The Duchess of York, Sarah Ferguson, has revealed the anguish she felt when her daughter Eugenie underwent surgery for scoliosis. Last October the young princess had a seven-hour operation to correct a curvature of the spine which could have become seriously debilitating.
"We thought it was a small curvature, but it was mammoth," said Sarah. "Her bones had oscillated to the degree that by the time she was 18, she would have been a hunchback. It was just horrendous. My little girl was in the operating theatre for seven hours.
"She now has these eight-inch titanium rods down each side of her spine and one-and-a-half inch screws at the top of her neck. But she is straight and she will stay straight." The Duchess spent eight days keeping vigil at Eugenie's bedside after the operation took place.
The 43-year-old also revealed that Eugenie had always been slightly "needy", but the operation had transformed her life. "By the end of our stay, Eugenie had changed," said Sarah. "I had given her all the words in the world, but what she needed was proof that her mummy loved her." Tests conducted since the procedure was carried out have shown it to have been a complete success.
Sarah, who was speaking in a newspaper interview, also made some rather candid and self-deprecating comments, describing herself as "the completely dreadful freak who let down the monarchy".
"I will never work in Great Britain," she said. "By doing so I would be perceived as using my name and I think that would be about the rudest thing I could possibly do to Her Majesty."
Photo: © Alphapress.com
