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- Herausgeber: Liberties Press
- Kategorie: Ratgeber
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2012
Baby Ava is the moving and insightful account of Caroline and Niall O'Flaherty's struggle to have a baby. Faced with infertility after Caroline's battle with cervical cancer, the couple begin to explore various options. However, with the usual pathways of IVF and adoption proving too problematic, all hope seems lost until Caroline happens to see a TV documentary about surrogacy in India. Buoyed by the possibility of a child, the pair contact the Akanksha Infertility clinic run by Der Nayna Patel and set about making arrangements to travel to India. This book details their remarkable journey through the surrogacy process, from Caroline and Niall's first trip to India, to the arrival of their beautiful daughter. Following Ava's birth, however, the O'Flaherty's meet a further obstacle; with no surrogacy legislation in place in Ireland, they cannot obtain an Irish passport for their child. Niall immediately embarks on a campaign to bring his family home, as Caroline adjusts to motherhood while stranded in a foreign land. The O'Flahertys' story is both poignant and powerful. Their personal exploration of this emotive issue provokes thought on the wider questions of morality and ethics surrounding surrogacy, making Baby Ava as enlightening and challenging a read as it is heartwarming.
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Baby Ava
An Irish Surrogacy Story
Caroline and Niall O’Flaherty
With Antoinette Walker
Ava, this book is dedicated to you from your Mom and Dad so that when you are old enough to read it, you will understand just how precious you are. We love you so much. You have filled our lives with so much joy and happiness.
Love Mom and Dad x.
Contents
Acknowledgements
With special thanks to Dr Patel, Dr Hitesh and their team, and to dear Nita to whom we will always be grateful.
We are deeply appreciative of both our families for all their help and support in this great venture.
We extend our gratitude to Antoinette Walker for her professionalism and patience and for bringing the story of Ava to fruition, and to our legal team, Deborah Kearney and Nuala Jackson, for the wonderful work and long hours that finally brought Ava home to Ireland.
Chapter 1
I was meant for motherhood
From a very young age, cradling a Crolly doll in my arms, I dreamed of being a mother one day. Perhaps all little girls dream of motherhood, but I could not stop, even when the odds were stacked against me. In the face of cervical cancer, radical surgery, failures of infertility treatment and adoption, I clung to the belief that one day I would hold a babbling babe in my arms. One that I could call my own. And the long litany of disappointment, pain and despair would fade and become a thing of the past. After many fruitless years, the one glimmer of hope was surrogacy. It appeared on the horizon one day and grew as bright and warm as the country that made our dream possible: India. The baby we so wholeheartedly desired would become a reality.
If yearbooks had been all the rage when I was at school, like in American movies, I would have been labelled the ‘Girl Most Likely to Be a Mother’, not due to the hazards of sex but out of sheer yearning. From primary school in Palmerstown, Dublin, where I grew up, to Our Lady’s School in Templeogue, most of my school friends will remember me for that. I was the one who always wanted to get married and have babies. The friends who shared my girlhood dreams became as close to me as sisters, or what I imagined to be sisters since I was an only girl. They knew me as a real girlie girl, with an insatiable appetite for dolls: Crolly dolls, Sindy dolls, Barbie dolls, of every shape and fabric, with cases of outfits for every occasion.
The years of waiting and wanting and exploring options are long and hard. You spend a lot of time reflecting on every aspect of having a child. You know that biological urge is no selfish whim but part of a much bigger picture. Because you were reared in a loving and secure family, you wish for what your parents had and grandparents before them. You wish for what seems the most natural thing in the world. You see traditions and customs handed on from your parents and want to see yourself continuing in that long line.
Both my husband, Niall and I are Dubliners born and bred, like our parents and grandparents before us. You imagine telling your children about their heritage; my parents’ families growing up and working on Francis Street in The Liberties and Niall’s highly skilled in damp-proofing. In my mind, I would tell my children that I was named after my paternal grandmother, Caroline, who holds a special place in my heart. Both of us knew the trauma and pressure of having children in very different ways and at very different times. By the time she died in childbirth at the age of thirty-five in 1948 she had given birth to ten children. Coming out of Mass one Sunday morning, years before, the fire and brimstone of the priest still ringing in her ears, she had told her friend tearfully how she did not want any more children. Yet contraception was out of the question; she was at the mercy of clerics, outsiders controlling her fertility. It was interference, a kind of exploitation really. It ended in heartbreak for her family. At the same age that she was laid in a cold grave, I was still childless. I had to go halfway around the world before I could call myself a mother.
You spend years hoping that you’ll be as good a parent as your own. To have the brilliant, open relationship with your father and mother that I have, to be able to talk to them and confide in them about anything. To all get along so well, apart from the odd disagreement. And of course as an only daughter being daddy’s girl is always something special. You recognise your parent’s wonderful qualities; an intelligent, hard-working father, now retired from business life, who only sees the good in people; a mother who takes such good care of us all, taking pride in our home and being more than a mother but a companion and best friend. I too hoped to give my children memories to cherish: Christmas trips to Santa Claus, family outings, and a few summer holidays in America that I was lucky to have.
