'The look on his face when he saw me was a joy. I didn't want to let him go': NHS nurse’s reunion with son after 11 weeks of separation

The big reunion between Karen and her son

They had been apart for 11 weeks, a schoolboy sent to lockdown with his grandparents while his nurse mum worked on the Covid frontline.

Yesterday, the hug shared by Owen Ramsay and mum Karen-Ann Robertson didn’t last just as long – but it felt like it. Owen, seven, lived with his grandparents as mum Karen-Ann worked tirelessly as a staff nurse in A&E at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in Glasgow.

Karen-Ann, 39, from Glasgow, sent him to live with her parents Anne-Marie and John Robertson 100 miles away in Tarbert, Loch Fyne because she did not want to risk infecting him.

Yesterday, after being reunited with Owen, she said: “It was a tough and heartbreaking decision but it was for the best. When I explained to Owen that it might be a few weeks, I don’t know if, at seven, he truly understood how long that would be.

“We spoke at least twice a day on FaceTime and he was desperate for me to come home. There were very upsetting times where I had to stay incredibly strong to keep going, but it was the right thing to do in a pandemic.

“When I got two weeks’ leave, I headed straight up the road to mum and dad’s. But I didn’t tell Owen I was on the way, as I didn’t want him too upset if I was delayed at the last minute.

After eleven weeks and 2 days finally reunited with my boy ❤️ pic.twitter.com/TTBHojLajH

— Karen Ann Robertson (@KarenAnnTT) July 3, 2020

“We thought it would be better to surprise him. So I came in the door and my mum filmed as Owen dashed off a kitchen chair and leapt towards me.

“The look on his face as he ran towards me was an absolute joy. We were both in tears and he didn’t want to let me go.”

Karen-Ann arrived back home on Friday and Owen hasn’t let her out of his sight since then.

Just the day before she arrived, he caught his first mackerel off the pier at the west coast town.

“He is taking me fishing over the weekend to show me how it’s done,” Karen-Ann said.

Karen-Ann with Owen and her parents, Anne-Marie and John

Then, overnight he lost his first tooth and his mum was there to share the childhood milestone with the tooth fairy.

Karen-Ann is one of an army of brave NHS hero parents who have chosen to separate from their families as they worked on the frontline with Covid patients.

She says: “It has been painful and the sacrifices are huge but they had to be made. I am very lucky to have two wonderful parents in a beautiful part of Scotland who stepped in to help.

“It is a lot to ask any child to be separated from their mum for 11 weeks. They deserve a medal.”