The Midwife's Here!: The Enchanting True Story of One of Britain's Longest Serving Midwives (23 page)

This news was delivered without fuss, though I was given a fancy certificate that informed me I was now entitled to inclusion in the Midwives Roll. It also declared that I, Linda Mary Buckley, was authorised to ‘hold herself out as certified’ under the Midwives Act of 1951. I was a qualified midwife at last! What an achievement!

I knew that staff midwives automatically qualified for a sister’s post after twelve months on the job, although of course you only got the job if there was a vacancy. With the new maternity unit opening, there would be plenty of sisters’ posts to fill, which was extremely good timing for me.

I rushed out of Miss Sefton’s office feeling fantastic. This was a very significant moment for me, and it felt very special. I had been a student for more than four years, all told, and this day was a real landmark. I felt truly ecstatic.

I could dedicate my whole life to delivering babies now. It was what I was meant to do, I was sure of it. Being a nursery nurse might have been a feasible alternative, but it wouldn’t have been the perfect job for me. I was meant to be a midwife. That’s how I felt, very powerfully now. I had achieved my dream thus far and I was certain I would never stop fizzing with pride whenever I heard those words, ‘The midwife’s here!’

Back on the busy ward there was no time for further reflection, and my first task that night was to assist two new mothers with breastfeeding.

‘Linda, see to those two in beds three and four, will ya?’ Sister Kelly ordered, scratching her bosom earnestly. ‘They’ve decided to try breastfeeding, so they have, but aren’t making a very good job of it if the truth be told. Poor little mites’ll be starvin’, the way they’re goin’ on.’

She rolled her eyes and sucked on her teeth as I headed off to meet Audrey Asprey and Eileen Yates, who had given birth to their respective daughters Adele and Donna within an hour of each other. Both women were bright-eyed and in their early twenties, and they explained to me enthusiastically that they’d
heard a radio programme about the benefits of breastfeeding and wanted to give it a try, to give their daughters the ‘best possible start in life’.

‘Good for you,’ I complimented them. ‘We don’t get too many mums wanting to breastfeed, even though as midwives we’re taught to encourage it. After all, breast milk is the perfect food for baby, and is always at the right temperature.’

They both looked very pleased with themselves and listened attentively as I discussed the basic principles of breastfeeding and described how they needed to try to relax in order to get the baby to ‘latch on’ to the nipple correctly.

‘I’ll be back over in a little while, after the bottles are dished out,’ I said.

An hour passed and my feet and head were throbbing. I’d prepared all the bottles in the steaming milk kitchen and changed three or four babies in the nursery, including Adele and Donna. Betty, one of the hard-working auxiliaries, returned the babies to their mothers while I dished out bottles of milk before going to help with the breastfeeding.

To my delight, when I arrived at Audrey’s bedside she was already breastfeeding beautifully, the little girl at her breast guzzling milk greedily and contentedly.

‘I don’t think you need any help at all,’ I smiled. ‘Well done! You’ve got that down to a fine art!’

Just at that moment, I heard a worried little voice from the other side of the curtain around Audrey’s bed. ‘Excuse me, Nurse, can you come here a minute?’

I stepped out through the curtain to find Eileen standing before me with a confused look in her eyes.

‘What’s the matter?’ I asked.

Eileen hesitated for a moment before hissing in my ear, ‘The thing is, Nurse, Adele is in the nursery and Donna isn’t, and I think …’

‘Whatever do you mean?’ I asked, my heart rate quickening as my brain caught up with what she was saying.

‘Audrey is feeding Donna!’ Eileen exclaimed loudly.

I pulled back the curtain to reveal the well-fed baby in Audrey’s arms giving a contented burp as she nestled on her chest.

‘Bloody hell!’ Audrey yelped, handing Donna over to her mother as if she were a hot potato. ‘Does that mean I’ve got to start all over again with Adele? I’m not sure I’ve got any milk left!’

‘I’ll fetch Adele right away,’ I said, dashing off swiftly. I’d never known Betty to make a single mistake before, let alone one of this magnitude. Normally the auxiliaries were marvellous and a crucial part of the team. Midwives treasured them as they were always there when you needed them, not only fetching and carrying but acting as another pair of eyes and ears. Betty must have been run off her feet today, I thought.

