‘I Don't Want My Daughter to Be Hurt Like I Was'

In an exclusive interview, new mom ‘Zephany Nurse’ opens up to YOU’s Marelize Potgieter about the shock of finding out she was kidnapped as a baby, and how she feels about the woman who raised her and about her real mom, Celeste

- Marelize Potgieter

SHE cradles the baby on her lap, wrapping a pink blanket around the little girl and peering down at her. “She’s so cute – so small,” she says. Dressed in black tights and a white jersey, her long dark hair tied back in a ponytail, the young woman looks like any other smitten yet slightly overwhelmed first-time mom.

Yet there’s something that sets her apart: this is Zephany Nurse, the girl who was stolen from next to her sleeping mother’s bed three days after her birth in April 1997.

Like her mother, Zephany is a young mom: Celeste Nurse was in her late teens when she had her daughter, then spent years looking for her until she was discovered. The details of that astonishing discovery made headlines the world over.

Zephany will turn 20 next month and, speaking to the media for the first time since she was found and the deception surrounding her upbringing was exposed, she says she’s a little overawed by her tiny daughter.

It wasn’t easy bringing this little person into the world, she says, gazing down at her daughter’s pretty face and pouting mouth. At first she thought, “Ha, she’s out! You’re out of me now and there’s less pain.”

Little Emma* was born in the early hours of 20 February, weighing just under 3 kg, and Zephany says she wanted to take her baby home straightaway.

“You love her and for nine months you’ve been waiting to see what she’s going to look like.”

But then she admits being a new mom is hard. “I’m not used to having a child. Usually when I’m in relationships I can easily walk away. Even with school, you can walk away from it. But with her, you must look after her.”