by Mia Marconi
Doctors and nurses seemed to come from everywhere, and Hope seemed like such a tiny little bundle amid all the chaos. They took her away and I sat in a side room on my own, howling. I lost control of my body and sat there shaking, unable to talk. All I could do was wail. After a while a doctor came in to see me, and he had a nurse with him who looked lost. They said they were sorry, but they had been unable to save Hope. I just looked at them and screamed until my screams gradually turned into silent sobs. They had no idea how to console me and anyway I was inconsolable. After what seemed like a couple of minutes, they looked agitated and said they needed to move on to their next patient. They asked if there was anyone they could call. ‘My mum,’ I said, and they left the room.
Poor little Hope had died within minutes of arriving at hospital, having suffered total organ failure. Her heart, liver and kidneys had taken too much of a battering from the alcohol and recreational drugs, and the fact that she had been born before they were fully developed had not helped. Then the medication she was on to keep her alive had stopped working and her body had just shut down.
Mum came to pick me up and took me home. When she walked into the room I could see her face was full of sorrow and anxiety. She was sad for Hope and worried about me. I was grief-stricken and she almost had to carry me to the car. I remember hardly anything about the journey, but I know neither of us said anything. There were no words.
She was always brilliant when I needed her, probably because I was such an independent, determined child, constantly filling the house with injured animals that she had to help me care for. I remember how she helped me with my lists of things I had to do for them, and came with me when it was time to set them free. As if having four kids and my father was not enough, she had my lame ducks to deal with as well!
My dad never really coped well when I was at my weakest; he was so used to me looking out for him, he struggled when I was vulnerable and stayed in the background, but my mum knew exactly what to do.
I thought back to the meeting I had had with social services when we’d talked about the care Hope would need. No one had said that Hope might die, no one. Would I have cared for Hope had I known? My feeling now is that I would have cared for her anyway, because you never know what new medication or procedures will be available in the future. I would have stayed positive. My sights would have been set on that silver lining and the fairy-tale ending.
Hindsight can be a wonderful thing and if I really think about it, I knew that her chances of making a full recovery were slim. I was probably given all this information but did not want to accept or acknowledge it. I had convinced myself that it was going to be all right, because the alternative was just too hard to contemplate. Looking back now, I realise that no amount of love, no machine, no injection, no medicine and no miracle could have saved her.
I had agreed to care for Hope because I wanted her to have the best life she could, and the truth is that no one knows how life will pan out for a child with a disability. I knew that, but the one thing I was not prepared for was for her to die.
Hope’s funeral was arranged within the week at a tiny local church where she would be cremated rather than buried. I was dreading it. I had never been to a child’s funeral before and had no idea what to expect. No parent expects to bury a child; your whole life is dedicated to helping them grow up and mature, and although Hope was not mine I felt no differently about her. I expected her to get stronger month by month and year by year, to finish school, get a job, fall in love and have her own children, and I would have had the satisfaction of knowing that I had played a big part in making that possible. I had never seen this coming, and I had no idea whether or not I would be able to keep myself together, or even if it was right that I tried.
The saddest thing about that day was the handful of mourners. There was no big family turnout for Hope, only Martin and me, Vicky, Vicky’s mum, an aunt and a couple of Vicky’s friends. Three social workers and Hope’s community nurse also came, which was lovely as they didn’t have to, but it just reminded me of the struggle Hope had endured even to get this far. Vicky’s new boyfriend was there and was just as much a bag of bones as she was. As I looked at him all I could feel was sadness. He was doing his very best, but he seemed like a lost soul himself, and although they were both eighteen, they looked as immature as two young school children.
Martin was a pillar of strength all the way through. He had also bonded with Vicky and often said he felt so sorry for her. He’d treated her like a daughter, and as she had no father figure in her life she’d really responded to him. I got a lot of pleasure from seeing Martin banter with Vicky. As far as I knew, he was the only one who could make her smile.
Martin is an amazing man and he was a massive support to me throughout that whole episode. I don’t think I ever told him so at the time, so he didn’t know how much it meant to me. Some partners would have waded in with ‘I told you so,’ but he never once said that I should not have cared for Hope. Not once. And I know that he never thought it privately either. Secretly, he was proud that I was prepared to take on such a huge challenge, even if it had not turned out the way we thought it would.
Martin always has the right words to say, or he will say nothing at all – not so much the strong silent type, but he is wise and keeps his counsel. It was at times like this that I realised how much I loved him, and I promised myself I would stop taking him for granted.
Vicky was a gibbering wreck all day, shaking and sobbing. Her boyfriend was literally holding her up. I wasn’t much better. She and I were both in shock. Who wouldn’t be? We were there to bury a baby that we had loved and cared for.
