The Long Haul

However much you long for the homecoming when your baby is in NICU, going home can be a shock. No monitors, no nurses to consult. Suddenly it's just you and your baby, the way it was always meant to be - but adjusting can be difficult. I was wild about potential infections when my girls came home, to the point of mania; one friend picked up her floorboards to check for mould; another purified the air with a bag of charcoal. Sometimes it's only after a trauma that one allows oneself to feel the enormity of it. So how do you adjust? On this final episode of Mother Ship, both my guests were themselves born prematurely. I talk to journalist Sarah diGregorio, whose wonderful new book is called Early: An Intimate History of Premature Birth and What It Teaches Us About Being Human. Sarah's daughter Mira was born at twenty-eight weeks and so Sarah has been in NICU twice - once as a mother, and once as the baby in the incubator. And I also called my friend, award-winning Israeli writer, Etgar Keret. When I was pregnant with my twins I interviewed Etgar about his wonderful memoir of having and being a son, The Seven Good Years, and over coffee he told me the story of his own premature birth, in the Sixties. Barely a few weeks later I was in hospital delivering the girls and I clung to his story like a talisman. So I asked him to tell it again, for the podcast. That really is a happily ever after.I have loved every moment of making this podcast, of hearing your stories, and knowing that you are connecting with me, with my friends, and with one another as you listen. Thank you for joining me on what has been an incredible journey. Francesca xMother Ship is brought to you by VINTAGE Books and produced by Leena Norms. We’d love to hear what you think – please rate and review to spread the word and follow us on social media:  https://www.instagram.com/francescasegal/https://twitter.com/vintagebooks Find out more about Francesca’s book at http://bit.ly/MotherShipBook.If you need more information about prematurity, help and support is available at www.bliss.org.uk.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this podcast I’ve tried to give voice to the mothers, and to make sure that all prematurity stories are told, even the hardest. But what’s it like from the other side? What is life like as a doctor, working in the perpetual crisis of a neonatal ward? Today Dr Roly Blumberg talks about the differences between planning a pregnancy and planning a birth, the rollercoaster ride of NICU, and what he wishes all his patients knew. Mother Ship is brought to you by VINTAGE Books and produced by Leena Norms. We’d love to hear what you think – please rate and review to spread the word and follow us on social media:  https://www.instagram.com/francescasegal/https://twitter.com/vintagebooks Find out more about Francesca’s book at http://bit.ly/MotherShipBook.If you need more information about prematurity, help and support is available at www.bliss.org.uk.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This interview with my friend Jess might be one of the hardest of my career. Going home empty-handed is everyone's greatest fear when a baby comes too early; but for Jess and her husband Pete that fear became a reality. I’m so grateful to Jess for sharing her experience. She told me all about her beautiful little red-haired boy, Rafi, from celebrating all that he achieved in his life to sharing the ways in which she and her family remember him today. It's our hope that anyone who has experienced their own tragedy will find comfort in hearing they are not alone.Mother Ship is brought to you by VINTAGE Books and produced by Leena Norms. We’d love to hear what you think – please rate and review to spread the word and follow us on social media:  https://www.instagram.com/francescasegal/https://twitter.com/vintagebooks Find out more about Francesca’s book at http://bit.ly/MotherShipBook. If you need more information about prematurity, help and support is available at www.bliss.org.uk  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week is all about the journey – the new normal, when your baby is in hospital. I talk to the amazing Inga Warren, who has devoted her fifty-year NHS career to nurturing that vital, living, invisible thing – the bond between parent and baby. Inga is full of practical advice, and she is also full of reassurance, which is equally important. My second guest is a nurse, Zowie, who knows more than most about life on our side of the incubator. Zowie has worked in Special Care for ten years, but has also had two children of her own in NICU. ‘I know,’ she told me. ‘I mean, I really get it.’ They are two very different, equally incredible women – it was a privilege to speak to each of them. Mother Ship is brought to you by VINTAGE Books and produced by Leena Norms. We’d love to hear what you think – please rate and review to spread the word and follow us on social media:  https://www.instagram.com/francescasegal/https://twitter.com/vintagebooks Find out more about Francesca’s book at http://bit.ly/MotherShipBook. If you need more information about prematurity, help and support is available at www.bliss.org.uk  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Mother Ship is a memoir of the fifty-six days my premature twins spent in hospital and, when it came out, readers sent me some incredible messages. Women wrote with their own stories of prematurity, sent photos of their beautiful babies, confided their fears about their children’s on-going battles, triumphed at what their preemies had overcome. And, over and over, the messages were about the beloved friends I met when we were expressing in the hospital milking shed. Some readers had made friends of their own but many hadn’t, and had found prematurity to be an incredibly lonely, isolating experience. And so we want our crew to be your crew. In this episode my friends and I throw open the doors of our milking shed, share our birth stories, our highs, our lows, and discuss the ways in which we believe hospitals can improve their holistic family care. Prematurity casts parents outside of the mainstream but, however it might feel, you are not alone. There are so many of us - your tribe is right here, and we get it.Mother Ship is brought to you by VINTAGE Books and produced by Leena Norms. We'd love to hear what you think – please rate and review to spread the word and follow us on social media:  https://www.instagram.com/francescasegal/https://twitter.com/vintagebooks Find out more about Francesca's book at http://bit.ly/MotherShipBook.If you need more information about prematurity, help and support is available at www.bliss.org.uk  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Prematurity is much more common than you’d imagine, but it’s so hard to find honest and open discussion about how it really feels when your baby is born too early. And so it was a particular honour to talk to singer-songwriter Sophie Ellis-Bextor, whose first two children were both premature. She and I talked about what happens when your birth story doesn’t unfold the way you’d imagined, what it’s like to go back into neonatal intensive care with a second baby, and all sorts of really vital and pressing issues, like whether she celebrates their due dates as well as their birthdays. Despite sepsis, a collapsed lung, and a norovirus scare, Sophie's boys are sixteen and eleven now, strapping boys who have come a long way since their days in NICU – and she’s had three more boys since then, too.  Mother Ship is brought to you by VINTAGE Books and produced by Leena Norms. We'd love to hear what you think – please rate and review to spread the word and follow us on social media:  https://www.instagram.com/francescasegal/https://twitter.com/vintagebooks Find out more about Francesca's book at http://bit.ly/MotherShipBook. If you need more information about prematurity, help and support is available at bliss.org.uk Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This podcast is about a pregnancy that doesn’t end the way it should; about what happens when your baby is born too early to survive alone. It’s about the parents, the babies, and the doctors who save them. Hosted by award-winning novelist Francesca Segal, whose memoir, Mother Ship, inspired this podcast.During the fifty-six days that her premature twins were in hospital, Francesca wrote a diary. That diary became a book, Mother Ship, and the incredible letters and emails from readers that began – and haven’t stopped – inspired this podcast. In each episode, Francesca will talk to friends and medics, parents and professionals about their experiences, so that new parents of premature babies feel supported and less alone. This is a place for the free exchange of stories, humour and support and information about prematurity and its consequences. Mother Ship is brought to you by VINTAGE Books and produced by Leena Norms. We'd love to hear what you think - please rate and review to spread the word and follow us on social media: https://www.instagram.com/francescasegal/https://twitter.com/vintagebooksFind out more about Francesca's book at http://bit.ly/MotherShipBook. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.