Lisa Faulkner
When Lisa Faulkner was going through the anguish of infertility, she read every book she could find about her situation, but none was a comfort. So now she’s written her own.
Called Meant to Be: My Journey to Motherhood, it’s a candid memoir about the actress’s struggle to have a baby, and the eventual adoption of her daughter Billie, now 12.
‘It was a lonely time, and there were no books that “spoke” to me,’ recalls the 47-year-old. ‘It was all “I couldn’t get pregnant, and it was a nightmare, and suddenly I got pregnant and everything was all right”. There was no story of “OK I didn’t get pregnant, but there is another way”. I wanted to write that book, to hold people’s hands.’
Growing up, Lisa wasn’t particularly ‘mumsy’, but by the time she hit her late 20s and friends were having babies, the broodiness began to bubble. She and her then partner, actor Chris Coghill, duly began trying – and Lisa was overjoyed to find out she was pregnant. But just a few days later she was rushed to hospital after collapsing on set. The pregnancy was ectopic.
‘It was horrific because we’d gone from thinking “We’re going to be parents” to…’ she tails off. ‘It was rock bottom for me, and it kicked the biological clock from a tick into pounding, deafening beat.’
Fiercely focused, Lisa stopped drinking alcohol, ate wholesomely and tried everything from ovulation-stimulating pills to hypnotherapy. ‘If somebody had said to me “You have to walk down Oxford Street naked four times a day and you’ll get pregnant”, I would have done it.’
She eventually resolved to have IVF, and was brimming with confidence: ‘I was young, I was healthy, I’d got pregnant before. There was no reason why it wouldn’t work. And when it didn’t, I was just floored.’ After three attempts, the doctor gently told her that there was no point in continuing. ‘He said “Everything is working, but I can’t do the magic”.’
Lisa’s breakthrough was accepting that she didn’t have to give birth to be a mother. ‘I suddenly thought what is the most important thing? Is it about growing a baby, or is it about having a baby? And once I’d flipped that, that was easier.’
For her, the answer was adoption and, after enduring dozens of tests, panels and general hoop-jumping, she finally had a call to say that she and Chris had been matched with a 15-month-old girl, Billie.
A visit was arranged, ‘and this little cheeky pixie looked at me from around the door, then poked her head back, then looked at me again, and I remember thinking oh, she’s so cute! She came and sat on my lap and I could smell her little head. She smelt like strawberries.’ Two months later they brought her home.
A decade on, Lisa insists that adoption is something she’d ‘absolutely’ recommend. ‘There are so many kids in care that need families, but the number of people adopting is going down. Children are removed from very dangerous situations, and I think that scares people,’ she says. ‘But you never know what’s going to happen to your child, whether it’s your birth child or not, so really it doesn’t make any difference. You love them, and you take it all on.
‘I love Billie more than if I made her myself. She astounds me,’ adds Lisa, her eyes sparkling. ‘She’ll just run in to a situation and be a ray of sunshine. She’s such an incredible human being, and I celebrate that more because I didn’t make her, and I feel like I’m allowed to go “Look how amazing she is!”
‘There have been ups and downs and I’m sure there will be more – I’m not under any illusion,’ she concludes. ‘But I’ll take it all. The love that I feel for her is so fierce. And if I can love like this, then anyone can.’
:: Meant to Be: My Journey to Motherhood by Lisa Faulkner is published by Ebury, £16.99
Faulkner Facts
Originally from Kingston, Lisa started modelling at 16 and was cast in a film, The Lover, after the director saw her photo in a magazine. She went on to have roles in Brookside, Holby City, Spooks and EastEnders, in which she played Fi Browning, daughter of the dastardly James Willmott-Brown.
A keen home cook, Lisa won Celebrity MasterChef in 2010, ‘and I didn’t realise at the time quite how much it was going to change my life!’ In 2013, after both their marriages had ended, she and MasterChef judge John Torode became a couple.
Engaged since Christmas, they now have their own Sunday morning cooking show, John and Lisa’s Weekend Kitchen, on ITV. ‘It’s really good fun,’ she says. ‘We forget the cameras are on.’
Lisa has written four cookbooks, and says the biggest fan of her food is John. ‘He’s so lovely: he’ll have been doing MasterChef, and I’ll have made a traybake, and he’ll still go “This is the best food I’ve had all day”.’
An edited version of this interview appeared in Waitrose Weekend on 27th June 2019. (c) Waitrose