It was so important for us all to be together, supporting each other. Vicky and I cried a river, wiped each other’s tears and comforted each other. We could feel each other’s pain, although I could not measure my grief by her grief. She was Hope’s mother, after all. The thought of how we were going to live without Hope was devastating, and I kept thinking how I would never get to see her dressed in the lovely frilly dress I had pictured. It sounds so silly when I say that now, but at the time it seemed like such a big thing. I felt I hadn’t managed to help her heal enough so that she could wear that dress.
I knew in my heart that I would recover in time, but I felt Vicky would have a tougher journey than me. It was daunting to think how she was going to tackle it. I wondered if she would do what so many in her situation do and turn to a syringe or a bottle for comfort.
It was sunny that day and I took it as a sign that Hope was free of pain. As I stared at her tiny white coffin, on which I’d laid some pink roses, I thought about how she had graced this earth for such a short while.
Vicky never once blamed me and at times that thought got me through the day. It may sound surprising but we were close, and when she wasn’t holding her boyfriend she cuddled me and said that she was relieved that Hope had died while she was with me and not in a hospital cot, being looked after by a stranger.
The service was over quite quickly and afterwards we went back to Vicky’s mum’s house. It was rough and ready, with few comforts, but when we arrived Vicky greeted us with a cup of tea. We sat down and talked about what the world without Hope would be like and how it would be a sadder place. Caring for Hope had taken up so much of our day – as with all babies it had been a twenty-four-hour job, but with Hope it was like having five babies. Martin chatted to Vicky’s mum and he said she seemed like a nice woman, so I wondered to myself: what was going on under the surface in their family for it all to have ended so badly?
After an hour, we said goodbye. Martin and I got into the car and looked at each other. We had no words. He just squeezed my hand and I could feel tears burning my eyes.
I turned and waved to Vicky. She looked sad and lost standing there, and I wondered what was next for her in life. I wondered if her boyfriend would treat her well and whether she would ever have any more children, and if she did, whether her time with me would have helped he
r to learn that caring for a child could be really rewarding. I wondered whether, if she ever got pregnant again, she would manage to stay away from drink and drugs or whether the same fate would be awaiting her next child. I felt that she would be able to cope better, but I never did find out as I haven’t seen or heard from her since.
I cannot deny that Hope’s death was traumatic. It affected me deeply but, looking back, I can honestly say that I am glad I was part of her life. I learned a lot from that tiny sick little girl. I learned that I cannot fix everything.
Chapter Eight
We decided not to take Francesca and Ruby to the funeral. Whether we were wrong or right to make that decision I still do not know. Our decision may seem odd. My mother and her brother were not allowed to go to their father’s funeral, and it affected them deeply. Mum often speaks about it now and never really got over the fact. I always thought they should have been allowed to go, yet here I was, decades later, doing the same thing.
There was only one thing that influenced me: I did not want my girls to suffer more pain. No child should have to watch a baby being buried, and I simply wanted to protect them.
The girls became very subdued and sad after that, though, so I drew pictures with them and asked them to draw what heaven looked like. I remember Francesca’s drawing was sunny, with a big park and lots of sweets in every corner, while Ruby’s had lots of dogs running around with other children. We talked about Hope, and how she was running around happily with lots of new friends and dogs and had all the sweets she could eat.
Slowly, I got back into a routine of school runs, after-school clubs and the park, and the girls helped me heal as much as I helped them. While they were at school I spent my time sorting through Hope’s things and talking to family and friends, attempting to make sense of it all and trying to find peace.
When I started fostering I had no idea that it would take me down such a sad path, but now it had I immediately decided that I would never look after a disabled baby again, or any babies, in fact. I was determined never to put my family through that again, and I suspected that I would give up fostering altogether.
I was full of admiration for the doctors and nurses – even the standoffish ones – who deal with death everyday. I had no idea how they did it and still kept their sanity. Maybe I just find death particularly hard. I know that I go to pieces whenever I have to talk about it, but I was determined not to face a premature death again.
Martin was fantastic and let me talk to him about Hope’s death whenever I needed to, but I felt so raw immediately afterwards that I needed something else, something on a deeper level. So a couple of days after Hope had died I asked Mum if she would take me to church. The door was closed at my local Catholic church, so we went into the Church of England one nearby. I sat in the front pew, crying and praying, and it was not long before the vicar came out and sat beside me. By this time I was hysterical, but he held my hand and assured me that Hope was at peace. He said she had been released from pain and assured me that I had done everything I could.
The next time I went I took the girls. The vicar was fantastic with them. He asked them what death meant to them, and they said, ‘It’s when you go to heaven.’ He agreed and then explained that Hope had been a very sick little girl, and that heaven was a place where she could be free of tubes and oxygen, and she would be running around doing all the things that little girls should be able to do. They were very concerned about who was looking after her, and he told them not to worry that her mummy and me were not with her, because there would be so many other people who would be there caring for her.