I returned from the nursery to find the two women chuckling merrily away. ‘There’s no need to apologise,’ Eileen was saying. ‘I’m just glad my Donna’s had a good feed – first proper stuff she’s had!’

With incredible good nature and impressive ease, Eileen later went on to breastfeed the real Adele, and as far as the women were concerned that was the end of it. They wouldn’t hear a word of apology and both said how uncanny it was that their daughters had been born so close together, and how alike the two little girls looked, especially in their matching hospital gowns. Neither woman blamed the
auxiliary, despite the fact both babies wore name tags and were in labelled cots.

Looking back, I marvel at how times have changed. If that were to happen today, blood tests would definitely be called for, and most probably lawyers too. But this was a time when HIV was unheard of in maternity units and litigation was a word you rarely heard, so life carried on with no harm done.

I reported the matter to the night sister, of course, but I am pleased to say I heard no mention of the mix-up ever again. Nevertheless, my nerves were shot to pieces at the end of my shift and I couldn’t wait to get home and unwind.

As I was leaving the hospital at 7 a.m. the next morning I ran into Mrs Tattersall, who was rushing to a home birth.

‘Fancy coming with me?’ she asked. ‘Sixth baby, would you believe. Should be quick, up on the Moss. Husband makes a very good brew.’

‘Do you mind if I don’t?’ I said politely. ‘I think I need to get some sleep. I’ve had quite an eventful shift.’

Intuitive as ever, Mrs Tattersall knew I had a tale to tell and urged me to do so. I was so tired I could hardly relate the story without getting Adele mixed up with Donna and Eileen confused with Audrey all over again.

Mrs Tattersall laughed like a drain. ‘It happens, Linda love,’ she said. ‘All’s well that ends well, that’s what I say.’ She put her hand on my shoulder, and I sensed she had a tale to tell too.

‘A lot worse things can happen, Linda. Perhaps this is not the best time to tell you, but then again I don’t know when it ever is. I heard some sad news last night. Moira Petty’s little boy, Jimmy, has died. He had a serious heart defect. Nothing could be done for him, poor soul.’

I felt my legs buckle beneath me, I was so shocked and upset. I could picture poor Moira, labouring in the cold and damp in that front parlour, and I remembered how pleased I had been to see her little boy dressed up in his brand new clothes despite the poverty he was born into. I had hoped his life could be better than his mother’s, but now he had no life at all.

‘That’s awful,’ I gasped. ‘That’s just awful.’

‘Well,’ Mrs Tattersall replied thoughtfully, ‘it might have been a blessing. The poor little lad had enough disadvantages in life. A heart defect was perhaps one too many to bear.’

I knew what she meant but it didn’t make me feel any less sad about his passing.

When I arrived home, I fell through the front door feeling as if I’d been put through a wringer and was greeted unexpectedly by Sue, our Red Setter. Normally she was asleep in her basket at this early hour, but she jumped up on me excitedly, taking me completely by surprise.

There was something white all around her mouth, and when I looked closely and took a sniff I realised to my dismay that it was icing – or the royal icing from my Christmas cakes, to be precise.

‘Sue!’ I hissed. She bounded off and I went to give chase but tripped clumsily over something hard in the hallway. It was one of the tins of white emulsion paint I’d left standing there, ready for the decorating. It overturned and spilled all over the hall carpet, making me burst into tears on the spot. Sue barked loudly, and I followed her through to the kitchen to find both of my lovingly baked Christmas cakes half-eaten on the floor. I sat on the cold tiles beside the crumbs and mess and sobbed into my hands.

Graham appeared at the kitchen door.

‘Whatever’s going on?’ he asked, rubbing sleep from his eyes and looking bemused.

‘Nothing,’ I shrugged, wiping away my tears. ‘Just a day in the life of a midwife, I suppose.’

He put his arm around me. ‘There’s no need to cry about spilt paint, you know …’

‘I’m not,’ I replied. Poor little Jimmy was dead. As if I would waste my tears crying about a ruined carpet! ‘And I don’t care about the cakes either, not really,’ I sniffed.

‘So what is it?’ Graham asked.

‘Just work. It’s hard sometimes. And sometimes you have to sit down and have a good cry. This is one of those moments. It comes with the job. I’ll be all right in a bit. You go back to bed.’

