Why her?...1995
Marriage can be a tricky thing. Couples never really know what they are signing up for. They all think their spouses are “the one”. But are they really? Life also has a hidden agenda, throwing roadblocks in our paths of happiness as it eagerly watches with anticipation, to see what we do next. Will we plough through them, go over them, around them or avoid them by making a complete detour? People’s choices are also impossible to predict. Mia was at a stage in her life when she was slowly becoming aware of these things.
Mia and Wolfie had been married for seven years and were celebrating the arrival of their second child. Chloe was the perfect baby. During her first three weeks, she did nothing but feed and sleep, and was more settled than her brother, Alex, at the same age.
I have my pigeon pair, my little darlings. A nice home, a loving husband. I’m so
happy.
Late one morning, Mia sat in her mother Natalia’s kitchen drinking the warm brew she had prepared, the lightly caramelized and almost nutty scent of her percolated coffee hanging in the air. Mia was exhausted from the nightmares that plagued her and kept her awake. With her mouth dry, her brow furrowed and wringing her hands, she hesitantly whispered to her mother, “Mamma, sometimes when I’m breast-feeding Chloe and I’m gently stroking her, she makes this kind of annoyed sound. I feel like she’s telling me off!”
Natalia placed her hands palm-to-palm, in the prayer position, as she looked up to the heavens and replied, “Please, don’t be ridiculous, Mia! You don’t want a baby with problems. I’m sure you are imagining things.” As much as she could, Mia tried to push these worrying thoughts from her mind.
When Chloe was four weeks old, she became more alert and aware of her surroundings, and this was when Mia started noticing other things. Chloe liked to sleep in the most convoluted, awkward positions and disliked being swaddled. Also, her pupils never stayed in the centre of her eye when she was awake, like normal pupils do; both eyes were always off to the upper left side, as if she was continually peering at something around the corner. Mia sensed something ominous and had not yet voiced her concerns to her husband. She took Chloe to the baby health sister for her check-up by a round-faced brunette called Narelle.
“Why do you think my baby is always looking to the left like that? I mean, look at her. Why does she seem to be comfortable when she is all twisted and contorted?”
Narelle replied, smiling broadly and with a relaxed voice, “It’s just because she was crooked in the womb. Don’t worry, she’ll grow out of it.” However, the feeling of dread that gathered in her gut could not be ignored.
Since Chloe was due for her vaccination, Mia took her to see Dr Knight, their family doctor. She placed her daughter on her lap, as he prepared his syringe, and Chloe instinctively wiggled into her favoured twisted position. Her head on Mia’s left thigh, torso over to the right and her legs back over to the left. Mia said, “You know she always wants to be crooked like this. It’s weird but that’s what she likes.”
Dr Knight, seemingly unworried, chuckled as he injected Chloe in the thigh, and responded, “All babies are different, aren’t they?” Chloe who was already half asleep did not have any reaction.
Finally, when she was nine weeks old, Mia decided to make an appointment with the hospital, wanting a definitive answer once and for all. In the consultation room, the paediatrician listened to Mia’s summary of her daughter’s life to date. Dr Tucker performed some simple tests to check her reflexes. Her knees jerked as something resembling a small hammer struck her semi-flexed knees. He then held her elbow between his thumb and fingers, tapped his thumb at first on her bicep, and then used the tiny hammer so that her elbow jerked in response. He then shone a light into her eyes, and watched her pupils dilate and constrict. He held her in his outstretched arms as he deliberately spun 360 degrees a couple of times in his swivel chair. Chloe’s eyes did their familiar dance quickly to the right and then settled to the left again.
Dr Tucker was a man in his fifties with gold-rimmed glasses that sat at the end of his nose. He made eye contact with Mia, reaching for his doctor’s pad, his bushy eyebrows having shifted slightly upwards and his forehead tightening. “I agree that there’s something wrong. Let’s get an ultrasound done. She can sit on your lap while you hold her. The test can be done through the top of her head, through the fontanelle. It won’t hurt, and it might give us an answer.”
They were ushered to another part of the hospital and into a dark room. She held Chloe on her lap as a sharped-faced sonographer squeezed slimy gel onto the tip of her probe and placed this atop Chloe’s head. Mia watched the monitor; a fan of grainy white, a blob of black appeared.
“What’s that?”
“I don’t know. The doctor will need to look at the film and make his findings. He will then discuss these with you,” she said, her voice having risen an octave as she stretched over pushing buttons so the machine clicked and beeped. Her maternal intuition told her immediately there was something wrong. The sonographer made no eye contact with her but kept her eyes fixated on the screen, her face looking troubled.
She called her husband from the hospital. He said he would meet her there. Mia and Chloe were once again ushered into another waiting room. She waited there anxiously for more than half an hour, sensing that something was off kilter. Finally, the nurse called them in to see Dr Tucker again. Mia entered the small office carrying Chloe, who had not made a sound, and found him sitting there studying a printed report that he held in his hand. He looked apprehensive. “I’ve had a look at Chloe’s ultrasound and there is something there. There’s a mass that’s approximately one third of the left side of her brain in size. I’ve made a call to Professor Fourrier at the Children’s Hospital; he’s a neurologist and top in his field. He will see you today, and I’ve organised an ambulance to take you both there immediately.”
“What is it?” asked Mia. “What’s the mass?”
“In layman’s terms, she’s had a stroke. It would have happened just before, during, or straight after birth, but Professor Fourrier will be able to tell you more.” Mia’s shoulders drooped as the tears streamed down her cheeks. He paused as he took her hand and gave it a squeeze; this act of kindness caressed her aching soul.
