My mother finally set me free.

My mum was a big lady, in every way. Large of body, mind and presence. I am ashamed to admit it, but when I was in high school, I would dread parent-teacher night because I didn’t want anyone to see how fat she was. Similarly, family trips to the shopping centre would see me walk 10 paces ahead or behind, rolling my eyes angrily if she dared call out to me. Of course I grew out of that, but her weight was always an issue for our whole family. She lost 40 kilograms one year, and it was fantastic. She bought new clothes and went on an overseas trip to New Zealand for the first time. Sadly, the weight crept back on, and it certainly helped kill her when she was only 65.

She never drove, so there was always lots of ferrying around with mum. Trips to doctors and shops, our weekly visit to Waverley Gardens to see an 11am movie together on a Friday when I was at Uni, (she’d insist we get there at 10am to get a ‘good seat’ in the always empty cinema). She was physically dependent on dad and all of us, and I am sure she resented this, as she was always the sharpest mind in the room. She had devoted her life to being a mum to her own three children, to fostering 17 others, and to adopting one of those (me).  How lucky I was to have this incredible matriarch as my own mum. I was adopted at four years of age, so I don’t really have anything to compare it with, but I doubt I could have had a closer relationship with my ‘real’ mother. Mum was strict, and proud of me, and supportive, and silly, and ever so bossy. Her home and children really were the centre of her world and mum had firm views on how each of us should live our lives. Support was given freely, provided your plans happened to align with her own vision for your future. She would voice her disapproval in spells of silence (she once ignored me for 3 weeks when I went away on a holiday with my boyfriend, against her wishes, at age 20).

Now I am a parent, I know there are things I will do differently from mum. She was so totally controlling that I would often lie about where I was going in high school; I would stay at a friend’s house in theory, whilst we would be staying out all night at Chelsea beach, drinking cask wine and feeling terribly cool. She never did like that boyfriend, and the convoluted web of lies I told regarding our liaisons over the years makes my head ache in memory. Her strict regime never diminished my love for her, of course, and I am most grateful to have been able to experience a brief time when our relationship moved into the phase of adulthood, and she saw me as a mother in my own right. This was, however, all too brief.  My sons were just three and two when my mother died on June 22nd, 2008.

I lay my head on her dead stomach and howled. “My mum, my mum, my mum”. I repeated those words helplessly, like a mantra. Funny how primal it felt. My sister and I had been with her as she took her last breath and I was now alone in ‘that’ room with her lifeless, large corpse. Still warm. Still smelling of my mum. Two days before I had chided her for being dramatic when she announced to me that she was dying.“Don’t be silly mum, you’re just in hospital for your asthma”.  A day before I had called in on my way to pick up my sons from their other grandparents on the Peninsula. I never left the hospital. The quiche in the esky on the front seat of my car went off. Phone calls were made, doctors spoke in hushed tones. Such a fuss to ensure the dying are ‘made comfortable’. I don’t think she cared if she was bathed or not. I certainly didn’t.

A fortnight after the death, with the true horror of my new reality setting in, I commented to my husband; “Well, I could rob a bank now and it wouldn’t matter”. He patiently asked me to elaborate. I explained to him that no one in my life, from this point on, would ever care as much about me as my mum. Pure and simple. No one’s opinion would ever matter as much to me, no one’s approval would be so sought, no one’s 2 cents worth would be equal parts valued and annoying.

You lose your narrative arc when your mum dies. Part of your story has gone. The person who was truly there with you from the start (or in my case, from four, but let’s not get technical), is no longer there. A couple of months after her death, on a particularly good day, I came home, and as I placed my keys on the shelf, I asked my husband “Did mum call?”. For a brief, shining moment, I didn’t even know why he looked at me so sadly. And then I remembered.

Free. No one else in charge of you, no one to ever exert such total emotional power over you.

Free.

The saddest freedom I have ever known.

What set you free?

Fiona is a modern history and English teacher and mother of two.