Gemma Metcalfe - A Mother’s Sacrifice

Everything slowly starts to fade away, sights and sounds spliced through their middle. I stare out at my surroundings through smudged lenses, doctors and nurses melting into the background until only streaks of colour skim across my vision. I try to fight my way out, to bring myself back to the present in order to save my baby, but I am trapped, trapped in a silent world where nothing is how it should be.

‘Louisa, I’m Doctor Dhingra. The midwife is going to make a small cut in order to get your baby out.’ I look over to the source of the sound, my brain unable to process what is being said. I nod, dumbfounded, and am only vaguely aware of the burning pain between my legs, followed closely by the tugging sensation which seems to last for an eternity.

James’s voice washes over me. I know he is shouting but I can’t quite make out what he is saying, only that it is bad. I blink over at him. He is now on the other side of the room, bent double, a metal trolley to the side of him, surrounded by several strangers who all poke and prod a lifeless scrap of purple flesh in the centre. Inside I scream. Inside I thrash around and pray to God to help the doctors save the little scrap of flesh on the trolley because he might not look like anything to them but to me he is everything.

Eerie silence falls down all around me, my own ragged breaths the only sound in the room. ‘Why isn’t he crying?’ My voice is barely a whisper. ‘What’s happened to my baby?’

James looks over at me, his head shaking ever so slightly from side to side. ‘I’m sorry,’ he mouths, tears streaming from his eyes. ‘I’m so sorry.’

As his words resonate within me, I am suddenly pulled back into the past, once again looking out through five-year-old eyes, the smell of burnt toast in my nostrils, my world collapsing like dominoes all around me. I don’t move, can’t move, a scream of terror trapped inside my throat.

At first I don’t understand what’s happening. Why is a baby crying somewhere in my mother’s house? I don’t have a brother. I always wanted one but I never got one. And then, slowly and somehow all at once, the shrill cry grabs me by the scruff of the neck and hauls me back into the present, shrinking everything back into focus, the doctors and nurses once again speaking a succession of words I don’t understand. The crying continues, rising in volume and pitch. I daren’t look, daren’t believe, and then before I can think another thought, my baby is on me, causing shock waves to pulsate through me, restarting my broken heart.

I look down at him and he stares up at me, our hearts beating as one, his skin melting into mine. ‘Hello, Cory,’ I whisper, his name on my lips the most beautiful sound I’ve ever spoken. ‘I’m your mummy.’ I look over at James, his face collapsing in on itself as he makes his way over towards us. ‘And this is your daddy. And you have no idea how long we’ve waited to meet you.’

CHAPTER TWO

Louisa

Now

‘You’re a mum, Louisa. An actual mum.’ I whisper the words to my own reflection, causing a smile to spread the entire width of my face.

There’s nothing quite like the mirror in a hospital toilet to make you look even worse than you already do. My skin is paper-thin under the harsh glare of the overhead strip light and my coppery-red hair looks like a ransacked bird’s nest. And yet none of that stuff seems to matter any more. Because I am a mum.

I love the word ‘mum’, love how softly it sits on my lips as I speak it out loud. It’s an insignificant sound really, one syllable, three measly letters, and yet it means so much to so many. I’m sure it means more to me than most, although I suppose any new mother would say the same. But not every mother has sacrificed what I have to hold the title. Some would probably say I sacrificed too much to have a baby, but, after holding Cory in my arms, I’d have to disagree. I’d do it all again in a heartbeat.

I continue to stare closely into the glass, searching for the person who resides behind my eyes. Outwardly nothing has changed; my freckles still stick together across the bridge of my nose and my top lip remains a fraction too thin. But inside, I am different, I am new. It’s almost as if the moment I set eyes on Cory, I too was born into a new world.

I haven’t had it easy. My life hasn’t always been white picket fences and foreign holidays. For so many years I hoped, prayed even, that one day everything would slot into place, that I would somehow live the life I always knew was out there.

I met James ten years ago, when I was just nineteen and he twenty-nine. He was a trainee anaesthetist at the local hospital where I was an outpatient, my anxious mind reaching new heights as I steamrolled into adulthood. I was smoking a roll-up cigarette under a glass shelter outside the entrance, the cold biting the tips of my fingers as I sucked in nicotine like my life depended on it. I didn’t want to continue with the counselling sessions my GP had recommended, didn’t like where they were heading. ‘Got a light?’ James asked, his accent clearly northern but less harsh than the Salford drawl I was used to. I said I did and continued to fumble around inside my handbag for what seemed like hours, the silver clipper lighter nowhere to be seen.

In the end I passed him my roll-up, its filter smeared with blood-red lipstick. ‘Sorry,’ I muttered, embarrassed by the whole situation. He bent down, cupped his hands around mine as he sucked on the end of his Silk Cut, trying his damnedest to light it.

‘You fancy a coffee across the road?’ he asked. ‘It’s bloody freezing out here.’

‘Sure,’ I replied, my voice sounding much more confident than I felt.

We were happy for a while, and I really felt my Happily Ever After had arrived. Then we started to try for a baby…

I wince as I make my way over to the cubicle door, convinced my nether regions have been stitched back together by Buffalo Bill! And don’t get me started on the ‘first pee’. I thought nothing could be worse than labour pains but it would seem that ‘pissing razorblades’ is a pretty accurate metaphor for what I’ve just experienced.

It’s now four hours since I gave birth to Cory and at just gone 7 p.m. the maternity ward is heaving with visitors. Shiny helium balloons in various shades of pink and blue float up towards the ceiling, accompanied by the hushed chatter of men, women and children. The air buzzes with excitement and yet there is an almost underlying hush, a collective respect for the newborns who are experiencing life for the very first time. They are all beautiful, all special in their own unique way, some with full heads of hair and others like little squashed-up aliens. Of course none of them are as beautiful as Cory, but I would say that, wouldn’t I?

Flimsy white curtains split the ward into several bays. I make my way down the centre aisle, my head raised a little higher than it’s ever been before. In the corner bay, sat on a plastic chair, an older woman gazes down at the tiniest baby I have ever seen. She looks almost terrified to move and I can’t say I blame her. He must weigh no more than five pounds, minute in comparison to Cory’s whopping eight pound nine. His face is covered in downy blond hair and his head is hidden under a white bonnet several sizes too large for him. He wears a chalky-blue sleepsuit with Peter Rabbit embroidered on the top pocket, and his pink blotchy skin looks so soft I almost want to reach out and stroke him. I assume the lady holding him is his grandmother. She seems oblivious to her surroundings, her eyes soaking up every inch of him. The baby’s mother is asleep in the hospital bed to the side of them, her face relaxed, almost as if she knows it’s okay to switch off because her tiny, delicate son is in the most capable of hands. I can’t help the tears that pool into my eyes. I think about my own mother, wonder what kind of grandma she’d have been to Cory had she still been alive. Would she have loved him unconditionally? Would she have cradled him in her arms even though she was terrified he might break? ‘He’s beautiful. What’s his name?’