I NEVER KNEW WHAT HAPPENED TO MY BOY

When midwife Agnes Nisbett's son was born sleeping, she knew something needed to change

- ANNA MATHESON

Holding the hand of a mum in the final stages of labour, I gently encouraged her to push one last time. The room was quiet except for her sobs, already grieving for the baby not yet born. When her little girl arrived in silence, I wrapped her softly in a green blanket before I carried her away. The hospital would deal with what happened next while I comforted the devastated mother. 'I'm so sorry,' I whispered. It was the early 1970s and I was a midwife working at the Bond Street Maternity Hospital in Leicester. In those days, this was standard procedure - the mother of a stillborn would not be given the chance to hold their baby, to say goodbye, or to even see their child. It was tragic, and each time it happened, it never got any easier, but I just accepted that this was the case.

As a mother myself, having given birth to Ian, born in 1965, and Alison in 1967, I knew first-hand how important it was to have a good midwife. And by March 1973, I was pregnant with my third child.

When I reached my due date, the nursery was ready and Ian, then seven, and Alison, six, couldn't wait to meet their baby brother or sister. Husbands didn't attend births back then, so when I went in to be induced, James, then 39, a criminal barrister, dropped me off at the hospital with a kiss.

As part of my induction, I had my membranes ruptured but shortly after, when the midwife checked the baby's heartbeat with the stethoscope, she gave me the devastating news.

'I'm sorry,' she said, 'there's no heartbeat.'

It felt surreal as I tried to absorb the news I'd told so many other unlucky mums in the past, and time passed in a blur as contractions started and labour began.

PRECIOUS MOMENTS