While they processed their grief, my girls continued to withdraw and over the next few months they were still unusually quiet. Normally loud and confident, they stopped dancing and putting on shows when they got home from school. All they wanted was to come home and have quiet time, and I let them. So instead of shows, they drew a lot of pictures for Hope, mostly of heaven, and we talked a lot about her.
Hope’s death affected Ruby more than Francesca, because she was the younger one, so she had tended to play more with Hope. She was the one who stayed quieter for longer.
The school noticed too and called to tell me they were concerned because they were both so subdued, so I went in to see their head teacher and reassured her that we were helping them through it.
Social services offered therapy for them, but I have such a big family network I didn’t think it was necessary. I spoke to the girls, my mum spoke to them, so did Martin and my sisters, and we had the vicar. I felt they had enough support, and so we got through it together as a family.
With time, their confidence and personalities returned, but I was shocked to see how severely the loss had affected them at that young age. I knew they were grieving, and it was right that they were, but it made me take stock and realise that although I was helping other children I had to consider what effect it was having on my own kids. They had built a relationship with Hope, they had helped me care for her, and one morning they had woken up and she was dead. Also it had all happened not long after Sofia had left their lives. So when social services called, I let them know that, for a while at least, I wanted no more children to foster.
It took months for me to clear out Hope’s room. I had to get all the machines and all the other paraphernalia that she had and return it to the various agencies they belonged to and it took quite a while to sort it all out. I could only do it in short bursts – too long in Hope’s room and I would get distressed and start having flashbacks and I would begin shaking, then the tears would return.
When I could, I avoided her room altogether, but whenever I did go in, I felt cold and sad.
In fact, the whole house was tainted and I knew we had to move. Martin and the girls felt the same. I never told anyone who wanted to buy it what had happened there. What was the point? Anyway, we had no shortage of prospective buyers because it was a nice place, and it wasn’t long before the estate agent plastered ‘SOLD’ across the ‘FOR SALE’ sign in the front garden.
We found a lovely new four-bedroom house a few miles away. I began packing boxes and as I filled them with the girls’ toys and clothes, a memory of Hope’s death would hit me hard, like a gale-force wind ready to knock me off my feet. When that happened I would visualise Hope’s smile and remember the first morning she held her arms up to me, asking me to lift her out of her cot, or the sound of her giggling when Jack and Jill licked her face, or when she was playing with Francesca and Ruby. Momentarily, I would feel better, until the whole cycle began again.
As a mother, I was riddled with guilt at what I had put my children and partner through. I made sense of it all by telling myself that we had made Hope’s life a little bit happier for a while. We had given love to Hope unconditionally, like any family would, and I knew that she’d had a better life because we cared. We had made a difference to her. It was important to remember that, and it was something that could not be taken away from us.
Our home held so many memories but I realised that, while living there, I had learned one big lesson: that life is for living and you cannot measure your achievements in money or possessions. The greatest gift of all, I decided, is being able to give your time without expecting anything in return.
My family had given everything, and now my heart was broken and my zest for life was ebbing away. I had to admit that I was exhausted, mentally and physically. I needed a rest from the tears that I could not stop and the thoughts – particularly the ‘what ifs?’ – that would not leave me alone. As a family, we needed time to regroup.
When the day came to move, the removal men loaded up our belongings in their van. I took a last look at the empty rooms to check we had left nothing behind, turned around and locked the front door for the last time. I will never forget the moment I shut it, because it was such a relief. It was like a terrible weight had been lifted off my shoulders.
We all piled into our car and it was mayhem. Jack and Jill wouldn’t si
t in one place and were clambering all over the seats, while Francesca held our goldfish bowl on her lap and tried to stop the dogs drinking the water. It was disorganised – or organised chaos, as I like to describe it – but that was our little family, and I loved us.
I opened the front door to our new home, and the sounds of happy squeals and laughter and dogs barking echoed in the empty rooms. I began to smile and I knew that life would go on. We would not forget Hope – it did not mean that, she would always have a place in our hearts – but we had to carry on living, something she had fought so hard to do.
I had no thoughts of taking another foster child then – we all needed a break – but I had not ruled it out. For the next year, I decided, it would just be me, Martin, the girls, the dogs and the goldfish. Then, when I felt we had all recovered, I would think about whether fostering again was the right thing to do.
Coming soon from Mia Marconi …
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Copyright
Certain details in this story, including names, places and dates, have been changed to protect the family’s privacy.
HarperTrue
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First published by HarperTrue 2014
FIRST EDITION
© Mia Marconi and Sally Beck 2014
Cover images © Shutterstock.com