You wonder too what hobbies and pastimes your child would take up. Would they be fanatical about gymnastics and dancing like I was, or more like my brother Philip, three years older, who played quietly and calmly with his toy cars for hours on end and later took up judo. Would you hold your breath as they recited poems at the Feis, echoing the verses in your head to the very end? Or watch them on stage at the Gaiety and Olympia in tap dancing shows with the Freda Bannon Stage School, which had filled my youth with vivid dreams of being another Shirley Temple.
Or would their pastimes be a source of family pride? Both my father and grandfather played the accordion, and my brother and I too followed in that tradition. Fridays were accordion practice nights, around the corner from Francis Street where my parents were reared. Mingled with the music were history lessons in which we learned much about Old Dublin, its traditions and characters. A neighbour of ours was our teacher whose patience we sorely tested each night. At times he got so cross with our renditions of ‘More and More and More’ or ‘Make Me an Island’ – Joe Dolan favourites – that he would bang his baton furiously on the chair he was standing on. His fury ensured we practised hard every day at home. Sunday afternoons were our performance days, courtesy of Dublin Corporation in the 1980s. From St Stephen’s Green and St Anne’s Park, Raheny to Howth and Sandymount, we belted out many a marching song, the Triumphal March being memorable, along with the Scottish Waltz selection. On windy days, perched on the park bandstand, rocks were placed on our music stands to secure music sheets or songbooks from the force of the gale. Being in the younger class, I was sometimes forced to smile and pretend I was playing if the tune was unfamiliar to me. In contrast my brother, being older and more accomplished, was ten times better.
You wonder too what family traits your children would inherit. Would they be quiet and studious like my brother? Or more fun-loving and outgoing like me? A real case of chalk and cheese. Would they be calm and composed in the face of pressure like my husband, Niall or get anxious like me? What jobs would they have in life? What direction would they go? Would they take after me and be dying to leave school, eager to be part of the working world? Or spend years at university like Philip, poring over economic books and computers?
The late 1980s in Dublin were thrilling for your average teenager and I got caught up in that excitement. Xtra-vision had set up a shop in Palmerstown and with their flamboyant jeeps flying all around Dublin, I wished to be part of it, meeting people and feeling independent. Video rental was something new to Ireland but before long I was working part-time for Xtra-vision while completing a computer course amongst others at Dorset College. Moving on to Intel, the multinational computer chip company, I enjoyed working in production and the great camaraderie among the staff.
And later when I worked as a medical secretary, I felt at home in that world, interested in people and their health. Or would the children be more like Niall and work in building and facilities maintenance with his ingenious way of solving problems? Would they have his grasp of law, which came as a revelation to us when faced with the legal challenges of getting our daughter’s passport? There was also his natural bent for computers, his analytical mind, seeing things in black and white.
One thing for sure, his trait of entrepreneurship was something to tell the children. I would have many a story to keep them entertained for hours. He was a bubbling fountain of ideas, a mixture of Del Boy and Bill Gates. An entrepreneur from boyhood, it was honed from Sunday trips to the open-air market in Jonesborough on the Border with his parents. Whenever he saw a FOR LET sign, his mind too went into overdrive, thinking of a suitable start-up business.
Yes, the years spent waiting to have children were peppered with imagining and wondering and rehearsing would-be conversations. But whatever the would-be children would do in life, I just hoped they would be happy and know their parents loved them, even more so for all the hurdles that had to be overcome in bringing them into the world.
Our story began one fateful day in April 1998. It was unseasonably cold outside as I waited nervously in the rooms of the Master of the Coombe and listened to what he had to say. It was no springtime for me. It was to get a whole lot chillier by the time he had spoken, his words delivered calmly but with an unmistakeable sadness in his eyes.
‘Caroline, you have cervical cancer.’
Chapter 2
Cervical cancer
In 1998, at the age of twenty-seven, my life was moving along nicely; I was enjoying my job at Intel, had no shortage of friends and acquaintances and a busy social life. By then, I had moved away from home and was sharing an apartment in Tallaght with a good friend called Lisa. I was back to the single life again, after a relationship lasting a number of years had ended amicably. No, there was little time to dwell on illness and disease. I didn’t smoke and other than having a smear test some five years before, I didn’t give my health a second thought.
In hindsight my symptoms were vague. There was no big bang warning signs at first. A gradual tiredness crept over me, making me feel weaker and weaker, until I reached a stage of pure exhaustion. Absolute and utter exhaustion. It all happened within the space of a few weeks. If I climbed the stairs, by the time I reached the top, I had to pause, weak as an old woman. That type of tiredness was foreign to me; I was the kind of person usually buzzing with energy. Never in my wildest dreams did I consider it could be cancer.
