I was rushing home from nursery pick up, banana peel in hand, when the new Naomi Campbell interview dropped on Monday afternoon. Mothers of all ages have been debating and celebrating the 51-year-old’s account of jetting round the world to fashion shows and shoots with her nine-month-old, who apparently “loves to travel” and “hardly ever cries”.

I had my daughter through IVF at the age of 49, and while it’s heartening to hear how much Campbell is loving the baby years, I can report that her interview – not to mention the photographs – bears little resemblance to the reality of becoming a parent at this age. The idea of those long haul flights frankly filled me with horror. The luxury scuba diving holidays I used to take in Egypt now seem a distant memory, and after two fairly disastrous attempts at flying solo with a toddler, I now settle for Legoland.  

I’ve wanted a baby for as long as I can remember – which is not to say, as Campbell does, that “I always knew that one day I would be a mother”.

When I hit my 40s, I was keenly aware of a window of opportunity closing. I’d been in love once and despite me willing them to feel the same way, it just didn’t work out. My sister and her partner have three great kids who mean the world to me. I would have cosy, noisy, emotionally-enriching visits and then cry on my journey home at the thought of the emptiness of my flat.

During my 40s, I actively considered my options. Fostering and adoption meetings left me brutally aware that being single and my age, I could be waiting years to become a parent. I started fertility treatment, and though in my heart of hearts I knew it wouldn’t be successful, when it wasn’t it felt like the end of everything. Depressed doesn’t feel adequate as a description of how I felt. At 49, knowing I was at the end of the road, I travelled overseas for fertility treatment using a donor egg and donor sperm. It took all my courage but I absolutely couldn’t face the future without giving it one last try.

On the day of treatment, the doctor told me that only one embryo was viable for transfer. I pinned all my hopes on that tiny human form and waited five very tense days before I could do the test. Memorably, it was Mothers’ Day when I did. I took three tests (because surely the first two were wrong?) – all positive. I went from survival mode to living in that moment.