On advice from their local Anglican church, Mrs D's mother took her daughter to St Mary's, believing they would give her the best care.
Instead, young women there were subject to inhumane conditions.
They were stripped of their identities, referred to only as "Gallagher's Girls", after the Matron Rhoda Gallagher, who has since died.
They were made to wear the same clothes, and not even allowed to wear underwear, told it would "harm the baby".
Gallagher would beat the women, and incessantly insult them, telling them they were worthless.
"She said I deserved it because I was promiscuous," Mrs D said.
She dearly wanted to keep her son, but was forced to sign documents that adopted him to another family.
About two years later Mrs D fell pregnant again, and was sent back to St Mary's.
She was more determined this time to keep her baby, a daughter, but again the baby was taken away from her.
Mrs D and her mother found out only days later the baby was being transferred to a new family.
They were told the adoption didn't work out because the baby was "Māori and dark-skinned", but when they met her with the new parents they found her "black and blue with bruises". She was 11 days old.
Mrs D managed to get her baby back, but she and her mother were turned away by authorities when they sought justice for the abuse, despite having photographic evidence.
During her stays at the centre Mrs D said she was sexually abused by two doctors during medical examinations.
She also bore witness to women receiving inadequate medical treatment, one who died with her twins in childbirth after being left alone in labour for two days.
The young mothers were not allowed to see newborn babies. They only ever caught glimpses when a "kind nurse" would leave the curtain open at night, "by accident".
"I remember we would hoist each other up just to try to get a glimpse of our babies," Mrs D said.
She feared for the safety of the babies, and for their development due to being neglected from birth.
"I am still upset at the memory of the little ones reaching their arms out to be picked up and held and cuddled and being forbidden to comfort them.
"I do not understand how a supposedly Christian institution could be so barbaric to children.
"It haunts me."
Mrs D, 67 and who works as a nurse, has gone on to have further children, grandchildren, and relationships, but said the abuse has heavily affected her throughout her life.
"For decades I lived with the effects of being shamed and humiliated and abused and violated as a teenager."
From 2012 to 2015 she sought redress and an apology from the Church.
Eventually while it acknowledged her maltreatment, it denied any legal responsibility, and declined any compensation.
Presently she could not afford to pursue legal action against the Church, she said.
The commission on Wednesday also heard from Margaret Wilkinson, who In 1964 at age 19 was sent to St Mary's for six months after she became pregnant.
She was given an unknown drug to induce her birth, and had her baby, which she too desperately wanted to keep, abducted by Gallagher while she slept.
She was drugged without consent, given medication to stop lactation, and her breasts were bound tight.
Her baby daughter was given to an Anglican woman who was a member of the Auckland Diocese. Wilkinson believed the babies were often given to friends of Gallagher.
Wilkinson was allowed to see her daughter, but not touch her.
She said she was made to sign legal documents adopting her baby eight days after birth, despite the law stating 10 days had to have passed.
"Some people call it 'forced adoption', I prefer to call it abduction," Wilkinson said.
Wilkinson has for decades now been fighting for redress for women like herself and Mrs D, and for the Government to launch an official inquiry.
Like Mrs D, Wilkinson said she was turned away seeking redress from the Anglican Church.
Presenting on behalf of support group New Zealand Mothers of Loss to Adoption for Justice, Wilkinson called for a public apology and support services put in place - as has occurred overseas - from the Government and the Church for its forced adoption practices.
"We ask that you hear us. That you hear how women, and known and unknown families, have had to endure terrible injustice, mourning missing members and seeking their inclusion remain experiences which, if unresolved, continue to haunt the pursuit of wellbeing which we all must engage in."
• To register with the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care phone 0800 222 727 or email contact@abuseincare.org.nz. More information can be found online.
Where to get help:
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If it is an emergency and you feel like you or someone else is at risk, call 111.
