I want to tell you about my perfect baby girl, Sophia.

In 2019, my husband (Nik) and I discovered that I was finally pregnant with our first baby. In truth, we had only been trying to conceive for about 5 months, but, as we were both so desperate to start the next stage of our lives and have a family, it felt like it was so long in coming.

My pregnancy was absolutely great – I was so well and happy and didn’t have any morning sickness (sorry if you did, I’m really not trying to gloat) or any problems at all. Looking back, it seemed to glide by and before I knew it, we were planning a little pre-baby moon just before my birthday to go to Salzburg for the Christmas markets. We had a scan scheduled and so we booked to see the consultant as well to get a letter to say I was safe to fly, as I was at 28 weeks. Everything was fine and I got my letter to fly as we were going to leave the following weekend. The next day was pretty normal. I even popped into Mothercare after work to start to get some baby grows and blankets together as we hadn’t really bought anything up to that point. The day after that was the day when my happy perfect world started to unravel.

I was cooking dinner after work when I felt something odd. I actually thought the weight of the baby was making me become a bit incontinent (sorry for the over sharing, but we’ve all been there, right?) The trickle kept coming and so I explained what was happening to Nik who had just got back from work. We laughed a little at the thought of my having a little wee in my pants! We ate dinner and then I started to get really concerned as it wouldn’t stop. We rushed down to Royal Surrey and were put in the waiting room. The time went by so slowly and by the time they called me round to the ward my jeans were soaking. I was assessed and the midwife told me that it was likely that my waters had broken – I was at 28 and 3 days.

At first, I panicked and had a million thoughts going through my head. Then I remembered the last antenatal class we had been to where we learnt that water breaking prematurely didn’t necessarily mean that you would go into labour and have your baby early. I kept holding onto to that fact whilst I was hooked up and monitored to check for signs of labour.

This last glimmer of hope faded away as the tachograph started to show tightening. The decision was made to transfer me to St Peter’s Hospital, as Royal Surrey is not equipped to handle birth before 32 weeks. At around 3am, the ambulance arrived to pick me up. The night was so black, and the rain was like a monsoon. Nik followed behind in the car.

Once at St Peter’s I was put into a 4-bed pre-labour ward. There were already 3 other ladies in there, so we tried not to wake them up as I arrived. Nik eventually found me about an hour later as he had had no idea where they had taken me. The midwives continued to monitor my contractions, but I still couldn’t feel them. It wasn’t until about 9am that I started to feel the pain, and it was obvious that our baby was going to arrive today.

As I was now 28 plus 4, it was clear that our tiny baby was going to need to be cared for by NICU. We were invited to go and see the NICU before my labour got too far on, but I couldn’t get there due to problems with my cannulas. The contractions suddenly got so strong that we had to go to the delivery suite. I tried to get out of bed and walk there, but I couldn’t stand up. I was wheeled round in a wheelchair, and I just remember thinking, “Oh God, how has this happened, what has gone so wrong, everything was going so well”. I was completely petrified.

My labour wasn’t too long, only from about 11am until about 4pm, although at the time, it felt like about 30 minutes – I think it may have been to do with the gas and air! Things started to get bad quickly and although fully dilated, my baby just wasn’t coming. Decelerations were observed in her heart rate, and the decision was made to rush me into surgery for an emergency c-section. There was no time for an epidural and so it had to be a general anaesthetic. I’ll never forget being pushed through the cleared corridor and down to the double doors in the bed, with all the rush and panic that was running through me. The double doors opened, and I cried “I love you” to Nik who had to wait helplessly and watch me be taken into surgery.

The panic continued in the operating theatre. It seemed to take forever for them to get me ready. I remember they kept asking me if I had jewellery on, and I kept telling them “No, no, no”. Then they realised that I had wire in my underwired bra. I just remembered saying, “just cut it off, just cut it” as somewhere in the background a loud anxious voice kept saying “quick, quick, we have to go quick”. I felt a tipping sensation and felt like I was falling off the bed, and then that’s where my memory ends.

The c-section was not routine. I subsequently learnt all of the details that happened whilst I was out. My baby was so far down as I had been pushing so hard that she was stuck in my pelvis. A lot of force had to be used to pull her out. She wasn’t breathing. She had to be resuscitated twice, and eventually she started to breath and was whisked straight away in an incubator to NICU.

I opened my eyes and saw Nik sitting next to me. My brain was foggy and then Nik said, she’s here, she’s a girl. I looked round the room, but she wasn’t there. Nik explained that she was up in NICU, he’d seen her, and she is perfect and beautiful. I had to wait some time until I could see her as I was recovering from the anaesthetic – it seemed like forever, knowing she was here, but wasn’t with me in my arms. Complete torture.