To be honest, I felt a bit silly going to the GP at first. It seemed so lame to say you’re feeling very tired, especially in the absence of other symptoms. It was reinforced all the more when the doctor made light of it and told me there was absolutely nothing wrong. Though relieved to hear his words, my mind wasn’t entirely at ease. And still the fatigue continued. Then shortly afterwards, I was in bed one night and had a massive vaginal bleed. That shocked and shook me to the core like a horror movie. I had never experienced anything like it before and was convinced that something was radically wrong. The sight of the soiled bedclothes, the white cotton sheets nearly destroyed, more than anything forced me to seek medical attention. However, the next doctor I saw, a man at a local hospital, after hearing my story and examining me, was rather vague in his diagnosis.
‘You know, this can happen. It’s nothing to worry about,’ he began, sitting back in his chair. ‘You can go home, there’s nothing wrong.’
His response puzzled me. I was really taken aback.
‘What?’ I said, my voice croaking in disbelief.
At that, he proceeded to say it could be this, it could be that, maybe it’s hormones, maybe it had something to do with taking the Pill in the past. Nothing but a string of maybes and perhapses.
‘I’ve seen this happen to loads of young girls of your age. It’s nothing to worry about.’
And so I was sent off home again. Needless to say, it wasn’t very reassuring. It just didn’t make sense. My friend Lisa had accompanied me to the hospital and we returned to the apartment in stunned silence. I still didn’t feel right. I didn’t want to let it go, dismiss it from my mind like the doctor had recommended. The niggling doubts continued and with nothing but my gut instinct to rely on, I persisted. The same week I visited a local doctor, a GP based in Tallaght. She was sympathetic and without hesitation advised me to go to the Coombe for a second opinion. In fact, she quietly insisted.
And so I found myself on Cork Street in the heart of The Liberties, trying to cross the busy road and battling against the elements. We seemed to be stuck in an eternal winter that year with days on end of biting cold, sleety showers. I pulled my coat ever tighter across my chest and headed for the hospital entrance. Until I developed symptoms, I had never been to the Coombe before, never once had a reason to go there. Though I had been born in the Rotunda Hospital myself, generations of my father’s family had entered the world in the Coombe, that is, before the premises were sited in Dolphin’s Barn. The old Coombe Lying-In Hospital, not far away was where my grandmother Caroline had given birth many times before. The only trace of it that remained was its magnificent portico, preserved for posterity, which we used to pass on our way to accordion practice in my youth. I wondered did my grandmother feel as nervous as I did when she darkened its doorway one last time. It was Friday and, as I made my way to the outpatients, the hospital was bustling with numerous clinics. A steady stream of women, some with bellies bulging at various stages of pregnancy, waddled past me along its narrow corridors. Or else the teeny cries of newborns coming and going from the baby clinic filled the air.
This time a young Chinese doctor examined me. In her quiet and serious manner, she listened carefully to what I had to say and examined me thoroughly. Lying on the couch with my eyes firmly planted on the ceiling, suffering the indignity of the procedure, I hoped whatever the problem was that it could be easily fixed. The examination was suddenly interrupted when another doctor happened to pass through the room in search of some item or other. From her demeanour I could tell she was a senior doctor, and more so when the Chinese doctor asked for her opinion, which she gladly obliged. This was my first introduction to Dr Noreen Gleeson. She adroitly took over the examination, making me feel that I was in good hands. Her voice was reassuring as she told me she would need to take a closer look at my cervix and do some special tests. At last I felt I was being taken seriously. The tests were duly arranged for early the following week.
In hindsight, Dr Gleeson had spotted some abnormalities during the physical examination. The next week passed by in a haze except for the two tests she carried out: first a colposcopy and then a cone biopsy where she took a tissue sample from my cervix. Again these were words I had never heard of before let alone could pronounce. For the colposcopy she used a bright light and what looked like a large microscope to see my cervix really close up. The test didn’t last long, maybe fifteen minutes, and luckily didn’t hurt. But with her eyes glued to the eyepiece, I felt like a specimen under a microscope. I have no recollection of the cone biopsy as it was done under anaesthetic one morning. However, Dr Gleeson explained it was like taking a tiny piece off the top of your thumb, except it was my cervix. Later that day, she returned to the day ward and told me she had removed extra tissue. She obviously knew it didn’t look good.
Back home that evening, I rang my sister-in-law Bina, who lives in Hampshire in the UK with my brother. A trained pharmacist, Bina could be relied upon to give straight facts about medical problems.
‘Okay, it could be CIN1, CIN2 or CIN3 or precancerous,’ she answered. ‘But I’m sure it wouldn’t even be that bad.’
CIN was a kind of precancerous thing – cervical intraepithelial neoplasia – to varying degrees.
‘What!’
‘I mean there are plenty things that can be done.’
