Hector was here - Maud Vanwalleghem

A few weeks after Maud, heavily pregnant, took the oath as senator, her son Hector dies a month after his birth from a rare metabolic disease. An intense period of mourning and trauma processing follows, in which Maud, as a newcomer, finds her way through the turbulent landscape of (party) politics. Until, exhausted, she resigns her mandate, but does pick up the pen.

Maud reflects on how we deal with birth, death and everything in between. She tries to understand what happened to her, and especially to Hector. The fact that his death was not granted to him at first is a bitter exponent of how an excessive urge for control and intervention in health care sometimes comes at the expense of humanity.

This book, born from Hector, touches you to the depths of your soul, but is healing at the same time. It is an open-hearted plea for more connectedness, in an awareness that we are vulnerable and dependent.

'The purest representation of humanity in its greatest vulnerability.'
Annelies Verlinden

'A band-aid, that's what this book is.'
Eva Mouton