Eventually a midwife came with a wheelchair and asked if I wanted to go and see my baby. I almost jumped out of the bed, and then realised I had just had surgery.

Entering the NICU for the first time was a strange, surreal, and upsetting experience. We were taken into Nursery 1 and washed our hands. I was desperately looking round trying to figure out which one of the 8 incubators my baby was in. She was by the window. As we got closer, I saw her – tiny, bruised, swollen, so many wires and lines, but the most perfect and beautiful sight ever. I couldn’t believe she was here; she was a girl; I was a Mum. The tears didn’t flow at first. The NICU nurse said, “it’s ok, you can touch her, she’s yours”. I put my hands inside the warm incubator and felt her tiny head and body as the machines around us dinged and beeped – then the tears came.

We stayed with her for as long as we could, but due to my surgery, I had to go back down to the ward, take some more painkillers and get settled down for the night. The next day we went straight up to the NICU as soon as we could to be with her. I remember Nik and I sitting next to her and looking at each other and saying, “She’s Sophia”, we had always loved that name and it was so completely perfect for her.

Sophia’s situation didn’t seem to be improving. Our consultant, Tracey, arranged a meeting with us, and we were taken to a tiny little room. All Sophia’s nurses came as well, and so we were all cramped into the little room, with the nurses sitting around on the floor. Tracey went through all of Sophia’s problems – many of which were not as worrying, her heart, her lungs, but the one that didn’t seem to be getting any better was her kidneys. “They need to kick start and start working in order for her to be able to get rid of waste products from her body” – Tracey didn’t sugar-coat anything, but in a way, I appreciated that as it was easy to understand. “How long do you give it before they aren’t going to “kick-start”” – I couldn’t believe I was asking this question as they words came out of my mouth. “One week”, the stark answer came back. My head was spinning, I couldn’t believe that my beautiful baby girl had a one-week sentence on her.

We spent the rest of the day by her bedside, helplessly hoping for a miracle. I still hadn’t even been able to hold her, my arms ached to be able to pick her up and hold her close to me as any normal mother would do, but I couldn’t – too many wires and tubes. That night, Nik was told he couldn’t stay with me down on the ward, even though I was in a side room to shield me from all of the other mothers who had their babies next to them. Nik reluctantly went home. I tried to get some sleep, but in the middle of the night I was woken by one of the doctors. There was a problem with Sophia’s heart due to increased potassium levels (a result of her kidneys not working). “Do you want me to call your husband” she said to me. I replied that I couldn’t and asked her to do it. I rushed upstairs to be with Sophia, and about half an hour later Nik arrived.

We sat with her for the rest of the night as the doctors worked to reduce the potassium and help her heart. Miraculously, it worked, and she came through it, her heart rhythm normalised, and she was ok – such a brave and strong fighter, we couldn’t have been prouder of her and more thankful to the doctors.

As I was being discharged from the post-natal ward, the NICU thankfully said that they could accommodate Nik and I in one of the rooms that they have for the Mums and Dads of the sickest babies in Nursery 1 – only 4 rooms for the whole NICU. We were so thankful, and I was so happy that Nik didn’t have to go home again without us. We moved our things into the NICU and gratefully settled down into “NICU life”.

“NICU life” was hard. Days were spent by her bedside, with hands placed on her so that she knew we were here, and the nurses reminding us to go and eat some food at mealtimes. I used to put scraps of cloth that were given to me by the NICU staff in my clothes and then put them into the incubator with her so that she had something that smelled of Mummy. I was told that it’s a comfort for the babies whilst they can’t be taken out and held properly. She did seem to like it when I put a new bit of cloth in by her head – no eyes open or vast movement, but I just knew that she could tell I was there and with her.

After a few days of “NICU life”, the nurses said that they could try and get Sophia out of the incubator so that I could hold her and finally have my skin to skin with her. I was so excited, and also a little terrified as I didn’t want to hurt her or damage her any further. The time came, and with such military precision, professionalism and care our favourite nurse, Annie, gently took Sophia out of the incubator and placed her on my chest. Time stood still. It was incredible. Her tiny body pressed up against mine – the constant beeping and dinging from the machines suddenly stopped as both her and I shared a moment and she realised she was with Mummy again. I was overcome with emotion, and tears flowed. I tried to keep as still as possible whilst holding as she was still hooked up to the machines. She was so beautiful and perfect, and I couldn’t believe that we were in this position. I held her for such a long time, whilst Nik sat cuddled up next to us – I will never forget this first amazing family time – I could have stayed there forever.

As the days went by, family came and visited – only 2 at a time as that was the rule for the side of the incubators. Our feeling of helplessness was also felt by them as we watched and waited for good news. I felt like the whole nursery 1 staff in the NICU were so invested in Sophia and in trying to make her better. One of the doctor’s, Felicity, even used to do her nightly “wee dance” in the hope that her kidneys would work and there would be some wee overnight – only for us to be disappointed when we arrived the next morning and had the solemn answer “no, sorry” to the “has there been any wee” question.

