A mother's daughter

If I had a dollar for every time I’ve heard “it must’ve been hard to have grown up without a mother,” “at least you turned out so well…” or just awkward, lingering silence from well-meaning individuals responding to the news that I lost my mother to a brain tumour when I was just six years old. Depending on the person, I’ll either politely agree before tactfully changing the topic or I’ll mention my father who did his best to raise three children on his own, and my older brother who started packing my school lunches the moment he was tall enough to see over the kitchen counter. But what I’d really like to say to these people is too long and detailed for a new acquaintance to hear, too deep and uncomfortable to share over most friendly dinners, and is overall too socially unacceptable for the death averse society we live in. So instead, I’ll share my thoughts with you and hope beyond the deepest of hope, that wherever in the world you are reading these words, it echoes the stories of your lost loved ones too.

My mother has always been the most influential person in my life. You might wonder how that could be so, considering she left this world 21 years ago and I’ve had to weather the trials and tribulations of childhood, adolescence, and adulthood without her by my side. I purchased my first bra by myself, quickly learnt I wasn’t dying when I first got my period and I slowly learned how to braid my own hair and do my makeup. These are just some of the many little lessons that most mothers sprinkle throughout the daily lives of their daughters as they grow up. As helpful as they likely would have been in the short term, I didn’t really need these little lessons – because before my mother’s life faded she taught me the brightest life lesson. It’s a lesson you won’t learn in school or find in books or see on the internet; rather, it’s a lesson she taught me through her actions and one final letter penned from her death bed.

You might wonder what a child can remember of a parent who they lost at a young age. Whilst I won’t attempt to speak for us all, I’ve held on to many of my early childhood memories as if they were my only map to simpler times. I remember the good and the bad in equal measure. Warm summer afternoons traipsing after my mum in gumboots too big for my tiny feet as we fed our pet chickens blur with memories of chasing after my dad and siblings as we wound down mazes of fluorescent hospital hallways, breathing in panic and antiseptic fumes with each purposeful stride.

My mum was a fighter. She fought to survive longer than any doctor had said she possibly could. Much like the chicken-egg conundrum, I often wonder if my mother instilled my sister with a stubborn willingness to survive against all odds, or if my sister had been the one to teach her. Either way, both my prematurely born sister and seven years later, my cancer-stricken mother defied every doctors’ scientific projection of how much life they had left to live. Every time I see my sister, I see a woman who wasn’t meant to survive to her first birthday and who lives and breathes life with a tenacity that I can only assume our mother would playfully claim came from her DNA.

I like to think that the moment someone becomes a mother and accepts responsibility for a life other than their own, they learn how to tap into some mysterious energy reserve unknown to us other mere mortals. Mothers who wake to a crying baby when waves of sheer exhaustion should pull them under, who juggle feeding times with jobs and skirting around office politics and a whole new world of mum-shaming. Do you see it? The mothers managing against all odds to get things done because they simply have to. Even at six years old I saw it. I noticed every time my mother smiled at me with eyes filled with love and unshed tears. Every time she made a cake or strung up decorations for birthdays and events that she’d be damned to let pass without the proper fanfare. Every time she pulled my brother onto her lap and told him what a tremendous responsibility it is to be a big brother. Every time she adjusted the clothing that draped over her thin frame and straightened the wig on her bald head, refusing to let chemotherapy be the reason she would be absent from her children’s first day of school photos. A mother’s love is a fierce energy that cancer, time, distance and death will never rival.

My mum taught me a lot about love and living life with determination in the few years I was lucky to know her. But I’ve learned just as much in the unfillable void of her absence, guided by the words she wrote in flowing script on a single page letter during the last weeks of her life. When I read this letter for the first time in my early twenties I had initially hoped for more. Where was the advice on how to mend a broken heart, or to find my purpose, or how to deal with this big scary world? Instead, the letter spoke of our family history, the events she would be watching over, and the need to take the time to really listen to others, and to then be receptive to the second side of any story. But it was the last line that always caught my eye, two little words that read “be happy.” A simple enough statement, but with wildly important ramifications each time I referred back to this letter over the years, during times my head and my heart needed encouragement and a sense of advice. “Be happy” I told myself as I ended an abusive relationship. “Be happy” I whispered as I jumped (or fell) from the plane on my first solo skydive. “Be happy” I hummed as I left a depressingly mundane job. “Be happy” I breathed as I took in the views from the summit of Mt Kilimanjaro. “Be happy” I explained to the tattoo artist as I showed him the letter and the place on my arm for him to ink those two very words.

So, if I had a dollar for every time someone shied away from the knowledge I lost my mum to cancer, I’d use my small fortune to spread the word that a mother’s love shapes our lives far beyond our comprehension. My mum showed me what it means to be a strong woman, to show up for your loved ones even when it hurts, to live like it might be your last day, to love like you have an eternity, and to rely on your inner strength to carry you through the brightest and darkest of days. Her words are tattooed on my arm but live in my heart and through my daily decisions. I am my mother’s daughter.