My favourite family photo: I can still feel my mother's arm around my shoulder'

"There are other things you can't see that I love about it too. My mother and father long separated but still close had raced each other in deadly earnest down the corridor and across the ward to get to our bedside first and meet their first grandchild; she won, of course. That makes me laugh, but also makes me feel fiercely loved."

"I also can't quite see, but absolutely remember, the full body relief I felt when she arrived. I had an easy birth, but it was followed by a rough, restless night in a ward full of babies who tag-teamed their screaming. I recall staggering, leaking alarmingly, to the loo, and alternating between trying to feed this angry, hairy enigma and haggardly eyeballing a lifetime of responsibility in the odd moments he slept."

"She was there for me and my partner constantly for the first year of Theo's life, holding me up when I couldn't cope (often I've never cried so much) and celebrating when I could, spending hours on the phone to me when she wasn't spending nights in the crappy spare bed in our flat. She changed trains, missed meetings and made excuses to stick around, even"

An intimate hospital scene captures three generations meeting newborn Theo the morning after his birth. The mother appears exquisitely dressed in pearls and a cherished suit, while the photograph's composition aligns three dark heads, profiles, and hands. The narrator notices small physical details of the baby and recalls parents racing down the ward to meet their first grandchild. Postpartum exhaustion and relief marked the early hours until the grandmother's arrival. The grandmother provided constant practical and emotional support throughout Theo's first year, including overnight stays, long phone calls, changed travel plans, and missed commitments to help the new family.

Read at www.theguardian.com