For When I'm Gone by Rebecca Ley

Author:Rebecca Ley
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Orion Publishing Group
Published: 2020-07-02T16:00:00+00:00

24

Sylvia’s Manual

I had done so well. Submitted to the yoke of motherhood, found myself even, under it.

I even convinced myself that I could pass muster as a decent human – you helped me do that for a while. Those happy years.

But what happened with Rosa undid me. It reminded me of my fundamental unworthiness.

The old habits came back swiftly. I went to the kitchen sink to vomit, leaving you sitting with her on the sofa, swaddled as if her tiny limbs were about to move. And then they took her away. God, they took her away. I shouldn’t have wasted a second being sick, but it was as if my body didn’t know how else to respond. I didn’t even need to stick my fingers down my throat, I just retched at the horror of it.

The kids were due back from Barbara’s. She still didn’t know. Nobody knew. Who would I ring? Not my mother, Tess, or even Nush. There was nobody in my life I could bear to break that news to. Amid the horror, I remember feeling almost embarrassed. Such an inconvenience for everyone, expecting another little bundle instead of nuclear devastation.

I needed to go into hospital too, the midwife said. To get checked out. I promised I would, but instead I ignored advice and went upstairs to the nursery I had got ready for our little girl.

It was so perfect, down to the little mobile of floating stars above the bed. The changing tray waiting for another inhabitant. A wooden ‘R’ propped on the windowsill.

I had got too cocky, expecting good fortune. I should have known when I was preparing that nursery. I should have reminded myself of my past mistakes. Tess would call it karma. She knows all about that.

My stomach was huge, as if she was still safe inside. I sat on the nursing chair. The one that had already been through Megan and Jude. That had already absorbed spit-up, breastmilk, tears. I was leaking blood and amniotic fluid with its distinctive smell into one of those huge maternity pads. Motherhood so humiliating, at the best of times.

Eventually, you came and found me, led me down to the car, to the hospital. Where I should have been in the first place.

* * *

Later there was counselling, leaflets, discussions about the stillbirth problem in the UK. The highest number in the western world. Apparently, Rosa had always been measuring large for dates – why didn’t anyone let me know? Why didn’t anyone warn me this could happen? There was a network, for other parents like us. Special chat rooms, a bit like the ones I haunt now for my cancer.

I did try to engage. But the sadness of those other mothers was too much to take. Their excruciating disbelief at their fate didn’t console me, only made me feel worse.

Just as the vomiting started, so too the bingeing. I needed something to bring up. Tunnock’s tea cakes liberated from their shiny shells. Salt and vinegar crisps. Cheese strings washed down with fizzy pop.

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