For almost twenty-six years, I had a son whose flesh I could touch and smell, whose jokes made me laugh, whose kindness and tolerance made me proud. Riley’s daily life and emotions were entwined with mine. He shaped my life.

But while I slept, my son died.

Now all I have are memories that I cannot hold in my arms. And Riley will not share the future with me. Even so, Riley still affects my life in countless ways. Some memories still make me laugh, but most make me sad.

In 1971, the year of Riley’s birth, Brisbane pulsated in opposition to the State of Emergency declared by Queensland’s Bjelke-Petersen government, which had denied the democratic rights of citizens to protest, and in particular against the forthcoming Springbok rugby tour which embodied the racist principles of apartheid. But my husband Kevin and I were more concerned about the impending birth of our second child.

Prior to Riley’s birth, in the fifth month of my pregnancy, I expressed concern to my obstetrician that I seemed to be very small. “Some people don’t realise that I’m pregnant. Shouldn’t I be bigger than this?” I asked.
Dr Fry was a weary man of few words and did not indulge in friendly chatter. During appointments, matters pertaining to my pregnancy were dealt with efficiently and quickly. A personal rapport was never established. “The baby will grow rapidly during this second trimester. We’ll see how things are going at your next appointment,” he responded.

At the next appointment, my size had not increased much, but I was assured that rapid growth would occur during the last trimester. Dr Fry had no doubt that I “would get a spurt on”. But six weeks before the expected birth date, he confirmed that the baby’s head was smaller than it should be, so I began weekly oestrogen tests, which monitored the baby’s progress.

“ Every detail about the baby’s development, except its sex, can be interpreted from these tests,” he assured me. This was the zenith of medical technology in 1971, before the advent of amniocentesis and ultrasounds. “If the tests reveal a problem, I’ll do an emergency caesarean delivery. But unless there are indications to the contrary, the baby is better off in the womb, rather than taking its chances outside in a humidicrib.”

However, Riley came naturally fourteen days after the expected date of arrival. It was a quick and easy birth.

He was born on a mild winter’s day, two weeks past his due date, on 15 July 1971, at 11.35am. I always told Riley that he was born just in time for lunch. We also told him, tongue-in-cheek, that he didn’t have a middle name because we couldn’t afford one, but in later years when he was at kindergarten I overheard the roll call one day for Riley John Brasch.

“ Riley hasn’t got a middle name,” I protested to the director, “John is not part of his name.”

“ I know,” she replied, “but he decided that he wanted to be Riley John Brasch because all the other children have middle names, and he wants one too.”

I paused. “Well, if he wants to be Riley John Brasch, then let him be.” We didn’t formalise this name change and Riley often joked about it in later life, telling us that he was a deprived child, a child without a middle name. We had purposely avoided giving our children middle names because they often become a source of embarrassment in later life, but Riley decided differently. “Deciding his own decides” as he later expressed himself, became a hallmark of Riley’s character as he grew up.

Riley was described to me as a ‘frail’ baby, weighing 5 lb 12 oz (2608 g). Dr Fry explained that the baby was dysmature because of placental insufficiency. Dysmaturity, or intrauterine growth retardation, describes an infant of significantly low birth weight, who is born postmature (later than forty-two weeks) rather than premature. This is caused by a failure of the placenta to supply adequate oxygen and nutrition to the foetus during gestation.

When all medical procedures had been completed after the birth, while I was still drifting in the hazy world of medication and post-birth euphoria, I watched the doctor examine the placenta in a bucket, beside the delivery table.

“ Look at this. All this black stuff. Dead. Fair bit of it’s dead. I’d say seventy per cent of it is dead. This little fellow has been starved of oxygen and nutrition during the pregnancy. What’s his name?” the doctor asked. Lack of oxygen would have explained the distinct blue colour of his skin that I remember being aware of when Riley was delivered.

“ Riley,” I replied. Saying his name for the first time sealed the bond that nature intended. I was besotted with instantaneous maternal love.

“ Sounds like you should be driving him, not giving birth to him.” The doctor was referring to the classic Riley sports car. And, although I was concerned about the outcome of the placental examination, I was not alert enough to ask probing questions.

“ Is he alright? He’ll be alright, won’t he?” was the best I could manage.

“ He’s frail and smaller than we’d like,” the doctor explained. “We’ll keep him here for a while and see that he gets off to a good start. Stabilise him. But don’t you worry. He’ll catch up before you know what’s what.”

I should have expected more information from the doctor, but I had a simple trust that the medical profession would support us through whatever health issues the future might hold.

“ You’ll be fine, little man,” I whispered in my baby’s tiny, tissue-like ear before he was whisked away from me. “We’ll be okay.”

Riley remained in the frail nursery of the maternity hospital to receive special care for two weeks after I was discharged. I had a two-year-old daughter at home, Coby, who also needed mothering. Walking away from the hospital without my baby in my arms was the hardest thing that I had done at that point in my life and it filled me with despair. I felt empty, bereft of sensation. ‘How do young women who give their babies up for adoption do this?’ I pondered. ‘How can they just walk away? I think I would die from a broken heart.’ I empathised with all those mothers who had made such a heart-wrenching departure. At least I could come back for my little one.

