INSPIRING REAL LIFE
Charlie Mosey, 36, from St Albans, had to fight for a diagnosis for her little boy
Shimmying around my study, I felt abit breathless as Isang along to the tune on the radio.
‘This ain’t alove song this is goodbye...’ I warbled, boogying to Scouting for Girls.
But 28 March 2021 was my due date, and ready to pop, my moves weren’t what they used to be!
Then all of asudden, apain shot through my belly.
Oh my God, I thought. This is it, I’m in labour!
Still feeling fine, Idecided to stay at home for as long as I could –still battling through the Covid pandemic, it was unlikely my husband George would be allowed to come to the hospital, so Iwanted to put if off until the last minute.
But that evening, with my contractions getting more frequent, we headed to the Portland Hospital.
‘You’re a couple of centimetres dilated, so it’s started but it’ll be awhile,’ the midwife told us. ‘Head home and come back in tomorrow.’
Back at home, Ihad abath and looked forward to meeting our baby boy.
George and Ihad been trying for ababy for nearly five years, going through four rounds of unsuccessful IVF.
But in August 2020, while waiting to start our fifth round, I fell pregnant naturally.
It really was amiracle. As we thought about names and bought cute little toys and babygros, we were so excited to become parents.
I couldn’t believe the time was finally here.
The next day, 29 March, we went back to hospital again, but Iwas still only 4cm dilated.
‘We might as well stay now,’ George said, and we settled down to wait for our baby to make an appearance.
Six hours later, Iwas checked over again –and it turned out Ineeded an emergency C-section.
Although we’d always planned anatural birth, I felt surprisingly calm.
By that point, our boy was in distress and I just wanted to deliver him safely. And about 20 minutes later, at 11.27pm on 29 March, little Rupert came into the world.
As doctors took him away to be cleaned up and checked over, George went for a peek.
‘He’s beautiful,’ he smiled. And acouple of minutes later, our little 7lb 9oz bundle was placed in my arms, wrapped up and snuggled in a little hat.
It was very emotional – after 44 hours of labour I was exhausted and full of drugs and adrenaline – but it was the best moment of my life.
Bringing him home on 31 March, we settled into life as afamily of three.
Rupert was amazing – latching and feeding well. But he struggled with silent reflux from acouple of weeks old.
And at four weeks, I noticed his thumb had bent back.
Maybe it got caught when I was dressing him, I thought, and wanting to play it safe, I took him to our local Lister Hospital.
‘It
