Nov 3/24 Remembering

It's 36 years today. I was 17 years, 10 months, and 19 days old when I watched my mum die. 36 years ago, today. I have lived without her for twice as long as I lived with her and while we never had a straightforward relationship, and I no longer actively miss her, I do think of her often. We had a difficult relationship from the very start, even before I was born I wasn't what she wanted, being the replacement child for my brother Jason, who had died suddenly aged less than one month old, I was the result of grief, pain and questioning. As a bereaved parent myself, I understand that kind of loss and the complex emotions that come with it and I know the heart-wrenching ache for a child that I have to say goodbye to. Back in 1969/70, grief was kept private, and people assumed that the only way to cope with a child's death was to have another one as quickly as possible; thus, in the spring of 1970 she was pregnant with me. I do wonder what that felt like, did she want to be pregnant? Or was she going along with what everyone had told her? Either way, it couldn't have been easy for her to carry me with all the anxious 'what ifs' and the constant fear of history repeating itself. My parents got ready for me as best they could, they didn't know whether I was a girl or boy because back then, the technology wasn't available to find out, but I do know that above all things, mum wanted another boy, more than that, she had decided that I was a boy, so everything was, as tradition dictated blue. Even my beloved teddy bear, Scruffy Simon (The Scruffiest Bear in Yorkshire!) who went everywhere with me as a child and was with me well into adulthood when he got lost in a housemove, even he was blue with white paws. I have no idea how my mum reacted when they told her that she had birthed a girl, but I do know that my dad was chuffed to have a daughter. Mum didn't neglect me, I was fed, clothed and played with, I was taken for injections and check ups, without doubt my basic needs were met. But it was dad who gave me cuddles when I was upset, dad who kissed me better when I was sick or injured, dad who suggested I go to Brownies and dad who took me to buy a Cindy doll. As I grew up, mum was definately emotionally distant where I was concerned, but dad was the opposite. It was dad that I went to with problems, whose advice I wanted when it came to pretty much anything and whose approval I wanted and got most of the time. Mum would favour my older brother, treating him like a prince who could do no wrong and needed no boundaries and at the same time putting so many conditions on me that I daren't even breathe in the wrong direction and when challenged she said that I needed to be protected, from what or whom, she never said.   It was an odd, upsidedown sort of relationship, me and mum. Not entirely healthy, sometimes quite disfunctional and often demanding. She became incredibly critical when I did anything she even slightly disagreed with, and often told me things I had no business knowing as a child, like other people's problems or that she (mum) felt suicidal. As a teenager, our relationship became worse, she became more judgemental, more critical and I got increasingly rebellious, climbing out of my bedroom window to go out and meet friends, when she refused me permission to go repeatedly. And lets not start on my first real boyfriend.

I didn't hate my mum, I just wished I had the same mum as my brother. I wanted more than anything for her to say 'well done' on a test mark or school report, to be encouraged by her and above all for mum to see me for who I was, not who she wanted me to be. But I spent my whole life being punished for not being the boy she so desperately wished for, and then on November 3rd 1988, she died. There was no chance now to be accepted by her for being just me, nothing could ever make that happen. I helped to plan her funeral, chose the hymns and made an abundance of food for all the visitors we had coming to share the grief, but I did not cry. I saw my dad torn in two by his pain and grief, his inability to accept that she was gone, he cried, I did not. I saw my brother spiral out of control, rolling home drunk most nights and having little to say to me or dad at all, one day in the middle of a minor disagreement my brother spat out the words 'I wish it was you who'd died' to me. I walked away but I didn't cry. After a month I decided to go back to school, it felt strange to go back and pick up my A levels but what else was left to do? Sitting in the sixthform common room one morning, drinking a coffee in between classes, a song came on the radio - to this day I can't remember which song - but I vividly remember the scenes that appeared in my mind, the feeling of grief that washed over me and desperately wanting my mum, just because she was my mum. I stood up and ran out of the common room into the ladies toilets, fell onto the floor and cried. 

When I met Matt and we got married, I missed my mum. To be honest, she would probably have been overwhelmingly controlling when it came to planning things, that's if she deemed Matt a suitable husband at all - nevertheless there was a gap - she was missed. I shopped for my dress with a friend who was also getting married and kept having to explain my missing mum, on the day I wanted her to see me getting ready, to keep my very nervous dad calm, to bring me a glass of fizz to enjoy before leaving for the church. I wanted her to be the last person to take her seat before I walked down the aisle and the first person to hug me when we left the church. I wanted her in my wedding photos wearing a big smile and something glamourous, standing next to my lovely dad in his suit that matched Matts. In reality, my wedding was fabulous and mum was included at the beginning of the service and in the prayers - dad was amazing and made my wedding day incredibly special in lots of small ways - one of his hankerchiefs as my something borrowed, making breakfast complete with bucks fizz and giving me mums brooch to wear pinned inside my dress, the last of her possessions now passed to me - dad did good, but mum was missed. 

When I graduated from University, when I was commissioned as a Church Army Evangelist, when I got pregnant and when I had my baby losses - I missed her - I wanted her in photos to keep, I wanted to make memories to hold on to and I wanted to share my grief with someone who I knew would understand. Dad was there for all those things, encouraging, celebrating and listening, but mum was missed. I wonder things occasionally about her, would we ever have resolved our relationship? What would she have thought about my hair being bright purple when we lived in Derby?  Would she love Matt like dad did, accepting him into the family as another son? What kind of grandma would she be? What kind of great-grandma? Would she be proud of who I am now, even just a little bit? It's taken me decades to realise that I don't need her approval - although for almost 18 years it was all I wanted - being honestly myself is much more important, but these days when I think of her, it makes me sad to remember her grief, her trauma, her struggle to cope with something so huge and inexpressable. It makes me sad to think of all that she has missed not just in my life, but across our family. I think of her often, occasionally I hear her when I say certain phrases in my broadest Yorkshire accent and sometimes in the right light I catch a glimpse of her when I look in the mirror.