We were quite oblivious to the effect all the extra waste might have on the environment, and when it came to the plastics, recycling was not a word we were familiar with. Greenpeace was a fledgling organisation at this time, and I was vaguely aware of its anti-nuclear protests in Vancouver in the early Seventies, but to be honest I didn’t make any connection between polluting the world with nuclear bombs and creating piles of NHS waste. I don’t think I was alone in this ignorance, either. Midwives generally enjoyed the luxury of it all, knowing that the next box of shiny new supplies was only a tick on an order slip away, and rejoicing in the fact we no longer had to endure the smell of washing out metal bedpans.
If we ever did think twice about our actions, the extreme busyness of the wards gave us a good excuse for being profligate. On a typical day shift we had up to fifteen ladies arriving on the labour ward, and usually on nights five midwives would deliver two or three babies each, making us very grateful indeed to have such plentiful supplies so readily available.
On one such hectic shift, on a warm day in July 1973, I was dispatched to look after a new arrival on the labour ward. My patient was a rotund, jolly-looking lady called Rosemary Battersby. I will never forget her for many reasons, and she was actually the very first patient I confided in about my own pregnancy.
Examining Rosemary in the admissions room, I was surprised to see her labour was so well established that she really should have gone straight into a delivery room, but at that time there was a strict process we midwives were instructed to follow. All new arrivals were seen first in the admissions room, where many were still shaved and given an enema, provided labour was indeed established and they were already at least three centimetres dilated. Next, the women were taken to a first-stage room, where they laboured until they reached about nine to ten centimetres. Finally, when they were very nearly ready to push the baby out, they went into a delivery room.
Looking back it wasn’t a good system, as it meant we were often shifting ladies between rooms when they were in the advanced stages of labour and could barely walk, let alone get on and off trolleys and beds. It was certainly not unusual to see women actually pushing as they were wheeled along corridors.
‘My goodness, you’ve done a remarkable job all by yourself,’ I said to Rosemary, seeing that she was already an impressive nine centimetres dilated.
‘To be honest, I tried to put off comin’ in until after the tennis,’ she told me.
I knew Wimbledon was on, and there had been great excitement as it was the first time the women’s final had been between two Americans, Billie Jean King and Chris Evert. I’m not a big tennis fan, though, and I hadn’t really been following it.
‘Well, I’m glad you’re here now,’ I told her.
When I felt Rosemary’s huge abdomen, her contractions were frequent and strong, though she didn’t appear to be suffering too much and even managed to give me a wide smile. I told her I was going to by-pass the first-stage room and take her straight to a delivery room as her labour was advancing so well, and I remarked that she appeared very good at dealing with the pain.
‘I used to be a dancer,’ she said proudly. ‘Did the summer season at Blackpool for eight years running. My Billy reckons I must still have muscles of steel, under all this blubber!’
She let out a raucous laugh as she patted her tummy, and I laughed, too. This was her first baby, and I had a feeling I was going to really enjoy this birth.
‘That’s ’im there,’ she said, nodding down the corridor as I helped her waddle carefully into a delivery room.
Billy was sitting on a plastic chair, his nose buried in a Manchester Evening News. ‘’Ere, Billy, wish me luck!’ Rosemary called over, making him bounce up as if his seat had turned into a trampoline. He was a well-padded man with ruddy cheeks, a small goatee beard and long, straggly hair. I noticed he was wearing a purple jacket and wide-collared chocolate brown shirt, which made him look somewhat bohemian compared with most men I was used to seeing in Ashton.
Billy bounded up to us, looking a tad unbalanced in a pair of camel brown platform boots, and asked animatedly whether it was ‘show time’.
‘Nearly!’ Rosemary chuckled. ‘Midwife here says I’m ready to go straight into the labour room!’
Billy planted a noisy kiss on his wife’s forehead and told her, ‘Break a leg now, Rosie!’
‘Is your husband in the entertainment business, too?’ I asked once we’d got Rosemary into a hospital gown and she was lying down fairly comfortably, a foetal heart monitor strapped across her expansive belly.
‘Oh yes,’ she nodded.
Rosemary was huffing and puffing now, the effort of heaving herself onto the delivery bed seemingly giving her more grief than the labour pains themselves. Nevertheless, she was determined to tell me all about her Billy.
‘He was a Redcoat at Butlins at Skegness before I knew him,’ she panted. ‘And we met when he joined a band and – uuuurggghhhh, that were a nasty one – did the summer season at Blackpoooowl. Ow, owww, owwwww! Is it meant to be hurting so much? I were fine a minute ago. He plays the ukulele like a dream.’
With that she let out a few rather musical notes of her own as the strength of her contractions intensified again and again, and yet again.
‘I must be mad! Why am I doing this?’ she wailed flamboyantly at one point, but I could tell she was simply letting off steam and was actually coping really well. Rosemary was clearly very comfortable taking centre stage, and even at the peak of labour she couldn’t help holding forth.
‘You … urgh – you got any yerself, Nurse?’ she asked me at one point, quite unexpectedly. ‘Babies, I mean?’
‘No … but I’m just over three months pregnant!’ I blurted out, astonishing myself momentarily with my revelation.
Rosemary’s face lit up, and I felt a real connection to her.
‘Good luck, nuuurrgghhhhsseee! Sorry – sorry – sorry – I want to pu-pu-puuusssshhhhhh!’
It was less than fifteen minutes since we’d got her into this room, and no more than an hour since her arrival at the hospital, but I could see Rosemary was ready.
‘OK, OK,’ I said. ‘Wait until I tell you, wait a bit, wait a bit, big breath – go now!’
Rosemary gave a substantial push and I could see the baby’s head, advancing, just as I wanted it to.
‘All right?’ she puffed as she gasped for air.
‘Brilliant,’ I said. ‘Magnificent!’
I wanted this wonderful performance to conclude well. Rosemary’s sunny disposition had rubbed off on me, and I was enjoying this birth a great deal.
‘I need the same again, when I tell you … OK, OK, go again, keep going …!’
An almighty cry filled the entire room moments later, heralding the arrival of a very rosy-faced, bright-eyed baby girl who landed with a little bump on the bed. Scooping her up, my eyes immediately fell on the baby’s left arm. Instinctively, I reached for a cotton towel and draped it over the baby, leaving only her pretty little face peeping out.
I was very upset by what I’d seen. At the end of the baby’s left arm there was no hand. It was just a little stump, with a tiny bud of a thumb and no fingers. Rosemary was propped up on her elbows now, her eyes darting between her large deflated stomach and the baby in my arms. She seemed stunned into silence by the speed of the delivery, which had left her dragging in breath noisily. She could not have seen her daughter’s arm; I had covered her up so quickly I was sure Rosemary hadn’t seen what I had. It was down to me to break the news.
‘Congratulations Rosemary,’ I smiled warmly. ‘You have a lovely baby daughter.’
I