My Mother

This is my Mum's mushroom collection. She died 13 years ago today. She died at approximately 1.15am. I'd arrived a few hours before - the 'MacMillan nurses' had come in and done whatever they do - and then myself and my dad were left alone.

I went upstairs to see Mum. She was in bed. Dad said, 'hold her hand & talk to her'. So I did. Can't remember what I said to her. Actually I don't think I said anything. I just held her hand and looked at her. She was dying. I've since found out that 'hearing' is the last sense to go. At the time I didn't know that.

Dad woke me up at 1.15am and told me she'd died. I went into the bedroom and looked at her. A shell of what she once was.

If I had the chance to talk to her now, I'd grab it with both hands.

She was a fabulous mother - and I never, ever told her.

I never felt that she understood me. I always wanted to do things that she didn't want me to do.

In the 1960's I wanted to go to piano & ballet lessons - she wanted me to join the Brownies & go swimming.

In the 1970's I wanted to wear platform shoes & go to youth club discos - she said platform shoes would damage my feet. And instead of discos, she had me running around on a hockey pitch and going to guides!

In the 1980's I was a teacher. I hated it. I wanted to be a PA to a successful businessman. She said 'teaching was a job for life' and I'd get a good pension.

In the 1990's I finally 'broke free' and had the confidence to go against everything my parents ever taught me. I was in my 30's, was financially secure, had no dependents & owned my own house. And even then my parents went mad - in retrospect I think it was because I was doing something totally alien to everything they had been brought up to believe in.

In the 2000's (after my mother had died) my Gran told me that when my dad started going on about what a mess he thought my life was in - my mum had said, 'leave her alone - she's happy!' And I was. I am.

All my mother ever wanted, was for me to be happy. In her quest to be a 'good mother' I think she got confused with what being 'happy' meant. And actually, I don't think that was her fault. She'd been brought up to believe that money and a job for life equalled happiness.

However, throughout all my teenage strops, throughout all our rows................... I was never in any doubt about one thing. From being a tiny little child she'd always told me that whatever I did, however mad she got, she would always love me.

And she always did. And to me; that's what being a mother all is about.