Mia stepped out of his office to find Wolfie waiting. Concerned, she updated him on Dr Tucker’s findings. He wanted to find out more before drawing any conclusions. The ambulance arrived, and Mia and Chloe were escorted into the back of the waiting vehicle. Wolfie followed in his new company car. It was a forty-minute ride in the ambulance. Mia sat rigidly on a seat; the colour having drained from her face with her hands clenched tightly in her lap. Chloe slept on the bed, looking tiny and helpless.
At the Children’s Hospital, they were expedited through the Emergency Department to another room where Wolfie met them. Professor Fourrier sauntered in. He was a tall, wiry looking man with a head of white hair and a wrinkled face. He wore an oversized lab coat and as he approached them the ID badge that hung from his lapel swung from side to side. He advised, “The next step will be to perform an MRI. This will give us a clearer image of what’s going on inside. Since she is so small, we can probably get away with giving her a small dose of Phenergan, which should be enough to make her drowsy and lie still for the test.” Wolfie and Mia gave their consent.
From behind a glass window, they watched a listless Chloe slowly slide into a tunnel. Various images appeared on the screen now with that familiar black mass. As soon as the procedure was completed, they were taken to a large sterile ward with rows of empty beds. In green vinyl armchairs at the end of Chloe’s bed, under the harsh fluorescent lights, they waited for Professor Fourrier. Two cumbersome looking bandages held an intravenous line in place, from her delicate arm to a drip, whilst another machine monitored her vital signs, periodically beeping softly.
“I’m worried that something’s really wrong with her,” Mia confided to Wolfie.
“Let’s just wait and see what the doctor says. I’m sure it’s nothing major,” he replied calmly. She had an uneasy feeling in the pit of her stomach that was getting stronger by the minute.
Professor Fourrier entered the room and pulled up a chair to face them. He spoke to them in a matter-of-fact tone. “I’ve just been looking at your daughter’s films, and from what I can see, she has had what we call an infarct, or as Dr Tucker has explained, she’s had a stroke. A blood vessel in her brain has burst causing extensive damage, and that’s what the black mass is. It’s basically dead tissue. This large mass of scar tissue covers a third of the whole left side of her brain.”
Once again, the tears flowed freely down Mia’s face. He continued, “This most likely happened at the time of birth ... She’ll most likely never walk, never talk ... She’ll be in a vegetative state and will probably have cerebral palsy ...”
The room spun and Mia suddenly felt lightheaded and was trembling all over. Wolfie, who had not uttered a word, squared his already squared shoulders, but then stood up and stormed out of the ward. She was trying to focus on the doctor’s moving lips but could not make sense of anything he was saying. She could no longer absorb any more of the dreadful, grim future he was painting for Chloe. She sat there, shedding tears, her shoulders shaking uncontrollably from her sobbing. He remained unmoved and continued with his unpleasant prognosis.
When he had finished, Mia asked, “So what happens next? What do we do now?”
He replied, “Just live your life normally. The damage is done.”
“Will it get worse?”
“No, the damage has been done.”
She felt a surge of warm love rise as she looked across to Chloe, lying still in her oversized bed, and it spread throughout her like a fountain as the neurologist’s words echoed in her head.
No, not my daughter! That can’t be right. I’m sure you already have more movement than that. Never! I’ll make sure that you’re the best version of yourself! I love you so, so much. I didn’t think I could love you more than I do, but I do! We’ll get through this together. I promise I’ll do everything to help you.
She made Chloe a secret promise, a secret pact, right then and there, not asked for but given freely and with love. Mia emerged from the building wondering where Wolfie was, having no idea where he had parked. She found him sitting on a wooden bench in the nearby carpark, shoulders now slumped and a scowl on his face, looking down at the hands that lay limp in his lap. They walked to the car in silence, both absorbed in their tortured thoughts.
She strapped Chloe into the car capsule and got in. Mia’s face was streaked black from her running mascara, and it was smeared around her eyes, making her look like a panda bear. Her eyeballs were glazed, her hair a mess and her characteristically impeccably applied red lipstick was smudged. Wolfie concentrated on driving.
“Why has this happened to her? How could this happen to her? Where is God? Why did he let this happen?” she asked, distraught.
Wolfie wanted to know if the doctor had said anything else. They did not discuss his abrupt departure. That was the last thing on Mia’s mind. They were driving back to her parents’ house to collect Alex. As they pulled up in their driveway, Natalia came out to greet them. She asked in her thick Italian accent and all smiles, “Well? It was nothing? You were worrying for no reason?”
“She’s had a stroke,” replied Mia curtly.
“NO! NO!”, screamed Natalia as she ran to the baby capsule that Mia held, “Oh my God! No!” Gino came out to see what the commotion was. Natalia was crying, completely devastated. When they explained, he was also visibly upset, though he shed no tears. Mia had only ever seen her father cry once, when his mother had died.
Mia studied the scene with her eyes wide and her shoulders hunched. There was a palpable sense of despair in the air and in her body. She glanced over at Wolfie, her pillar of strength. He watched all of this unfold without showing any emotion. Her idyllic life seemed to be in danger, and no one around her seemed capable of handling these looming events. It was then that she heard it, a friendly voice in her head, that gave her strength and the resolve to help her daughter. It was loud, and it was clear, “YOU'VE GOT THIS! YOU CAN DO IT!”
