I LOVE YOU, MUM
Liz Eade thought she would never hear those four precious little words from her girl
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ost expectant mothers dream about their children’s futures – wondering whether they’ll be shy, smart or wonderfully chatty – and I was no different when my daughter Sophie was born. But what do you do when doctors tell you your seemingly perfect baby has an incurable genetic disorder? How do you come to terms with knowing she’ll need lifelong care and you’ll never hear her call you ‘Mummy’, or say ‘I love you’?
My husband, Mark, then 31, and I were overjoyed when I fell pregnant in April 24
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2014, especially as I’d suffered irregular periods as a teenager and doctors had warned I might struggle to conceive. In January 2015, aged 29, I gave birth to 6lb baby girl Sophie, and she seemed utterly perfect in every way, with her smattering of dark hair and her big, brown eyes. She’d giggle as I blew raspberries on her belly – and although she suffered a bit with reflux, causing her to projectile vomit her milk, I was told lots of babies did. But, by March 2015, at 10 weeks, Sophie was still struggling to hold her head up
like other babies her age were doing. Instead, it lolled slightly to the right. At first, doctors told us not to worry, assuring us that Sophie would get stronger – only she didn’t, and by six months old she couldn’t roll over and would just slump in her high chair.
Search for answers After tests, Sophie was diagnosed with torticollis – a painfully twisted and tilted neck. It was something she’d probably had since birth, but which had gone unnoticed. A physiotherapist did
