After three months caring for someone else’s baby after an apparent hospital mishap Mercy Cushworth, 39, had grown attached to the tiny boy she had fed from her own breast.
Finally holding her own child in her arms was incredibly joyous but handing back the other child still caused her terrible heartache, according to the Mirror.
“It was such a rollercoaster of emotions. On the one hand, I was elated to have my baby back in my arms, but just before this picture was taken I was sobbing and crying my heart out as I handed over Jacob, the baby I had loved and breastfed for three months,” she said.
“It was a joyous moment but you can see in my eyes that I was drained emotionally. Like the scar from my caesarean, the mark of what happened will scar my heart for ever.”
The Cushworths with “wrong child”, Jacob.
When Mercy received a much darker skinned baby to the one she gave birth to she suspected something was terribly wrong. It was not until DNA tests proved that the child she possessed had 0% chance of belonging to her and her husband that police launched an investigation.
Four other parents who had given birth at the same hospital also underwent DNA tests which revealed the terrible mistake.