Both Bina and my brother Philip were invaluable for giving advice. Indeed they are always very matter of fact. With degrees in business and economics, Philip works as a cancer network manager in the UK. Though not a doctor, he is still very scientific in his approach to things, which is exactly what I wanted. He kept telling me not to worry as I would have the best specialists.
By Friday that week, I had been speedily called in for an appointment with the Master of the Coombe. It was time to receive the verdict. April had never felt so cold, as I dressed myself warmly that morning, slipping into jeans, a new blue gingham shirt and a soft, cosy baby blue fleece that I loved. The early morning frost cleared but was replaced by more sleet. My mother, growing more alarmed, had come along for moral support. At the appointed time, the Master at the time, Dr Michael Turner, ushered us into a room. There would be no more examining, just talking. He sat us down and we waited anxiously to hear what he had to say. And then the words that nobody ever wants to hear arrived.
‘Caroline, you have cancer.’
He looked at me with such sadness, explaining there were abnormal cells in the lining of my cervix and I would need surgery urgently. My body started to shake against a backdrop of my mother’s loud sobs.
‘Look, I have a daughter, I have children myself,’ he continued, ‘and this is not an easy thing to tell anyone.’
Then a sinking feeling arose in my chest. I could feel myself panicking.
‘Is this it? Am I actually going to die?’
Beside me, my mother’s wails grew louder.
‘You really need to speak to Dr Gleeson before we go in and do the surgery,’ he explained, conscious there was no straight answer to that question. ‘We don’t know exactly the extent of what’s going on.’
Even today his face sticks in my mind. Amid the crying and the shaking, I remember thinking that this man actually looks upset for me. I was sure I saw tears in his eyes. So much I forgot later with the passage of time but never once his face.
‘Will I ever have a child?’ I whispered, the question popping out of nowhere.
‘We’ll have to wait until the surgery to see,’ he replied gently. ‘We should know how aggressive the cancer is by then.’
After that, there was precious little else I retained. All he could do was reassure us as best he could.
‘Dr Noreen Gleeson is the best surgeon here to deal with the cancer. We’ll get her to see you on Monday.’
Cancer is not something you give much thought to at the age of twenty-seven. There was no family history of cancer to put me on high alert. And certainly not cervical cancer. I hadn’t a clue about cervical cancer or what it meant. I wasn’t even sure if I had come across the word cervix in biology class before. I suppose most women are vague about where their cervix is and what exactly it does. I was no different. Although, then again, I knew that smear tests were something to do with checking the neck of the womb. I suppose we knew the layman’s term but not the medical one. Cervical cancer wasn’t even heard of in my day. Anything to do with women’s nether regions was off limits. Maybe it was down to embarrassment and seen as a private and delicate matter that shouldn’t be discussed in public. There were no celebrities then to put it on the map like Jade Goody in 2009. I suppose we have come a long way since then. Now with screening services and public awareness, young women are more clued in and knowledgeable. In my day, we were unbelievably in the dark.
***
Everything had happened at such lightning speed. Within the space of a week my world had completely changed. When you leave a doctor’s appointment with this terrible, frightening news, your life is suddenly turned upside down – not only for yourself but also your family. Once the shock started to wear off, I tried to get into the right frame of mind. I told myself that I would get through it and would fight and be strong for myself and my family. My family, such a great source of pride and luck to me, have always been amazing. They brought me up to speak openly about everything. I knew they would all be there for me no matter what. But the situation left them feeling powerless too. My father’s words always come back to me.
‘If I was a millionaire or a billionaire, I still could not help you.’
From that moment on, I knew just how true the saying ‘your health is your wealth’ is. If you do not have your health, you have nothing in life!
Within hours of returning home that Friday, every family member had been on the phone, as well as my extended family: aunts, uncles, and cousins from everywhere. They were just unbelievably supportive. But in the background the question of whether I could have children or not loomed large. My mother, in particular, was worried.
‘Oh God … if you can’t have children!’
I understood her fears but my focus had now turned to survival. Everything else paled into insignificance.
‘Look, I need to live. I don’t care what they have to do.’
Putting aside all thoughts of children, I turned into a machine. And all the cogs whistled survival, survival, survival. I knew I would be no good to any child if my physical health was not right. My dad recognised that too and encouraged my positive attitude.
‘Just do what you have to do.’
The most wonderful support came too from Deirdre, my next-door neighbour from Palmerstown, who was also a nurse. That night she was a godsend, offering such practical advice and really understanding the fears and anxieties I was experiencing. Truly, she was a rock of sense.
An arrangement was made for me to meet Dr Gleeson again on the following Monday. This time both my parents accompanied me, adamant I would not face the challenge alone. But I scarcely remember any of it. Each time I stepped inside the Coombe doorway, everything went by in a blur. I had the most wonderful doctor in Noreen Gleeson. She was warm and approachable and tried to reassure me that things would be okay. That said, I understood that until my surgery, no one could really tell the outcome of my condition.
