A woman who had to give up her child for adoption after being sent to a mother and baby home has spoken of the trauma she went through as a teenager.

Deirdre Wadding said coverage of the horror at Tuam - where it's believed that hundreds of babies died - "stirred up my own experiences".

Now a People Before Profit councillor, Ms Wadding was sent to the Bessboro Home in Cork in 1981 when she became pregnant at the age of 18.

Run by a different religious order to Tuam, Ms Wadding said she didn't experience "brutality".

But she said: "You had the trauma of guilt and shame that was imposed by the very fact of being there.

"You had the enormous trauma and sorrow of loss of your child being placed for adoption." She said the impact was like a life sentence. Ms Wadding said it's been "a great joy" that she was later reunited with her son.

She said she wants to see a comprehensive investigation into the former mother and baby homes nationwide.