last year we received another surprise phone call from a woman saying she was a daughter of one of my mum's long-lost siblings.

Through this phone call I gained four new cousins in the space of a week. It blows my mind that there are people out there with the same blood as me — the same grandparents, the same ancestors — and I don't know who or where they are.

Every day I wonder about the family members I may never meet.

Amanda and her aunty with Amanda's newfound cousin, who made contact with the family in 2017. ( Supplied )

My lost culture

As a result of being stolen, my mother and her siblings lost their connection to country. That means my sister, my nephew, my cousins and their children have all been deprived of this connection too.

Growing up, the only reason I knew I was Aboriginal was because that's what I was told. I remember a teacher at school calling me up on stage one day because she thought I would know about the didgeridoo — but the truth was I didn't know anything about my culture, language or spirituality.

I felt like I wasn't a "real" Aboriginal person — yet I also didn't fit in with my white family (my dad is non-Indigenous) in a predominantly white society.

The relatives I grew up with didn't look like me. My skin colour and facial features were markedly different, and that deeply affected my sense of belonging. I felt like an outcast who didn't fit in anywhere.

It's been 10 years since Kevin Rudd delivered the historic apology to the Stolen Generations. It is a moment that Australia is rightly proud of as it showed the nation's potential to face up to the ugly truths of the past and move forward together.

Moving forward is important, yes. But there are those who think we should "move on" and "get over it". I can see it's hard to fully grasp the realities of intergenerational trauma if you don't know someone who has experienced it.

Fighting stereotypes

All these years later, I've achieved a lot and overcome even more. I'm now a university student doing a corporate internship and I hold various leadership roles. Yet despite my accomplishments, I constantly have stereotypes imposed on me by the very people who expect me to just "move on".

Amanda is a university student completing a corporate internship. ( Supplied )

When you've only known fragments of your identity, it can be a struggle to find your true self amidst people's preconceived ideas.

I'm not the Aboriginal you expect me to be. I'm not the Aboriginal I should've had the chance to be.

But I am strong and I am proud and I will not give up. I am the child of a stolen child.

Amanda Fotheringham is a proud Kamilaroi woman. She is the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander representative on the Student Representative Committee at Macquarie University, where she studies sociology.