‘At the end of the day, my life is in your hands,’ I told Dr Gleeson. ‘You just do what you have to do to make me okay.’
The type of surgery required was experimental. Even the name of the operation was a mouthful – a radical trachelectomy. I had never heard of it before, which wasn’t surprising since I was only the second person that Dr Gleeson had performed it on in Ireland. She explained it was a new procedure to try to save the womb, for which she had received extensive training in America. Previous treatments for cervical cancer had tended to be rather brutal, whipping out the womb perhaps too hastily in some cases. Now at least there was some hope I would be able to have a child. Even so, there were no guarantees; Dr Gleeson would not know until she opened me up what tissues and organs needed to be removed. So when I consented to the surgery, it was really an open consent. I had no idea what exactly would be taken, what would be spared, what would be salvaged. Within days I was whisked into surgery with little time to think, let alone talk to the other girl who had had the same surgery.
‘Will I be able to have a baby?’
These were my first words when I came around after the general anaesthetic. Even though I had put it out of my mind before the surgery, it crept to the fore again, especially when my defences were down. It was something I just couldn’t suppress or deny, no matter how hard I tried. I was now at the start of a long and rough road to recovery. During the surgery my cervix was removed along with the top few centimetres of my vagina and the tissue around my cervix. The lymph glands and nodes on either side of my groin were also removed in another operation done at the same time called a lymphadenectomy. Thankfully, my womb was left in place but closed off with a large permanent stitch, except for a small opening to allow for menstruation. If I were to get pregnant in the future, the baby would be delivered by Caesarean section.
Not ever having had an operation before, I was not sure what to expect. In hindsight, I didn’t think it was going to be as severe as it was. Back then there wasn’t the luxury of keyhole surgery; I was basically cut open from front to back in my nether region. Afterwards there were drips, drains and catheters of every size and length coming out of me in all directions. I was also plugged with a vaginal dressing. By far the worst were the tubes draining blood from the lymphadenectomy site. They were a nightmare, which I later learnt to my cost.
For days I lay in my hospital bed and couldn’t move, almost oblivious to what was going on around me. I was on morphine for the pain, which knocked me out and so I didn’t move. For the first week, I couldn’t take even a sup of water. Nothing was allowed to pass my lips. I was constantly vomiting from the morphine and had a bowl in permanent residence at my side. To moisten my mouth, I was given citrus swabs, which had the reverse effect. Even the smell of the citrus sent waves of nausea through me. My body was bloated after the surgery and felt as heavy as lead.
The trauma of the surgery was made bearable by my family’s incredible support. The love and care lavished on me by my mother helped make me feel safe and secure like in my childhood. My brother and sister-in-law arrived over from England and gave me tremendous support too. Bina was full of pearls of wisdom. I remember she would say ‘What’s meant for you won’t pass you by’. By way of explanation she would tell me that this is just a path in life, there will be an end to it. Everything happens for a reason. Although at the time, I was saying why is this bloody thing happening? I think her attitude came from her culture, from being a Hindu; it gives its people great strength in the face of adversity. Her own family were fantastic to me as well. Being close to her parents, they too knew of my plight. At that time, her mother was visiting relatives in Kenya and she brought a small group of people to the top of a small mountain and they prayed for me. I was incredibly touched. All these small little things, these acts of kindness and thoughtfulness, just made me wonder at the sacredness of life.
Many years later I learnt just how distressing my family found the hospital visits. My illness had come as a major shock to them. As bad as it was for me, I felt it worse for my family. I was lying there, looking at them, knowing they were upset. You just feel rather powerless. I was trying to get through the cancer but there was nothing I could do to end their living nightmare. My father would promptly leave work every day and come straight to the hospital and spend as much time with me as visiting hours permitted. He became such a regular that the nurses would joke ‘here’s your Dad in again’. I think he felt better watching what was going on directly from the inside rather than wondering like crazy at home. He followed my progress diligently, and empathised with me each time I was sick or in pain. As indeed did my mother. The day before I was to be mobilised, the nurses confided that it would be especially tough for me to get out of bed. As a result, he made a special effort to get in quick and early to the ward.
Their words rang true. It was terribly painful that morning. Much later in the day I was returning from the bathroom to the ward and had paused at the end of the passageway. The pain was intense and I clutched onto the wall for support and slowly inched myself onto a nearby chair. A nurse had pointed my father in my direction and he walked cautiously up the long corridor towards me. I glanced up at the sound of footsteps approaching. The look in his eyes was of such loving tenderness and compassion, the kind that passes between father and daughter at special moments. No words were needed. So pitiful did I look that he felt he would have to teach me to walk all over again.
I had developed a complication with one of the drains but it would be days before it was confirmed by a scan. In the meantime the pain to be endured was so horrible that moving around became an ordeal each time. The nurses would urge me to straighten up to make walking easier but it was the one thing I could not do. I was miserable and frustrated that no one would believe me at first. The pain became so unbearable, almost like having a heart attack, that I moaned for two days solid. All I could say was that there was something wrong. Finally I was sent for a scan. It revealed that one of the drains had dislodged and the tubing was wrapped around some tissue or other. Removing the drain proved horrendous. It just had to be pulled out, without sedation.
