Baby Girl "A": The Memoir of A Miracle Child

By Laura Banyon

Baby Girl “A”: A Memoir of a Miracle Child is a glimpse into the miraculous birth and life of Laura Banyon. It was a birth that likely should not have taken place due to a horrific accident her mother endured while Laura was in still in the womb. Laura has had many struggles in life, both emotional and physical, yet she found a way to push through and persevere. She very well may be the only person to have come into this world in this way. You be the judge.

This is a story of real-life circumstances, of courage and the strength of a single mother, and of two brave little boys who did the best they could and who always tried to do the right thing or what they thought was the right thing at the time. Mistakes were made. Words were said, and forgiveness is still in process for some. This book takes you on Laura’s life journey of pain, regrets, love, and ultimate joy.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Aug 3, 2022
• ISBN: 9781662478741

Book preview

Chapter 1

The Shocking Beginning

I suppose I should go back to the beginning. When my mother was six months pregnant with me, she was doing the laundry in our first home in Nutley, New Jersey. My mother, Kat, was using a Sears & Roebuck, Co. Kenmore washing machine that was given to her as a gift by my father’s parents, my grandma and grandpa, Maria and Antonio. Way back then in the ’60s, they made few, if any, washing machines with a rubber seal or rubber rings around the inside of the tub. The machine my mother was using did not have that rubber safety seal or ring.

My mother noticed that her wash had stopped agitating and lifted the lid to see what the matter was. She placed her hands into the wash to move the clothes around. In doing so, once she put her hand into the washtub, still filled with water, she was immediately given an electric shock that entered her right ring finger, went through my body (in utero), and exited through a toe on her left foot. My mother, Kat, still to this day has scars to show for it. Kat was then tossed or blown across the room, hitting her belly against the hot water heater, knocking her unconscious. My father found her on the floor and helped her to her feet more than an hour later. They called her doctor and went in for a visit the next day. We will get back to the outcome of her visit a little later on.

My mother was twenty-eight years old and very naïve. She never liked to call attention to a situation and would never think of suing someone or a company. I wanted to first put that out there. You would have to know her background and childhood to fully grasp what I mean, but this is about me. So we are moving on. To my knowledge, my mother and father never approached my grandparents regarding the faulty washer. My grandparents were first-generation born in the US, and their parents came from Italy and frequently spoke Italian in front of us, to each other, which I am sure came in handy when they wanted to speak without letting us know what they were saying.

My mother did write to the Sears and let them know what happened. It would be many years later, after my first marriage, before my mother would approach me with the details of the accident, how she did not think of my right to pursue compensation for all of my pain and suffering and for leaving me less than six months to file suit against the hugely famous company, but the kicker was that my mother had thrown away the response letter she received from Sears & Roebuck Co., acknowledging and admitting fault in their washing machine. We will get back to that later.

My mother was most concerned about how her belly hit the hot water heater. The jolt basically went through my whole body, giving me a sort of whiplash in the womb. She recalled that I stopped moving for a while, making her more nervous with each obstetric appointment. Her doctor kept reassuring her that the baby was fine. He heard a heartbeat, and within a few days, she began to feel movement again. One would think that I would have been born early but nope. I was born one day after my due date, September 4, which was a Sunday, at 12:15 a.m. My mother recalled the left side of my face, being depressed inward, almost sunken in, and my left eye was in a fixed position to the left outer corner of my face. Having very pliable bones as a newborn, my face soon filled out, but my left eye never improved.

Now I have a chapter in this memoir called Surgeries, where I give more detail about my nearly two dozen operations and procedures, but my first surgery was when I was four years old. My mother started taking me to see the eye doctor at the age of two, but due to my young age, the doctor did not want to move forward with corrective surgery until I was four years old. I would say most of my childhood memories are of doctors’ offices, hospitals, and of being horribly teased in school. Sad but true.

My eye doctor, Dr. G, an ophthalmologist and surgeon in Wayne, New Jersey, was my primary doctor and surgeon throughout my childhood, until we moved to Florida in 1977. I never knew his first name, but I do remember he used to call me one of his best patients, because I would always stay so still for him, whenever an exam would begin or eye drops would be administered. By the way, the Baby Girl A came, as I heard years later, from that doctor that my birth was written in the medical journals in New York as a first-of-a-kind situation, hence I was Baby Girl A. Interesting news I thought.

My first eye surgery was scheduled, and I can remember being four, in the pediatric department of the hospital, being in my hospital room, screaming and crying for my mother and father, who were there, but I knew they would be leaving me soon. I was sitting at a small table, where the nurse was trying to get me to eat a few bites of ice cream as a distraction so that my parents could make their getaway.

My father had already made his escape, and I had found myself holding my arms out, reaching for my mother, who quickly turned the corner and ducked out of sight. I remember the crib they placed me in. It was shiny and stainless steel. It felt like a cage to me. I was so scared. Even though I was only four years old, I can recall them giving me a shot in my hip, which made me feeling sleepy. I recall being rolled on a gurney into