On The Cover
Milly’s Hitting A High Note A singing porter
Just a few weeks ago, 25-year-old soprano and rising star, Milly Forrest, would be up with the larks, singing her own morning chorus in the kitchen of the home she shares in Hertfordshire with her husband Louis, also a professional musician.
Revising plots of operas over a coffee, punctuated with more songs and scales, she would have a little lunch then brush up on her French or Italian.
Later in the day, she’d swap her jeans for an elegant evening gown, apply her make-up, step out on to a flood-lit stage and wow audiences with her hypnotic per formance.
However, like so many others, Milly’s world suddenly changed.
All Milly’s hard-won contracts and per formances had to be cancelled due to the coronavirus.
“I knew I would find it hard to stay at home for the next couple of months so when I heard that my local hospital urgently needed more porters I applied for a job.”
A job more usually undertaken by men, Milly says her fellow porters couldn’t have been more welcoming, taking her under their wing and showing her the ropes as she familiarised herself with the layout of the hospital, drawing maps as she went around.
Learning on the job, she shadowed them as they transported patients between wards. Essential daily tasks include taking patients for x-rays, replacing empty gas cylinders, and collecting specimen samples and equipment.
Milly clocks in for a gruelling eight-hour shift. She’ll get one thirty-minute break and works six days a week. Her radio bleeps and she’s allocated her first job. She has to go to the isolation ward and will be in close contact with Covid positive patients, which means putting on special protective equipment over her regulation black trousers and t-shirt.
Tucking her hair up in a hair-net, she quickly dons a mask, gloves, glasses, special gown and apron.
It’s hot and heavy to wear and Milly says it’s a relief to take it off as, “It can get rather toasty!”
The work is hard.
“My hands are sore and dry from all the washing – we have to wash them every ten minutes and my legs are tired from walking 16,000 steps a shift. Only half the usual number of porters are working. Many are isolating, a couple have newborn babies and some are just too terrified to come in.”
When not in the isolation
“Working in this hospital has been the most fulfilling job I have ever done”
wards, we just have gloves, masks and disposable aprons, which are immediately thrown away after moving individual patients between departments. There is a lot of waste but if we touch doors, clean mattresses or equipment with dirty gloves or aprons the virus can be spread around the rest of the hospital.”
One day, one of the nurses asked Milly if she would like to sing to the patients. Once a per former, always a per former, and
Milly readily agreed.
“The nurse told me that working in the hospital was really hard for her and her colleagues at the moment.”
Milly sang Danny Boy. She jokes that she chose not to sing a more operatic piece in case it alarmed the patients.
“Most of the patients were fast asleep but some of them smiled and clapped after wards. One doctor said she felt quite emotional. To me, that’s what music is all about. I hope it was a comfort to them.”
Work for ever ybody in the hospital is extremely challenging just now but
Milly thinks morale is good.
“From what I can see, the hospital staff are coping unbelievably well. They are all exhausted and overworked but I haven’t heard anyone complain.
“The porters are all smiling and seem to take so much pride in their work.”
She thinks that the weekly applauding for NHS staff has been hugely uplifting.
“It’s such a lovely feeling to be recognised for your hard work and I think the staff must feel hugely appreciated. In this very difficult time, we all need to support each other as much as possible.”
Milly will be stepping back onto the stage as soon as the theatres are open again.
“Working in this hospital has been the most important and fulfilling job I have ever done. The nurses, ambulance crew, doctors and carers are so brave and so determined and it really puts the life I’m used to into perspective.”