‘Hold your breath now. Deep breath.’
Needless to say, I was relieved when it was all over and could put things in perspective. The incident with the drain was a small price to pay for surviving the cancer.
My recovery continued but was slow, having to spend three long weeks in the hospital. About two weeks after the surgery, the registrar on Dr Gleeson’s team, Dr Edgar Mocanu, arrived in and told us he would be back in an hour to give us the results of the biopsies taken during surgery. In all the commotion with the drain and lulled from the effects of the painkillers, I had overlooked my prognosis. Until then, I had forgotten how serious it was. At least my parents were with me that day and could share my anxiety and the suspense. Of course everything started to race through my mind. What if they hadn’t got all the cancer, what if it was in my lymph nodes, what if I needed chemotherapy or radiotherapy, how would I cope with all that? Was I going to die?
The hour seemed the longest in history, as if waiting to be sentenced to death. It was a bizarre time and my body didn’t feel like mine – more like I had been run over by a bus and was undergoing an out-of-body experience. I shrank into the bed like a corpse.
‘I think she’s going to die in the bed,’ my mother said, her anguished tone audible.
I just wasn’t expecting the news. For the hour we waited, Dr Mocanu’s face was imprinted in my mind. And all I could think was ‘Oh God’. But I needn’t have worried. True to his word, he returned on the hour and with the biggest smile on his face.
‘You are one lucky person, Caroline. I don’t know who’s been praying for you.’
We laughed knowingly. It was Bina’s mother up a mountain invoking the power of God. But I did feel lucky, lucky that I had met Dr Gleeson and the GP in Tallaght. My diagnosis was early stage cancer, spreading fast into the deeper layers of my cervix. Only for it being caught at the time it could have spread to my lymph glands and I dread to think where else.
The news was definitely something to celebrate. It certainly gave a boost to my recovery. A week later, I was discharged from hospital, admittedly a little earlier than normal because I really wanted to go home. I decided to go back to the apartment I shared with Lisa in Tallaght, though my parents were a little disappointed. They would have preferred if I had gone home with them to recuperate but I was anxious to get things back to normal as quickly as possible. There was only one problem. I came home with the urinary catheter still in, as the muscles in my bladder had not yet regained control. It would take another three weeks before they did. It also meant I had to measure my urinary output during that time to make sure my bladder and kidneys were working! Little did I think that my friend Lisa would turn into my nursemaid, but I am eternally grateful she did. She took charge and before long was helping to wash and bathe me. Her kindness and goodness were truly overwhelming. My mother had also nearly taken up residence in the apartment and helped as much as possible too. Every day she came to visit and made sure I had plenty of nourishing food to eat and was warm and comfortable. Deirdre too with all her nursing skills was just fantastic.
Though I was a little incapacitated and totally bloated, it was a relief to be at home, in my own bed with familiar sights and sounds. Being girlie girls and clean freaks, Lisa and I had gone to great efforts to make the apartment cosy and a home after we first moved in. With our stylish lamps from IKEA and surrounded by photos of nights outs, holiday snaps and ornaments, it was as good as a tonic. What I loved most was our black lamp that spun around like disco lights as colourful as a kaleidoscope. It had pride of place beside one of the three sittingroom windows overlooking the street. Niall used to say he always knew if we were at home because the light would be on and he could see it from the street.
Even so, I had underestimated just how hard it would be to climb the stairs properly to my apartment. As a result I stayed indoors for the first four to five weeks. It took weeks before I could go for short walks in the neighbourhood. After I left hospital I also developed lymphoedema in my right leg. This kind of swelling happens after the lymph glands in your groin are removed and perhaps the trouble with the drain didn’t help matters either. The condition was news to me, as I had not heard about it in the hospital. Luckily, after some time I got in contact with a physiotherapist in Tallaght, who had experience in manual lymph drainage, the treatment required to manage it.
Holed up in the apartment, I passed the time watching TV and videos, reading and listening to music. But without my friends and parents I would have gone crazy. I enjoyed hearing about what my friends were up to and what was going on in their lives. I always had a good laugh with Lisa. She was such a reservoir of strength and it was always pleasant to be in her company. My father always used to say if he had two daughters, Lisa would be the second. She really did become part of our family and they appreciated everything she did for me.
It took five months before I was fit to return to work. Much of that time was spent thinking and coming to terms with what I had gone through. The question of whether I would be able to have a baby or not was never far off. I wondered what the other Irish girl who had the radical trachelectomy had thought too. Had she been able to have a child? What had her recovery been like? Had she had any long-term problems? Before being discharged from hospital, Dr Gleeson had suggested it might be worth speaking to her, as she was around my age. In fact, she thought it might even do the two of us some good.
