A Mummy At Last
This year, Christmas will be extra special for Laura
Absolutely besotted. That was me and my boyfriend Luke. We’d met at 15, got engaged a year later.
‘Puppy love’ some people said.
But we knew better.
We may have been young, but we were no fools.
This was the real thing. ‘Let’s be together forever,’ we agreed.
At 18, we moved in together – and, straight away, we started trying for a baby.
Quick perhaps. But we knew we wanted to spend the rest of our lives together.
So why wait around?
Only, Mother Nature had different ideas.
A year later, we still hadn’t managed to conceive.
Tests confirmed that
I wasn’t ovulating.
A month later, a fertility specialist diagnosed polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS).
‘So it’s my fault.’ I wept.
In May 2014, we got married.
And, two months on – in July – I was put on Clomid to boost my circulation, and we kept on trying for a baby.
Our best wedding gift? Not a toaster... but a positive pregnancy test two months later.
‘At last!’ I whooped to Luke.
But our joy was short-lived.
Just seven weeks on, I started to bleed and needed a scan.
The sonographer frowned.
‘I can’t find anything,’ they said.
We were called back a week later to make sure. But still, nothing.
Doctors gave me a D&C and suggested I may have suffered a molar pregnancy.
‘It’s when abnormal cells grow in the womb instead of a foetus,’ I was told.
Shattering news
Thankfully they weren’t cancerous, but I was absolutely devastated.
The little ‘ baby’ in my tummy that I’d talked to,and planned a future with, had never been a baby at all.
I was told to wait a year before trying again, as my hormone levels needed to settle down.
But I was desperate, impatient – and, by November 2014, I was pregnant again.
I was excited, but nervous too. I went to hospital to get checked out. And days later, my local hospital, in Treliske, Cornwall, called to say I had another molar pregnancy.
‘But this one has formed a tumour,’
I was told.
‘It’s cancer then?’ I stammered.
Luke looked over, startled.
The doctors couldn’t say, said I’d need to go to Charing Cross Hospital in London for emergency treatment.
Luke was there holding my hand when a doctor told me it was a cancer and said I needed chemo to shrink the tumour. Without it, it could spread.
It meant I’d have to spend Christmas in hospital undergoing chemo.
‘I’ll be with you,’ Luke told me. ‘We’ll still make it special.’
On Christmas Eve, we ordered a takeaway pizza and had a feast in the hospital lounge.
Then, on Christmas Day, staff gave us a roast dinner.
It wasn’t how I imagined spending Christmas – but we made the best of things.
From December 2014 until February 2015, I had chemo treatment every other day.
I was moody, and when doctors advised not to try for a baby for a year, heartbroken.
Reluctantly I went on the Pill. And when I came off it, I fell pregnant straight away.
And this time, at five weeks, a scan showed it was
Luke was there when a doctor told me it was cancer
a proper pregnancy.
Luke and I wept with joy when we saw our baby’s heartbeat on a scan two weeks later.
But, after only two days, I started bleeding...
As soon as I heard those words ‘I’m so sorry’ from the sonographer, my world caved in. Why me?
‘The only thing that can fix it is another baby,’ I wept to Luke. So we started trying again. But, over the next six months, I lost five babies.
I became obsessed, would look at pregnant women... Why them? Why not me? ‘Maybe we should try to adopt?’ I said.
We weighed up all our options – adoption, fostering, using a surrogate.
But then the charity Tommy’s referred us to Birmingham Women’s Hospital.
There, a specialist prescribed a progesterone pessary to help support an early pregnancy, and
I was told to take it as soon as I fell pregnant again.
That time came just weeks later, in November 2016. Could this finally be
our chance to have a baby?
‘Let’s try not to get our hopes up too much,’ Luke said gently. He was right. But hope surged when a scan at five weeks showed there was a baby.
Seven weeks, a heartbeat...
I had more scans at nine, 10 and 12 weeks. Our baby was still alive!
At 16 weeks, we actually dared to believe.
‘We’re going to be a mummy and daddy,’ I beamed to Luke.
We paid for a private scan to discover the gender.
‘A little girl,’ I squealed, clapping my hands together.
I was so excited, but terrified too.
Especially when I went eight days past my due date.
On 11 July this year, I had to be induced.
It was a traumatic, 36-hour labour.
On 13 July, our longed-for baby got stuck and as soon as she was born she needed oxygen.
Time stood still.
I was terrified. Please don’t let me lose her now.
So cute
Waiting to hear that first cry felt like forever.
Then the most blissful wail rose from her chest!
And Luke and I sobbed like babies ourselves. At last, we had our baby girl, Lillie Rose.
‘She’s beautiful,’ Luke whispered in my ear. ‘I’m so proud of you.’
Now we can’t wait to celebrate our first Christmas with Lillie.
I’m going to dress her in a cute reindeer outfit and take hundreds of photos to embarrass her with on her 18th birthday.
I can’t wait to spoil her rotten!
Every Christmas since spending it in hospital in 2014, I’ve looked back with sadness. This year, I’ll look back and see just how far I’ve come.
I love being a mum. It’s everything I’d imagined and more.
We’re a proper family now. Lillie makes us complete.