Months after her birth I still found myself affronted and incredulous, as if at some foreign and despicable justice, by the fact that I could no longer sleep in or watch a film or spend a Saturday morning reading, that I couldn’t stroll unfettered in the warmth of a summer’s evening or go swimming or wander down to the pub for a drink. The loss of these things seemed a high, an exorbitant price to pay for the privilege of motherhood; and though much was given back to me in the form of my daughter it was not payment in kind nor even in a different coin, was not in fact recompense of any sort.
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