When I took the girl’s telephone number from Dr Gleeson, admittedly I was a bit reluctant. At the time I wanted to put the surgery behind me. To move on and forget. I didn’t want to be going to any mad counselling sessions, as I saw it. I didn’t want to be asked how I was feeling and what were my fears. I didn’t want anyone to tell me how I should cope. But after a few weeks at home, I had a change of heart. Summoning up the courage, I went to the phone box outside the apartment and rang the girl.
As soon as I began talking to her, her voice sounded familiar. She asked me where I was living.
‘I’m actually renting an apartment up here in Tallaght,’ I replied, wracking my brain to remember where I had heard her voice before.
‘I’m in Tallaght as well,’ she answered, incredulous.
‘Oh right,’ I said, ‘you sound familiar.’
‘No, YOU sound familiar.’
And would you believe it we actually knew each other, or rather had previously met socially on a number of occasions. After the initial phone call we met up a couple of times to exchange surgery stories. For her, it was still unbelievable that she was the first person in Ireland to undergo the surgery, while I was shocked to realise we were two girls of the same age and so young for cancer to have struck. Behind it all, we wondered how it could have happened.
Amid all the pain and distress during my recovery, there was one beacon of light on the horizon. It was an unexpected outcome that I scarcely could have imagined possible. Before the cancer, I palled around with a group of friends, many of whom worked for Intel. Niall was part of that group. I had first met him a year or so before I had got sick, when he worked for an external company that supplied parts to Intel. Years later I learnt that Niall, on those daily trips to the company, would make it his business to walk near where I worked hoping to get my attention. But of course I was oblivious to all this at the time. Maybe the fact that he was a little younger than me made me fail to notice him. Later we all socialised as part of a big group and I enjoyed his company, whether it was drinks after work or house parties. After I was discharged from hospital, Niall was one of the first to visit me in the apartment. Mostly he would call around during the day, seeing that he then worked the night-time shift. Chatting and joking, soon we became closer and our friendship deepened. I began to look forward to seeing him each day and excited when the buzzer on the door finally sounded. Before long, I had fallen in love with him.
When my strength to get out and about returned, he finally plucked up the courage to ask me out. Our first date was a trip to the cinema to watch some light-hearted film and our second was to Dublin Zoo. It might be a cliché that the zoo is a favourite haunt of couples, but it was one of the best dates I ever had. It was a joy to be out in the warm summer air strolling around, listening to the cries of monkeys and screeches of baboons and watching penguins waddling in the blue-tiled pool. Life felt like it was getting back to normal and even a simple thing like a trip to the zoo was an exotic adventure. Romance in the air just made it all the more special. I suppose I learnt too that if someone is there for you during your darkest hours, they get to know you pretty well. They see you at your worst but are still prepared to stick by you, through thick and thin, and wait for happier times. There was no pretence or playing games: we could just be ourselves. On the way home from the zoo, we stopped by my parent’s house in Palmerstown. It was a sign that our relationship was becoming serious. My parents took to Niall almost immediately and within a year we were engaged.
It had all happened so fast but we felt sure of ourselves. We were only going out for four months when we took a drive one Sunday afternoon and ended up in Citywest. The building boom in Ireland was starting to take off and houses were sprouting up west of Tallaght towards Saggart. There were fine views of the Dublin Mountains and the sense of open space and fresh air was exhilarating, almost like you were in the countryside. However, our relationship, even in its infancy, was reaching a crossroads. Niall was interested in going to Australia and hoped that I would come with him and we could build a life together Down Under. Moving to Australia was an exciting prospect for me too, but my hospital appointments and check-ups prevented it. It was too soon after my recovery. I knew I would have to be followed up by the Coombe for at least ten years. That’s what stopped me. So that Sunday afternoon, driving around Citywest, we decided to have a gander at the newly built houses. It was a momentous decision. As soon as we laid eyes on one house in particular, it felt so right. Before we knew it, we had applied for a mortgage and got it. We saved hard and thanks to our families, who helped out, we were able to buy a home. I hoped before long that the patter of tiny feet would echo through the house and we would be a family for real.
Chapter 3
Attending the HARI Unit
Now that my illness was well behind me, I settled down and threw my energies into building a life with Niall and making our house a home. I also got into the rhythm of going for regular outpatient appointments with Dr Gleeson at the Coombe. At first these were every three months, then weaned down to every six months for several years and then yearly. Life started to feel normal again and Niall and I eventually married in September 2002.
Only once during my check-ups did I get a serious jolt. It happened after a routine smear test.
‘Mmm, I don’t know if I like the feel of that,’ said Dr Gleeson, after examining me.
‘Oh, don’t tell me that,’ I pleaded.
She glanced at me and, knowing that I was such a terrible worrier, patted my arm.
‘Okay, come into the day ward tomorrow at seven.’