As the days went by, Tracey and the team tried everything, even things they hadn’t tried before, and went above and beyond to help our beautiful Sophia. 7 days after her birth, Tracey explained to us that there was nothing else they could do. Our world fell apart. It couldn’t be the case. There had to be something more, or there had to be some divine miracle out there waiting for us – we aren’t bad people, and it all just felt so completely unfair. Day 7 was very hard. We met with the amazing people from Shooting Stars hospice, who explained to us that Sophia could be moved to Christopher’s hospice and we could be with her there. We decided that we didn’t want to move her, the NICU was all she had known and that’s where we wanted to stay. We both managed to get her out the incubator and have more cuddles which went on late into the night. I didn’t want day 7 to end as I knew what was coming on day 8.

Day 8 came. Most of the day is a blur, with us just sitting at her incubator desperately hoping for time to slow down and there to be a final miracle. There wasn’t. The NICU nurses came and took some final pictures (the ones that to this day I still haven’t been able to bring myself to look at) and do some foot and handprints. Then the time was suddenly upon us, and we were shown round to the daffodil room, with the promise from Annie that she would bring Sophia round to be with us there.

The daffodil room was so strange – a hospital bed, an en suite, a comfy sofa and artificial flowers, but also full of light from the double windows. I remember naively saying to Nik that it was such a weird room, and what on earth did they use it for? After what seemed like forever, Sophia was bought into the room with us. All of her wires and tubes had been removed and she looked like a normal tiny baby. Annie was using the hand pump ventilator to keep her breathing. We took our tops of for final skin to skin and sat down on the sofa. As Annie passed Sophia to me, Tracey explained about how some babies pass away straight way but also how some can stay for some time. Everyone prepared to leave Sophia, Nik, and I alone, and I remember repeating “it’s not sad, it’s not sad” over and over in an attempt to make us calm with my eyes so full of tears that I couldn’t focus.

Sophia didn’t leave us straight away; she was a fighter to the last. As I held her close to my chest, she made tiny breathing sounds, the first (and only) noise that I ever heard her make. It was so quiet and peaceful. After a few minutes, Tracey came back into the room. “She’s still here” I told her as Tracey checked her heartbeat. She indeed was. Tracey left and Nik and I continued to cuddle our precious baby Sophia. A few minutes later I felt it happen, I felt her peacefully slip away as the late afternoon sun suddenly shone into the double window. I know it sounds weird, but I felt a warm rush in my body, and I felt her go from being cuddled on my chest to being just above my head on the left-hand side. My beautiful baby Sophia had died.

The time in the daffodil room after she had passed away was surreal. After being confirmed, we were told we could stay as long as we needed and that she could stay with us as well. Annie helped us to wash her gently with water and cotton wool and dress her in the tiny yellow sleepsuit we had chosen. I then gently swaddled her in her yellow and white blanket and laid her down in the cot – an image that is emblazed into my mind. Nik suddenly broke down. I held him whilst he physically shook and sobbed. We decided that we couldn’t stay any longer and as we left her in Annie’s safe care, I looked back at her, crying, and knowing that I would never see her beautiful face again. Her perfect face, that had my top lip and Nik’s deep brown eyes, our happy, courageous, and loving Sophia.

We knew that we wanted to try again to have another baby. In fact, I remember Nik saying one night in the NICU that whatever happened he wanted to have a football team’s worth more. The doctors

advised me that due to the severity of my c-section (an inverted T-cut) I should wait a year to heal properly. One whole year???

I couldn’t wait that long. 6 months after Sophia passed away, I found out that I was pregnant again. Emotions were high and I was so happy, yet nervous. Unfortunately, our joy was short lived as I suffered a miscarriage at 9 weeks. We had gone for an early scan only to be told that there had been an embryo, but it was now empty. The sense of loss was immense, but the pain was nothing compared to holding Sophia as she passed away.

We decided to get a puppy to fill the emptiness and silence in our house. Crazy, fluffy Mika arrived home with us on the day before Christmas eve 2020. Two days later I got my period, another sad month in which I wasn’t pregnant again. This sadness was only temporary as in January 2021 I found out I was pregnant again.

My 3rd pregnancy was so very hard - not physically as again, I didn’t have any problems with sickness or anything. But it was so mentally hard after losing Sophia. I was lucky to have a lot of support with our grief counsellor from Shooting Stars hospice, the Jasmine team, the Rainbow group for bereaved mothers from Royal Surrey and from a perinatal mental health worker (promise I’m not crazy, I just needed all the help that was available!)

