Grandma for one day

Kelly Stokes, 39, thought she had a lifetime to make memories with her baby and mum

- FIONA KINLOCH, TRACY GAYTON

Scrambling for my phone, it would have been impossible to have dialled my mum’s number any faster. It was May 2017 and after eight months of trying with my partner, Paul, then 34, a pregnancy test had come back positive. ‘We’re having a baby,’ I gushed the moment Mum, Elizabeth, then 70, answered, and we burst into excited chatter about me becoming a mummy and she a grandma.

I grew up in a tight-knit family, sharing some of the happiest times with my brother, James, Mum, and my dad, Graham. Sadly, Mum and Dad split when I was 18, but Mum and I propped each other up as we adjusted to life without him around as much.

Even when I left home at 28, I only moved around the corner, and Mum and I would take turns to host daily chats over a pot of tea. I didn’t think we could get any closer, yet my pregnancy proved me wrong, as Mum was there for every scan, twinge and strange pregnancy symptom. When the hormones overwhelmed me, or I panicked about being a good mum, she dried my tears and reassured me that I would be. And when I needed advice, she mentored me.

Everything was perfect

Mum helped Paul and me paint the nursery pink when we found out we were expecting a girl, before finishing off a beautiful knitted cardigan.

‘I don’t know how you fit it all in,’ I told her, admiring her creation – she worked full-time as a check-in assistant for British Airways and fundraised for multiple charities. And she did it all while continuing her five-year battle with bowel cancer.

In early 2018, just days before my due date, we received the most incredible news: Mum had been given the all-clear.

It felt like a new beginning, and with no illness to hold her back, Mum was more excited than ever to savour every moment of her granddaughter’s life.