It seemed like a joke at first but then Fiona’s husband decided he really was going to walk to the North Pole for Borne.
Author: Fiona Mylchreest
Fiona Mylchreest was born in the beautiful middle of nowhere in Scotland, and stayed there for 18 years. She went to teach in China and then to Oxford, where she read Classics and English. She planned to be an art historian, but gave it up and went to work for a medical charity in Calcutta until she ran out of money. She joined the Overseas Development Administration (now DFID) where she managed aid programmes to India, negotiated EU banana policy and ran the programmes for Poland and Romania, during which she did an MSc in Culture, Gender and Society. Secondment to the Foreign Office as Private Secretary to Malcolm Rifkind and then Robin Cook was fascinating but frustrating so she left and went to Chelsea School of Art. Photography and combined media was wonderful but abandoned instantly when her first son Finn was born at 27 weeks. After three more premature babies and about a person-year in NICU, she started a BSc in Health and Social Care, finished in Josephine Barnes Ward waiting for her fifth baby. By this time, Finn had been diagnosed with autism; his catatonia responded only to music therapy, so the family began supporting the music therapy department (and still are, 11 years on). Now all the Fabulous Five are at school, she does some communications work for her local church, co-Chair of Governors of Finn’s school and delighted to be part of Borne. In-between times and all the time, mother of five, carer to two tortoises and an energetic black spaniel. And now she has unwittingly taken on the role of backroom support for stupid people walking to the Arctic …!
Fiona’s story
I have five fabulous children. That’s the happiness. All five were born prematurely, which sounds crazy, I know. But the thing is, we never knew why.
Borne to Dance 2017
Banqueting House played host for the eveningLast week was Borne to Dance. The Borne team, including my husband, have been…
Pancake Day and the 40 Days of Prematurity
It’s Pancake Day! This is a church tradition to use up all the rich ingredients before Lent. These luxuries –…
Please, be my valentine
My second baby was due on St.Valentine’s Day. I flirted with the idea of giving him or her Valentine as a middle name. It was silly really, but it seemed a special day to be born.
The Borne Dream
In August 1963, Martin Luther King Jnr made his I have a dream speech, about true equality, about an end…
Christmas in NICU with a premature baby
“When people talk about a baby’s first Christmas, they don’t mean in hospital.”
Development: how premature babies grow
Why do premature babies grow as they do? Fiona Mylchreest, mother of five and wife of Borne Chairman, reflects on her children’s experience.
From bloodbath to bubble bath
I remember vividly one terrifying incident in NICU. I can still feel the sweet stickiness of blood on my fingers; I can feel the tension even writing about it.
Incredibly small and very, very frightening
Fiona Mylchreest, mother of five and wife of Borne Chairman, shares her experiences of her first born child Cormack, who was born prematurely.