My pregnancy was consultant led from day dot. The Royal Surrey did an amazing job to help Nik and I, to make sure that we felt ok and were comfortable with every meeting, appointment, and scan, as every trip to the hospital was triggering. We eventually made it to the 3rd trimester, and we started to actively plan the birth. I had to have a caesarean due to my previous surgery with Sophia and so we started to plan out the date for my c-section for our new baby.

My Consultant, Mr Koomson, was reluctant to let me go past 37 weeks as Sophia had been born early at 28 weeks, and so we made a plan to schedule the c-section for a day when Mr Koomson would be working and so could do the c-section himself. We planned for 15th September 2021 as I would just be 37 weeks the day before. It was a hard decision to make as my head was telling me that the best place for the baby was inside me to grow as much as possible, but my heart was just so worried and anxious that something was going to go wrong again.

The weeks stretched out as we got closer to September, the 15th was looming in my head. I made the decision to go on maternity leave early as I couldn't focus on work with my anxiety. One week into my maternity leave I went to meet another Rainbow mum friend at Devils Punchbowl. We had a cup of tea and I remember I said to her that I thought this baby would not make it to my scheduled c-section day, I just had a feeling. I went home and just after lunch I walked into our home office (where Nik was working) and said, “I think we should go to the hospital”. He hung up his conference call immediately and we rushed straight to Royal Surrey (completely forgetting the hospital bag that I had had packed since week 27). I felt that my water might have gone, although it was a completely different experience than when it happened with Sophia.

We got to Royal Surrey and they took me for observation. Eventually they decided that my waters had gone but they were going to monitor me overnight. I wasn’t too happy as I thought I could feel that labour had already started, and I have in my notes that I am not to labour again. A bit later, after having reviewed my notes and history the doctors came back and said that we had to go for an emergency c-section straight away. I was being bumped to the front of the queue and it had to happen right now, tonight.

I was petrified. The feeling from my previous emergency c-section came flooding back and I didn’t know how this was happening again - my calm planned c-section on 15th September wasn’t going to happen and my baby was going to come now, and it was all completely out of my control again.

Nik was amazing. He too was so terrified, but he had the bonus that he knew I wouldn’t be wheeled away from him and put under general anaesthetic this time - he could be here with me. The midwife who helped us through was the most kind and amazing lady ever. When I was wheeled through to the theatre, I just remember being so thankful that it was all so calm and everyone was being so nice and positive - it was a million miles away from being rushed to theatre, saying goodbye and shouting “I love you” to Nik at a pair of double doors.

Once in theatre it was very calm and bright. My body was shaking with fear, but everyone in the room was so good. After a round of introductions, the next steps in the procedure were explained to Nik and me. I won’t lie, the needle in your back is not pleasant at all, but in hindsight it is a mere pinprick when you finally have your healthy baby in your arms.

Once the injection was in, it seemed to take ages for all of me to go numb. The Anaesthetist kept doing tests and asking me if I could feel things. I remember at one point trying desperately to feel something as I was so scared about the surgery that I was trying to imagine that I could feel something when I couldn’t. They were so patient with me and helped me to relax and so I eventually knew I couldn’t feel anything. Then we were ready to go.

I would like to tell you what it felt like, but it was so very quick. Nik had managed to put together a very quick music playlist in the short time we had and so we listened to that together whilst the Anaesthetist and Midwife comforted and reassured me.

The next thing I knew, they held my beautiful baby above the screen for me to see, and I remember being so shocked that he was a boy as I had spent my whole pregnancy imagining that my baby was a girl! They passed him over to me for skin on skin and it was the second most perfect moment of my life - the fact that he immediately wee’d down my neck was not a problem - just an amazing, real, and beautiful moment.

They took our baby boy to be cleaned up and Nik asked if we were going to SCBU, only to be told in amazement that he was completely fine and healthy, and he’d be staying with us. We couldn’t believe it as we had expected to be in SCBU as he was premature. I was eventually wheeled back to the room holding my beautiful boy, to be greeted by the night midwives saying their congratulations as we went past. I held him and stared at him all night, too afraid to put him down. I couldn’t believe that after all we had been through with Sophia, I finally had her beautiful little brother in my arms. The next morning, Nik and I again looked at our baby boy and said, “he’s Sebastian”.

As I think back to my c-section, even though it was calm and planned, it was one of the scariest moments in life, but it bought us our beautiful son, Sebastian. It also showed me how strong I could be in the face of absolute terror, a strength that I hold on to when I talk to Sebastian about his perfect big little sister Sophia.

Sebastian is now 2 years old, and we frequently visit Sophia with crazy dog Mika. I want him grow up knowing that he’s part of a bigger family that includes Sophia, and that we are forever wrapped in a unique family bond of love together.