My 'Baby Bump' WAS DEADLY!

Jayde's growing belly was something more sinister than she expected

- Claudia Siron

Jayde Martin, 44, Darwin, NT

Hello girls! How was your morning at Dad's?' I asked my daughters Cameron, then 10, and Bonnie, eight, as they walked in the door.

H It was Christmas Day, and my mum Jan, 64, was helping me whip up a roast and a trifle in the kitchen.

By 11 am, we packed up the food and drove down the road to my friend Ruth's place for lunch.

There were 20 of us, and for hours we ate, laughed, and played fun games like charades and Pictionary. As the day came to an end, I cleaned up with the adults.

It's still really wet outside, I thought, ducking out to the recycling bin with an empty wine bottle.

We'd had a lot of rain in the past month.

I'd only taken a couple of steps when I slipped on the wet ground and tumbled forward.

As the wine bottle smashed into pieces, I hit the ground with a thud.

'Ow!' I screamed at the top of my lungs.

My right hand had gone straight into the sharp glass.

I can't feel my fingers, I thought, panicked.

Mum rushed me to Palmerston Regional Hospital, and the girls tagged along.

At the emergency room, doctors said they couldn't perform surgery right away as I'd eaten so much food.

'You'll have to stay here for 24 hours,' a doctor said.

'After surgery, you'll have to wear a cast for eight weeks and do physio five times a day.'

As I love horseriding and being outdoors, I was already dreading the coming months of recovery and inactivity.

Back home, my girls were very helpful, though.

'I'll help you get your bra on next, Mum,' said Cameron, as she tied my hair into a ponytail.