A word with Him upstairs Over the page…
When divine help’s needed, Dad has always got my back! Jennifer Holman, 31, from Liverpool
More of a wilted bunch of flowers than a bed of roses. That was my life. But with all those ups, downs… and more downs, I’d forgotten something important. That I’m blessed. ‘You must see it,’ Mum Lynda, 59, said. ‘An angel, right there!’
She wasn’t wrong. It was there all right.
An angel. In black and white on the shoulder of my unborn baby.
Bleed
It was May 2013. That morning, me and my boyfriend, Anthony, 36, had been at Liverpool Women’s Hospital for a scan.
I was 12 weeks pregnant.
‘Everything looks fine,’ the midwife said, moving her scanner across my belly. ‘There’s the heartbeat.’
I know I should have been excited. I know I should have been happy, jumping for joy. But I was terrified. Because I’d lost two babies. The first in 2011. Me and Anthony had only been together a few months when I fell pregnant.
I can’t tell you how crazily happy we were about it. Nervous, too. But who isn’t when you’re having your first baby? ‘I’m going to be a mum,’ I said, holding my tummy. Two months on, I bled. ‘I’m sorry,’ the doctor said when we got to the hospital. ‘You’ve miscarried.’ He couldn’t say why – just one of those things. ‘Just one of those things?’ I cried. ‘Like losing your bus fare or forgetting to record
Eastenders?
This is my baby we’re talking about.’ Still, we had no choice but to pick ourselves up and carry on. Two months later, I was expecting again. Same happiness. Same nervous butterflies. And, after nine weeks, the same bleeding between my legs. ‘I’m sorry,’ the doctor said. Picking ourselves up was harder, second time round.
Baby niece
Other women had babies easily – why not me?
I think I’d just taken it for granted that one day I’d be a mum. Growing up, I’d been surrounded by babies.
My big sister Joyce is 10 years older than me.
She had her first baby when she was just 16 and living at home with me and Mum. Mum had split from my dad, Michael, but we were still really close.
Our nan Joyce even made the front page of the Liverpool Echo as, at age 52, she was one of the youngest great-grans in Liverpool at the time
Mum and Dad were so supportive. And Joyce’s baby Robyn was beautiful.
He’s gone
I was 6, and loved helping Joyce out with Robyn.
A few years on, my
I was 16 when Dad died from an aneurysm in his head
brothers Scott, now 36, and Peter, now 34, had babies, too.
Soon, I was an aunty to 10 gorgeous nieces and nephews.
Then, 10 years later, at age 16, we lost Dad, who’d worked his whole life as a shipping manager.
One night, in front of the TV, he died – an aneurysm in his head no-one knew about until it was too late.
He was just 48.
‘You know he’ll always be there watching over you,’ Mum told me.
‘I know,’ I cried. ‘But I want him here instead.’
Wings
When I lost my two babies, I thought of him. Wished he could give me a hug. Now pregnant for the third time, I thought of Dad again. ‘Dad, could you have a word with Him Upstairs?’ I said, half joking. At the 12-week scan, the midwife said things were well. I was still scared something might go wrong. But that night, I texted Mum a photo of my scan. And she called… ‘Have you seen the angel?’ she asked. ‘It’s in the scan!’ ‘How did I miss it?’ I said when I looked. There was an angel on my baby’s shoulder – open wings, a round face. ‘Can you believe it?’ I asked Anthony. ‘Well, what did my mum say?’ Anthony grinned. A few weeks before, Anthony’s mum Debbie saw a fortune-teller.
My dad
‘Her predictions were something else,’ Debbie had told us. ‘She said an angel from the sea would guard your baby. And she said a Virgo would get cancer… but the angel from the sea would sort that, too.’
I hadn’t paid much attention. Seemed like a lot of hot air. But here it was, a photo of an angel. Not just any angel, an angel from the sea.
‘It’s my dad,’ I realised. ‘It has to be. He worked as a shipping manager. He’s had a word with Him Upstairs, like I asked him to, and he’s looking after our baby.’
All the worry, all the fear vanished in an instant.
An angel was watching over our baby. My dad. My blessing.
My dad was watching over my baby Something bad was about to strike