Amber's Mums

SOPHIE

I know what the doctor is going to say as soon as he enters the consulting room. I try to make eye-contact with him, but he just averts his gaze, pretending instead to focus on his notes.

I have known for days that the news today was going to be bad. The truth is, I have known it for years, ever since that dreadful evening over seven years ago.

The doctor is droning on about the latest round of treatment. His voice is monotone. He is professional, but he lacks any real empathy.

The walls of the soulless little room seem to close-in on me. There are no windows and the lighting is very fierce. A framed print of mass-produced artwork shows a colourful seaside scene. Its fake cheeriness makes me feel worse.

My husband, Dan, is sitting next to me. I cannot look at him, because if I do, I know that I will start crying and that my grief will overwhelm me entirely.

I wanted this, most of all, for him.

For Dan.

For this wonderful man who I love dearly.

I hate myself for what I have put him through. The years of false hope and now this ultimate despair. He could - no should - have been a fantastic father, with his kind, gentle nature and his sense of fun. Our children would have adored him.

But now, it is not going to be.

At the moment though, I really must get these depressing thoughts out of my head. I want to wallow in my own self-pity and indulge myself with an all-consuming sorrow, but I will have to wait until I am alone before I can do that, so that nobody will judge me.

I wipe away a tear and force my mind to change tack.

The doctor is concluding his comments. “I am very sorry, Mr and Mrs Andres. There is nothing more that we can do. The health service is unable to fund any further IVF treatment for you. I am afraid to say that this really is the end of the road for you in this matter.”

Dan and I walk silently together back to the hospital car park. There is nothing more to be said. We both know that this is the end of our dream to raise a family of our own. We cannot possibly afford to pay for further fertility treatment privately and even if we could, what would be the point?

I am sterile.

Infertile

And useless.

I am going to have to find fulfilment in my work. I will have to become a ‘career woman’. And I will have to try to focus on Dan. I want to make him happy despite my failure to give him the one thing that I know he wanted more than anything else - children.

Cruelly, our route back to the hospital car park takes us past the entrance to the Maternity Unit. We have trodden this path on numerous occasions over the past few years, so I no longer really notice the irony.

However, today, as we are walking along the busy corridor, something truly awful happens.

A throng of visitors, patients and hospital staff are walking at varying pace in both directions along the corridor. The entrance to the Maternity Unit is directly opposite a crowded coffee shop.

Deep in my thoughts of self-loathing, I do not notice the man rushing across my path. We collide and I accidentally knock a mobile phone out of his hand. It drops onto the tiled floor of the hospital corridor with a loud smash. The phone breaks into at least three separate pieces.

“Watch where you’re going, you stupid cow!” says the man angrily.

He places his face aggressively in front of mine. The veins in the side of his shaven head are pulsating rapidly.

“You’ve broken my iPhone,” he shouts accusingly.

“Sorry,” I reply instinctively, backing away from the confrontation.

Dan, frustrated by his inability to comfort me after our recent meeting with the doctor, now comes to my defence.

“Actually it was you that wasn’t looking where you were going, mate,” he says.

“Fuck off!” yells the man, “I’m in a hurry. My girlfriend went into labour three hours ago. I’m late for the birth of my kid. Your stupid little wife here, got in my way and broke my new phone. It was really expensive.”

“Well you should have looked where you were going,” repeats Dan. “It wasn’t her fault.”

The man, who is probably only in his early twenties, bends down to pick up the pieces of his phone.

As he does this, he says, “It’s lucky for you that I’m in a rush, ’cos otherwise you wouldn’t have heard the last of this.”

I tug at Dan’s arm, desperate for us to get away from the scene as quickly as possible. It has been a dreadful day already. We have suffered enough emotional hurt as it is today, I do not want either of us to get physically hurt as well. Dan senses my urgency to get away, and another passer-by ushers us to keep walking before the man can attack us. We flea along the corridor.

The man shouts after us, “That’s it, run away, you chicken!”

I think of this vile young man about to become a father.

And I think of Dan, a man whose child I am unable to provide for him.

And I cry.

I cry uncontrollably and with a ferocity that I have not experienced in years, not since that night seven years ago when I miscarried the only child that we have ever conceived.

KELLY

“Where the fucking hell is he?” I scream.

“Don’t worry about him, my dear. Concentrate on the contractions,” says the midwife calmly.

The pain gets worse. Jesus Christ! It’s like nothing I’ve ever felt before in my life. I scream out again in agony.

“Okay, Kelly. I think we’re going to have to sedate you, because this isn’t happening naturally. I think we might be looking at a caesarean birth here.”

“Bloody hell!”

The midwife disappears to go and make the arrangements for the caesarean. I put the mask over my face again and take in another gulp of gas.

I could kill this fucking baby! I wish it would just get the fuck out! Why does it have to take after its bloody father and not just be here when it’s needed?

“Where the fuck are you Matt?” I shout at the top of my voice to the empty room.

I wake up slowly and look around me.

“Congratulations, Miss Thompson. You have a healthy baby girl.”

The room’s still a bit blurry. It’s so bright that it’s doing my head in! I work out that I must be in a post-delivery bay. I’ve been wired to some sort of machine which keeps beeping next to the bed. The beeping is doing my head in as well!

But wait a second? What did the midwife just say?

I ’have a healthy baby girl’!

Oh my God!

I’ve got a daughter!

I’m a mum!

“Can I see her?” I ask.

“Yes, of course. You can hold her too if you’re feeling strong enough to sit up after your operation.”

I lift my head up from the pillow. Using my arms for support, I move myself slowly up the bed. For the first time, I notice Matt sitting next to me on a chair.

“Well done, Babes!”, he says, smiling at me like butter wouldn’t melt in his bloody mouth.

I’ll deal with him later, because all I want to do now is to see my baby.

“Yeah. I feel strong enough”, I say.

When I’m in a more comfortable position, the midwife reaches down into a cot at the end of my bed. She pulls out what, at first glance, looks like a small bundle of white blankets. As she hands the bundle to me, I notice a tiny face peering out from beneath the warm blankets.

It’s my baby!

It’s my beautiful baby girl!

I can’t help myself and I reach out to take the precious bundle into my arms. It’s surprisingly light.

It’s asleep... I mean, she’s asleep.

She’s fast asleep in fact. Her tiny little eye lashes flicker sweetly as she breathes gently in and out.

She’s a fucking miracle!

She’s so tiny, and yet so perfectly formed.

It’s totally amazing! She’s so beautiful and gorgeous. She’s everything that I dreamed she would be.

At first, I don’t know what to do. I feel a bit weird, but then, I realise that I should probably just hold her and give her a cuddle.

After a while of doing this, I say quietly to Matt, “Take our photo, then.”

“I’m sorry Babes, but I can’t,” replies Matt unexpectedly. “My phone’s broken. Some bitch knocked it out of my hand when I was arriving at the hospital. It’s totally fucked!”

As is so often the case when Matt opens his mouth, I feel disappointed. Not just by his bad language in front of our newly born baby, but by the fact that he can’t take our photo.

I’m determined not to let him spoil this special moment though. I glance again at the tiny little baby in my arms.

“She needs a name. What shall we call her, Matt?”

“Well, I was thinking that as she was born on the day that my iPhone broke, we could call her ‘Apple’ or something”, suggests Matt.

He’s grinning broadly. He’s joking. (I hope!)

“That’s a stupid name,” I say, laughing out loud.

And then, in a serious voice, I add, “Amber - she looks like an ‘Amber’ to me.”