The woman who had roomed with me left hospital at the same time as I did, but with her baby cradled in her arms. I lingered at a distance down the corridor so that I didn’t have to confront them. But I could see her from the corner of my eye, cuddling her baby, bubbling with joy. I felt miserable.

In the following days, Kevin kept assuring me that it was better for Riley to remain in hospital, receiving the care that I was not able to give him at home. “Don’t upset yourself,” he pleaded. “He’ll be fine, you’ll see. We’ll have him home in no time.”

To ease my wretchedness in the following fortnight, my parents took me to the hospital daily to spend time with Riley.

Initially, because of his fragile health, I was not allowed to hold Riley. I could only look at him through a glass window, a tragic foreshadowing of what would happen later in Riley’s life. Still, I had no difficulty identifying my baby from all the other little ones. At first, they all looked the same: tiny, frail, swathed in bunny-rugs with just their little heads peeking through, but one looked like a wizened little chimpanzee with Prince Charles ears. This one was mine. Even though we were separated by glass, my nose filled with the smell of his baby-soft skin.

I was not permitted to breast-feed Riley, and was given tablets to dry my milk. I couldn’t even express my milk for Riley’s bottle-feeds. I was naive and felt intimidated by the authority of the nursing staff.

After a few days, I was allowed to hold Riley briefly once a day, and eventually my visits included feeding him one bottle daily, with the remainder of his bottles being held to his mouth as he lay in his crib — cot feeding, they called it. Feeding Riley proved to be challenging because he held his tongue against the roof of his mouth, making it difficult to get the teat into the correct position for him to suck.

I asked the big, robust religious sister in charge of the frail nursery, “How can I get this teat in? It keeps going under his tongue.”

“ Like this,” she replied as she pinched his tiny toes. “When he’s screaming, he will drop his tongue to draw breath, and that’s when you pop the teat in.”

I was bewildered, and never resorted to this tactic. I preferred patience and persistence.

And his bath, every second day, consisted of a quick wipe-over with a damp cloth. There were precious few opportunities to cuddle this tiny baby as medical advice continued to keep me at a physical distance from my son. “Too much handling will harm him. We must avoid any non-essential contact.” The inclusive ‘we’ drew me into impersonal nursing procedures.

Twenty-nine years later when my first granddaughter was born sixteen weeks premature, weighing 790g, or 1lb 12oz, Kangaroo Cuddling, a very intimate form of mother-child physical contact in which the tiny infant is removed from its humidicrib and placed between the mother’s breasts, skin to skin, was encouraged from her earliest days. This closeness promotes physical development and well-being in the delicate infant and significantly contributes to survival. Times change.

But nature works in wondrous ways. Although I had not lactated for three weeks, my maternal instinct was so strong that when the hospital phoned to tell me I could bring my baby home, I immediately began to produce copious amounts of milk. On arrival at the hospital a short time later, I was euphoric and announced: “I have enough milk to feed quads! It’s a miracle! I can breast-feed my baby!”

I was met with an emphatic ‘no’. “It will be too difficult for you because of his tongue, and you’ll only stress the baby. You’ll have to take those tablets again to dry your milk.”

Not me, I thought, I’m not taking any more tablets. Despite the discomfort of engorgement because I wasn’t breast-feeding Riley, I let my milk dry out naturally. Lactation completed nature’s birth cycle and it was physical proof of the strong bond that I had with my son in spite of the medical barriers that had marked the first three weeks of our relationship.

Following Riley’s release from hospital, his health continued to be monitored by a Child Welfare nurse who visited our home every second day for several weeks. Not handling him continued to be a priority and she always weighed him in his bassinet, in his clothes. The normal procedure is to weigh just a naked, or near naked baby.

“ Remember now. Only pick him up for every second feed, and baths every other day. He mustn’t be handled any more than is absolutely necessary. And no visitors! Visitors always want to pick the baby up. They’ll be a problem. And they might bring germs too. You have to be tough for the baby’s sake.”

What could I do? I longed to hold and cuddle my baby, but a fear had been instilled into me that physical contact would harm him.

But in time, Riley did reach the point where I could treat him as a normal baby. He was a delightful little person, whom I often remarked must have read the book on how to be a good and cooperative baby. Unlike Coby, whose incessant crying with colic demanded my attention for most of the day and night for many long months, Riley slept so well and so long, I would stand by his bassinet willing him to wake up so that I could hold him and breathe in his baby smell and feel his baby-soft skin.

Apart from the delivery room revelations about the placenta, I was given no further information, nor was any long-term prognosis made about how dysmaturity and placental insufficiency might affect Riley’s physical and mental development. Explanations were not given and questions were not asked. I know now that I should have asked questions and demanded answers, but I had a background where respect for the medical profession precluded patient interrogation. That was how it happened in the early 1970s. Two follow-up appointments with a paediatrician during Riley’s first year did not indicate any cause for concern. The prognosis at each visit was that he was ‘doing nicely, just a little on the small side.’

But, with hindsight, I can confess to always having a niggling concern about the circumstances of his birth, and how this might impact on him in later life. I was constantly watchful, always looking for reassurance that Riley was developing normally. Or was he?