I found myself saying a similar thing to him when I returned home from my shift on Christmas Day 1970. While the rest of the family tucked in to cold turkey sandwiches in the evening I could think of nothing but what had happened at work earlier that day, but it wasn’t fair to burden Graham.

‘How was it?’ Graham asked brightly, fetching me a Babycham. ‘Any Christmas Day babies?’

‘Yes,’ I replied warily. ‘Six today. Hard day, but I’ll be all right in a bit. Let me just get changed.’

I went upstairs alone and thought about the babies born that day. I had delivered two of them, and they were absolutely beautiful. One was a bouncing ten-pound boy named Nicholas who was so chubby he looked as though he had elastic bands around his wrists and ankles, and the other was a dainty girl named Angela, who was just under six pounds.

Their respective parents were ecstatic, and I experienced a rush of pure joy as I handed each mother her child for that first
momentous cuddle. Both babies felt extra-special, being born on Christmas Day, and I felt incredibly honoured to have brought such wonderful little miracles into the world.

‘This is why I do the job,’ I thought to myself as I surveyed the postnatal ward later, and met some of the other precious newborns delivered that day. I usually went to visit my ladies before I finished my shift, to check they were all right. It’s not an obligatory part of the job, of course, but it’s something I have always enjoyed doing.

We had a lot of fun on the wards that day, I recall. Some of the midwives played tricks on the patients, making what we called ‘apple-pie beds’ by turning the top sheet back on itself under the covers to make it impossible to get in without ending up in a proper muddle. One brave midwife also put KY Jelly on the telephones in the consultants’ and sisters’ offices, so each time they answered a call the handset slipped clean out of their grasp. It was all taken in good humour and there was a warm buzz around the hospital, which was decked out with tinsel and fairy lights.

Now, sitting alone upstairs in our bedroom at home, I reflected sadly on how the shine had been abruptly stripped from the day as I was finishing my shift and breezily wishing my colleagues a good evening.

‘Hope you have a few more Christmas babies!’ I smiled merrily.

‘Well, things can only get better,’ another midwife replied, ominously.

‘What’s happened?’ I asked.

‘Oh, Linda,’ she said apologetically, ‘I thought everyone must have heard. I shouldn’t have mentioned it; it was careless of me. You go home, go and enjoy the rest of your day.’

‘No, what have I missed?’ I asked. ‘You have to tell me now.’

My colleague sighed heavily and I saw that she was blinking back tears. ‘There was a poor young girl brought in earlier, probably while you were occupied with Mrs Burrows and baby Angela. She was only sixteen and had her baby alone at home this morning. Very sadly, the baby died. Such a tragic case, today of all days.’

‘Who was she?’ I asked, shocked. ‘Have I seen her in antenatal?’

‘No,’ came the reply. ‘She is still at school and had hidden her pregnancy from everyone, so it appears. She had the baby in the toilet upstairs while her family ate Christmas dinner. The first they knew about it was when they heard her screams.’

This was such a sad story that I couldn’t stop thinking about it all the way home. I couldn’t begin to imagine what that poor girl had gone through, frightened and alone and in so much pain. It made my spirits sink completely, and I had to tell myself to count my lucky stars. I had a loving husband waiting for me in our warm and welcoming house, where there were no secrets and lies. Thinking about that poor girl made me cherish what I had so much more. I had a good life, and I wished others could be as fortunate as me.

‘So six babies born today I hear, Linda!’ my mother-in-law, Edith, beamed when I reappeared in the living room, glad to be free of my uniform at last. ‘Well I never!’

I nodded and said no more. Sometimes, I thought, that was the best thing to do. Sometimes it was simply not the right time to talk about my job, and this was most definitely one of
those moments. I certainly didn’t want any of my loved ones to have their day spoilt too.

‘I’m glad I haven’t missed
Morecambe and Wise
,’ I said brightly, biting into a peanut cracknel from a tin of Quality Street. I turned to the television as the comedy duo launched into their silly signature tune, ‘Bring Me Sunshine’. The lyrics made me smile. ‘In this world where we live, there should be more happiness/So much joy you can give, to each brand new bright tomorrow.’ How very true, I mused to myself. Tomorrow is another day, and just think how many new babies will be born, lighting up their parents’ worlds.