Before I was ever pregnant with my son, I was already carrying trauma.
During my first pregnancy, I found out I was expecting my daughter at almost the exact same time my dad was diagnosed with glioblastoma, an aggressive brain tumour. He died six weeks after she was born. That pregnancy was lived alongside grief, fear, and anticipatory loss, and it left me with severe anxiety and PTSD.
After my daughter was born, I suffered a postpartum haemorrhage and retained placenta. In the months that followed, I was found to have scarring in my uterus and had to undergo further investigations and procedures before I could even consider trying for another baby. My body no longer felt safe or predictable.
Between my two children, I then experienced a miscarriage that unfolded over several months. It was not quick or straightforward, and it came after everything that had already happened. When I became pregnant again, the first twelve weeks were marked by bleeding and constant fear. A lot had happened in a very short space of time, physically and emotionally. I never felt settled. I never felt safe.
So when I say I have anxiety, it is not abstract. It is lived. My body had learned that pregnancy could mean loss.
By April 2023, I was seven months pregnant with my second child, my son. As a second-time mum, I knew my body well. I knew what his movements felt like. I also knew when something felt different.
On the morning of 9 April, a bank holiday Sunday, I woke up and did my usual check. Was I feeling him?
I wasn’t.
As a second-time mum, I knew my body well. I knew what his movements felt like. I also knew when something felt different.
We had plans to visit friends in Kent. I tried to push the feeling away and carry on with the day. We went, but all day something felt wrong. He wasn’t moving in the way he always had. What I could feel were faint flutters, like the very beginning of pregnancy, not the strong, reassuring movements I knew.
By mid-afternoon, we were back home. I couldn’t ignore it anymore. I picked up my handbag, my notes and my phone, and told my husband and little girl I would be back later. I got in my car to drive to the hospital.
Because my daughter was born during Covid, I was very used to going to triage on my own. I had done it many times before. But this time something deep inside me felt different. I knew I needed someone there.
I called my mum first, but she wasn’t able to come. I then called my sister, who was nearby having dinner, and she said she would meet me and sit with me. I kept my tone light and cheerful. I made it sound normal. Just the usual check on the monitor.
Inside, I was scared.
When I arrived at triage with my sister, the midwife checked me in, looked at my notes, and said loudly and sternly,
“You’ve been in here ten times. Weekly. You’re too anxious. You should know by now that your baby has a quiet day once a week.”
I felt completely taken aback. I felt deeply embarrassed, especially with my sister sitting beside me. She had never had a baby, and the last thing I wanted was for her to think this was the attitude of midwifery teams or that this kind of response was normal or acceptable. I was already scared and on edge, and suddenly felt judged in a moment where I needed reassurance.
I was put on the monitor.
About twenty minutes in, I noticed my baby’s heartbeat drop on the screen. Moments later, a doctor came in, introduced herself, and said they were concerned. The heartbeat was showing drops. I wasn’t in labour. She asked if I had felt him move. She said she would scan me.
When she returned, she said they were still not happy and that my baby might need to come that night.
Then a consultant came into the room and said very clearly,
“This is going to be a category one emergency caesarean. We’re going to take you down.”
I remember asking, “Where?”
He said, “We’re taking you down.”
I asked, “To labour ward?”
He said, “Yes. To labour ward. To theatre. We’re going to be taking your baby out in twenty minutes.”
They gently helped me into a wheelchair and started taking me down. I remember catching my reflection in a mirror and feeling completely paralysed.
From there, everything happened very quickly. I was surrounded by people explaining what they were doing, asking for consent, spraying me asking if I could feel anything, guiding me through decisions. I had always known a caesarean was likely because of placenta praevia, and I was not opposed to it at all. The anesthetist, surgeons, and theatre team were calm, kind, and reassuring throughout. They were exceptional.
What was overwhelming was the speed, the urgency, and the weight of what was happening all at once. I was trying to mentally prepare myself for the worst, while desperately hoping for an outcome where my baby would be okay.
Gabriel was born twenty minutes later and taken straight to NICU. He was resuscitated and stabilised and placed into a transport incubator. That was how I first met my son. Through a small window, for less than a minute, before he was taken away. I remember feeling so connected to him but also light years apart, like ET and Elliot at the end of E.T.
I was trying to mentally prepare myself for the worst, while desperately hoping for an outcome where my baby would be okay.
Gabriel was born weighing 1.87 kilograms. He was in the ninth percentile. Just two weeks earlier, at a 30-week scan, he had been measuring on the 50th percentile. The drop had happened quickly, in the space of two weeks, and it was significant.
That night in theatre, something else happened that I will never forget. A friend of mine who works in paediatrics was the person who initially received my crash call, although he sent a colleague in his place as he was busy elsewhere. He eventually joined in theatre when he heard I was here. He came into theatre, went to see Gabe and then came over to me, looked at Gabriel, and simply said, “Congratulations.”
It sounds small, but in that moment it meant everything. Hearing those words from someone I knew and trusted within the medical system brought a reassurance I did not even realise I needed. I will never forget him seeing my son.
I suffered a postpartum haemorrhage and remained in theatre for a long time afterwards. My husband arrived just as Gabriel’s condition improved and his APGAR score had gone up. He met him, then came back to me. I told him to go with Gabriel to NICU, and then to go home and be with our daughter so she would wake up to one of her parents there.
I met Gabriel properly nine hours later.
Eventually, we brought Gabriel home. Leaving NICU is joyful and terrifying at the same time.
He spent five weeks in NICU. About a week in intensive care, then time in high dependency, before moving on to the next stage. Nothing about NICU is linear. There are steps forward and sudden pauses. There was a day where other babies moved up and Gabriel did not, because his infection markers had risen sharply. I was prepared for the possibility of a lumbar puncture due to potential meningitis. I spent that entire day crying beside his cot, staring at this tiny, vulnerable baby.
Living between the hospital and home was exhausting. Being with my daughter and missing my son. Being with my son and missing my daughter. Trying to protect her from fear while barely holding myself together.
Eventually, we brought Gabriel home. Leaving NICU is joyful and terrifying at the same time. You leave the protection of a team who has kept your baby alive. As a second-time parent, I thought I would feel confident. Instead, I felt like I was starting from scratch.
My mental health was not good in the months that followed. I am still piecing it together. Recovery is not quick, and healing is ongoing.
Today, Gabriel is two and a half. He is happy, healthy, thriving, and full of life. He has the best smile and the most beautiful eyes. He is here because I trusted my instincts and because I went in. He is also so similar to my dad and I truly believe he was protecting him the whole time. His original due date was actually his birthday.
In a follow-up reflection with my consultant, he told me something I will never forget.
“You came in many times and you were reassured. And then one time, you weren’t. That is exactly why we tell people to come in.”
He also said, gently,
“Your anxiety saved your son’s life.”
That does not mean anxiety is required to advocate for yourself. It means instinct matters. Movement matters. And no one should ever feel embarrassed or dismissed for getting checked.
I now volunteer as a parent supporter on the NICU. I sit with parents in moments I recognise deeply. I tell them that every baby’s journey is different. That setbacks do not mean failure. That they are not alone.
Guidance from trusted sources like the NHS and Bliss exists for a reason. No one will ever be annoyed at you for being checked. One appointment, one decision, one moment of listening to your body can change everything.
If I had not gone in that night, my story would be very different.
I hope by sharing this, others will never ignore a change in movements and will always trust themselves enough to ask for help.
I am forever grateful to the nurses and doctors who cared for my son. In the most frightening days of our lives, they became family, and I will always see them as some of the most remarkable people on earth.