I needed no encouragement to be there bright and early the next morning, ready and willing. Niall accompanied me to the day surgical unit and I think he was worse than me, dreading hospitals and sickness of any kind. A typical man. But I knew I was in good hands with Dr Gleeson, who was thorough and left no stone unturned when it came to my care. An examination under anaesthetic was performed and revealed scar tissue, which thankfully was easily remedied. I was discharged later that day and within days I was back to my old self.
My journey to be a mother truly began about a year after my cervical surgery. The time seemed right to start trying for a baby now that my internal wounds were well healed. Besides, I was curious to see if the surgery had worked, though at the same time I knew I was likely to face problems. My menstrual cycle was never normal after my surgery, in fact, there were times when I feared the worst after very heavy bleeding. At one point, I was almost certain the cancer had come back. Luckily, Dr Gleeson put my mind at ease. She was always very attentive and supportive. Later we postponed trying for a baby due to an underactive thyroid, but I began again in earnest around 2001.
Over the years, getting pregnant just never happened. If I did a pregnancy test once, I did it a million times. Yet there were no moments of intense joy standing in the bathroom seeing a craved-for blue line or strip. Because my cycle was irregular, I was doing tests willy nilly, buying ovulation kits or pregnancy tests to beat the band. But all without success. Each time I had myself convinced it would be positive. Eventually, I abandoned doing pregnancy tests altogether because they were only upsetting me more and seemed pointless. I never did find out if I could carry my baby to full term either. The infertility was something that Dr Gleeson was conscious of too, year after year, appointment after appointment.
‘No baby yet?’ she would ask each time I was ushered into her outpatients clinic.
In reply, I would shake my head and purse my lips. Those words became so familiar to me.
‘When I see you next time, it’ll be in the baby clinic,’ she would cheerfully say at the end of each visit, pushing me just a little.
And six months later I would duly traipse in with nothing to report.
‘I’m not seeing you in the baby clinic!’ she would exclaim in jest.
I would just shrug my shoulders.
‘Well, I’m not being left with many choices. Can anyone else help me now?’
The disappointment on my face and frustration in my voice was becoming harder to hide. After three years of trying for a baby I was getting nowhere. Towards the end, Dr Gleeson had put me on a course of Clomid to stimulate the follicles in my ovaries but other than regulating my periods nothing had happened and later I was taken off it. In June 2004, she arranged for me to have a laparoscopy to investigate the infertility. It turned out that one of my fallopian tubes was blocked at the time, though it had not necessarily always been blocked.
The time had come to refer me on to fertility experts at the Human Assisted Reproduction Ireland Unit, otherwise known as the HARI Unit. In one way, my mind was moving in that direction anyway. Over the years my GP recognised the pain I was feeling, the longing for a baby that came to nothing. The blighted hope. The hurt that never went away. She could empathise with me and help me to consider other options.
‘Don’t wake up when you’re fortysomething, Caroline, and say why didn’t I try IVF,’ she advised me one day.
The HARI Unit was situated on the grounds of the Rotunda Hospital, where I had been born. Maybe that connection was a sign in itself, I thought. With some luck, it might make my dream a reality. Around September 2004, Niall and I first entered the unit, its low building dwarfed by the tall buildings and townhouses on Parnell Square, one of the biggest Georgian squares in Dublin. The vast Rotunda Hospital complex, bordered by wrought-iron railings, was the oldest maternity hospital in Ireland but looked more like a parliament with its impressive ornate buildings and social rooms of a bygone age. The unit was located to the rear in a two-storey red-bricked modern building. Stepping over its threshold, I was armed with a string of questions as long as a ladder. I would have to be as dogged and persistent as ever until I got answers. The experience of being a patient had also empowered me, no longer willing to blindly accept what was being said: ‘Right, yes, yes, yes. I’ll do that. I’ll do that.’
Inside, along one corridor colour photographs of babies and toddlers decorated the wall like prizes; success stories I presumed. I held my breath as I too dared to dream. We were guided to a small waiting room upstairs where a number of other couples sat in silence. The silence in fact was overwhelming. No one spoke or even gave a knowing nod. It was particularly hard for me because I was born to natter. So much so that when we later left the building Niall slagged me off.
‘I bet you were just dying to talk in there.’
Dr Gleeson had referred me to Professor Robert Harrison, the father of IVF in Ireland, but he had retired in the meantime. As we sat waiting, I wondered who would see us instead. And then all of a sudden a doctor put a firm hand on the back of my shoulder.
‘Well, come on in. I know who this is,’ he said, smiling at me.
It was Dr Edgar Mocanu, whom I had met in the Coombe six years before. He had just taken over from Professor Harrison. It was such a pleasant surprise to see him, though I was a bit shocked at first. I had been bracing myself to explain my medical history in great detail to an unfamiliar face. It came as such a relief that he knew it already having been on the surgical team in the Coombe.
‘Of course, I know your medical history,’ he exclaimed. ‘I was there during the operation.’
