The Day I Lost My Mum

Written by Kerry-Louise Barnaby

It was one of those moments; one of those rare, unbelievable, “happens to other people not you” moments. Your life changes forever and in that one moment, nothing will ever be the same. It’s a tunnel that once you’ve gone through, there is absolutely no turning back. It was a normal Thursday night. I was 15 at the time and I remember that I was sat playing on the computer while my 18-year-old brother was slumped in front of the TV. It was 7.30pm when my beautiful little cat, Misty, came crawling in to the living room of our Portsmouth, terraced house. Misty desperately circled the room meow after despairing meow, before finally, as if defeated, collapsed in front of our traditional fireplace. An hour later…The front door opened, our grandparents walked in, and everything changed… Funny how felines always seem to be the first to know. I don’t think it a coincidence that Misty collapsed at the moment she did. Everyone has their own view on suicide, of that I’m sure, but do we ever take the time to think about the flip-side of the coin? Society says it is a sign of great weakness and an act of pure selfishness; but we seem to forget that while, yes, living may be the easiest and most natural thing to do in this world, so too is dying. Isn’t it? Left feeling hollow and empty in that dark, dank room, unable to escape however hard you tried, or however much someone told you to, “Get over it and pull yourself together” the idea that the entire world was against you echoing around your head, what would you do? My mum was a mental health nurse. I guess it is rather ironic that she devoted her life to helping people sleigh their dragons, yet, she could never beat her own. It wasn’t until after, “the event” that I learnt that my mum had been in an endless war since I was born. Not only did she have the common feelings of loneliness and isolation, but she also showed signs of alcohol dependency and anorexia – Feeling so out of control, it is understandable that she tried so hard to regain some kind of control while her mind and world were overflowing with clutter. Thoughts she had locked away in a room finally came spilling out and burst that door down, drowning her.

Storm clouds started to gather when I was 12. My mum, tired and alone, took what was to be her first overdose. In fairness to my mum, she seemed to realise the mistake immediately, and called a friend. First I knew someone was desperately pounding on the door and they were carrying my dear mum away on a stretcher. Heart-broken and tear-stroked I followed her to Queen Alexandra Hospital, Cosham. I’ve always worn my heart on my sleeve, yet, my poor brother never has. I don’t recall him crying, all I remember is his anger and distance… I guess he was scared, but being him, he couldn’t show it – a sign of perceived weakness. If he didn’t give in, it wasn’t real. It was. The next “event” didn’t happen until my brother’s 18th birthday: December 31st 2002. Again, my mum survived, physically, though I think she may have mentally died that day. I didn’t really understand at the time, maybe my family was trying to protect me. A suicide note was the last thing my 15 year old self expected to find when looking for something in my mum’s room a few days later. After all we had gone through; I wish I hadn’t had to find out how ill my mum really was in that way. My father had walked out when I was a baby, my brother was anything but emotional, my mum was my best friend and now, I was alone. My brother completely detached himself from that day on – to be fair I can understand his anger, not only had our mum told us she didn’t want to be with us anymore, she had done so on his birthday! I, on the other hand, felt it was my responsibility to make her better. I stopped socialising with my friends as much; I just wanted to spend time with my mum, time I think I knew, was fast running out. After this attempt, my mum admitted herself to The Meadows, Southampton where she underwent Electro-convulsive therapy as well as other treatments. I remember being taken to see her. She looked so ill, so thin, drawn, like she wasn’t really there anymore. I desperately wanted her to be ok, to get better. I had been told she wasn’t eating, and so I took her some cup-a-soups, trying to say that they were, “like a drink more than food” and a bottle of her favourite Coca-Cola, to which she replied simply, “I only want it if it has Bacardi!” Of course it didn’t, she wasn’t well. I remember one Sunday morning, just after that I awoke to see my Nan's eyes staring back at me. Waiting to find out what had happened was the worst feeling I think I had experienced, my brother was in the shower so we just sat on the sofa…waiting. My mum had been rushed to Kings College Hospital London. I remember going straight up to see her in the ICU. Anyone who has ever been in to an ICU, I’m sure will agree that it is a place where all hope has died. A hole in the world where it’s hard to breathe let alone find a way of believing that your loved one will ever come out of there alive. To see a parent or loved one on life support is hard to describe. It’s simply devastating, heart-breaking.

I could barely breathe through the sobs and the salty tears streaming down my face, but I made a promise to myself. I would not be one of those people who said, “If only they had known how much I loved them”; I couldn’t live with that amount of regret. Somehow, I found the strength to utter those four words, “I love you Mum” before collapsing. I remember the Doctor telling us there was a 90% chance. That she would die. God I clung on to that 10%. Back to that Thursday night at 8.30pm on 3rd February 2003. No words were needed. Words couldn’t change anything. All we could do was breakdown and cry. It’s been eight years and I still can’t listen to, “The Circle of Life” (the song my mum requested for her funeral one care-free day. It never occurred to me that we would actually have to play it for her funeral one day, who knew that one day would be so soon). It’s been eight years and I still can’t read the letters my mum wrote me. It’s been eight years and I still don’t know how to deal with the loss. I still don’t know whether to be sad or angry or whether my mum “gave up” or sacrificed herself because she believed we would be better off without her. Of course we weren’t. It’s been eight years and at times, I still want a hug from my mum, because that love between a mother and a daughter…well, there’s just no substitute.