Covid-19 wasn’t the biggest change to my 2020, but it affected my journey of loss.
16th March 2020 – Lockdown. Isolation. Schools shut, social activities cancelled, everywhere unessential closed down. Lives were changed forever. Mine changed even more on March 31st. My mum was diagnosed with cancer – which was incurable. My mum was dying and we were in a lockdown.
Now, you may think that the lockdown was a blessing in a way, since it meant that we got more time together. Well… not really. Me and my mum, we clashed a lot; we both have bad tempers and we both just knew how to make each other tick. Us being in the same house, constantly, was not good. Tensions were high at points and I had to hold back and bite my tongue many times. This wasn’t always an option though, especially as we went through the summer and there was still no sign of proper freedom other than going for walks with friends.
Because of the lockdown as well, I don’t think I ever had a chance to properly process the information of her not only being ill, but being in the process of dying. It was all I was surrounded by, day in, day out – except there were no days out. I had no escape from it. I was forced to witness every moment. The change in my mum – from a woman who was stubborn and strong, never showing any sign of weakness, turning to someone slowly getting weaker, sleeping through the days, the chemo making her throw up, lack of appetite and the number of tears that were shed.
Going to uni was equally as terrifying for me because I was a three-hour train ride away and had no way to get back in an emergency. I tried desperately to fix our relationship before university so I had no regrets if the worst happened but the issue was, it had to go two ways. At points, I felt like she didn’t want to fix this relationship that we barely had. The night before I left for uni, I went in to say goodbye, since I was heading off early the next morning, but all I got in return was her pushing me away. She was shouting at me about how she was glad I was going, to never come back. I sat in my room and cried, just saying ‘you’re my mum and I love you. I’m not leaving with it being like this.’ For the first two months at uni, she blanked every message I sent her, ignoring my existence. Then, finally, she replied.
November 2020 – Lockdown 2. I got COVID. At this point, I hadn’t travelled home at all so when we went into isolation, the fear of something happening and me not being able to get back was torturous. I would jump out of my skin anytime the phone rang from my dad, worrying about what news it would be, but equally as scared getting no news. I had a couple of messages every few days from my mum so that was some improvement. Constant fear ran through me as I stared at the four walls, slowly losing my sanity, panic attacks hitting me regularly, a hole opening up inside of me as all I wanted to do was scream. Especially when I got the call from my dad. 3-8 months left. That’s all she had. The need to go home for Christmas became even stronger, even with the uncertainty of the restrictions. I was going home whatever the cost, this was my mum’s last Christmas and I wasn’t missing it. I didn’t care about restrictions at this point – I was out of isolation and getting home.
December 2021 – Christmas. Over that Christmas period, there were many emotional conversations. I sat with my mum and spoke to her and we expressed we loved each other. I never got an apology for what she said but, at this point, I was just grateful that she wasn’t blocking me out. That’s why, when my university went into a local lockdown, I headed back immediately. I knew me and mum wouldn’t keep this rekindling of the relationship going if we were under the same roof, especially with how I had grown so much more independent since uni, even more so than I was beforehand.
In the following months, I went back twice; once when she went into hospital and then a couple of weeks later to say goodbye. I couldn’t visit her when she was in hospital the first time due to COVID. She was all alone, struggling. And she was told she had a month, at most, left – which me and my dad had to find out through a text. She argued with the doctors saying she wanted to go home, fighting to be allowed out of hospital so she could come home and we could be as a family since we couldn’t see her. So I stayed home for that week then headed back to uni with me saying ‘I’ll see you soon’ to her and her promising me she would keep fighting, but she had a do not resuscitate order.
March 30th 2021 – she went into Rowcroft. I couldn’t get home until the next day so I stayed up all night, alarms set for every fifteen minutes in case I fell asleep and my phone rang with the news. The travel was still technically illegal as it was still guided that you shouldn’t travel unless it was a necessity – to me this was more necessary than anything else in my life. My grandad showed me a photo of her when I got back and she already looked like a corpse. There was no life in her and it was so painful seeing her like that. We got to Rowcroft and only two of us were allowed in the room so I couldn’t even sit there with my grandad and my dad together. My mum was unconscious the whole time, unable to talk, barely able to breathe. It was so painful to see her like that. All I wanted was to be there with both my grandad and my dad, but that was impossible. The last thing I said to her was a choked ‘I love you’ through the lump in my throat. My grandad got the call from my dad ten minutes after we left saying she was gone. March 31st.
Because of COVID, she had said she didn’t want a funeral, she was going to have a direct cremation so the number limits of attendees didn’t prevent people from being able to mourn her death. In a way, this meant we had barely any closure. Restrictions made travel between uni and home difficult. COVID meant there was a period of time where I was physically unable to head home no matter what. It was torturous. Every time I headed home, I was terrified of being seen as a student just breaking rules when I was actually having essential travel. I wouldn’t have been the only one to experience this; cancer treatments among patients were delayed as well as essential and probably life saving operations. Losing a loved one in lockdown was torturous.
