SHE Writing Competition

Open Finalist: Emily Robertson

SHE who did SHE who can … did Could she?

They said she could, that she must. She was tired, depleted, mind and body. It seemed her very soul was waving farewell as she laid there. With a groan she forced herself to sit upright, the ache and heaviness spread to her limbs, reaching her fingertips and starting its return journey to her equally exhausted brain.

‘Would you like to breastfeed him?’ asked the nurse. She nodded numbly. That was expected right? The nurse handed her the delicately wrapped bundle, pink squashed alien face peering out the top at her. How on earth did she do this again? This hadn’t been in the pre-birth lessons.

The nurse bustled around her offering words of encouragement that didn’t permeate her brain. The tears were threatening to fall as she struggled to get him to latch, panic flaring, perhaps unreasonably, that her child would starve in the hours since he’d been born. But her brain couldn’t hear that right now. Eventually her sweet baby that she’d been pining for, for the last two years latched, and it hurt. Was she doing something wrong? Where was this feeling of overwhelming love people talked about? She knew she loved him but where was the joy? The Insta worthy post to gush about him? Was she broken? Could she do this?

The thoughts swirled on an endless spool, drowning her. Her baby with his squashed little alien face happily fed, while she sat hunched in pain over him at the bad latch and the overwhelming feeling of being a failure already.

The nurse left and the tears came silently. The sobs suppressed as best she could.

‘First baby?’ asked the voice from the other bed, obscured by the curtain pulled between them. She hurriedly wiped her face on her sleeve and cleared her throat.

‘No, he’s my second’ she replied, shame weighing so heavy on her tired shoulders. How on earth was she going to manage two? The plans she’d laid out seemed to vanish like smoke as she tried to grasp them.

‘You can do this mumma’ said the voice firmly. She felt annoyed at the words, “you got this” was bandied around so much, what did it even mean now?

‘Yeah, I know, I just….’ Her words failed her. Just what? She was sinking here on this bed. It felt like she was drowning right next to a lifeguard.

‘You need to tell the Doctor when she comes in’ the voice behind the curtain told her.

‘Why do you say that?’ she asked, wiping again at tears that continued to leak.

‘Because you have to do it all’ the voice simply replied, ‘So you must be ok.’

She gently laid her precious bundle in his clear crib, his face turned towards her as he quietly snuffled, still getting used to using his lungs. As she waited for the doctor she laid down and watched him sleep, drifting off herself, thoughts settling as she decided.

I can ask for help.