I guess I should give some background about why I've made the decision to take a year or so out to go traveling. To many of my nearest and dearest it seems a very sudden decision and out of character, but if I share with you a slice of my life you may just understand.
In October 2004, late one Saturday night I received a phone call from my Dad. He never calls me so I knew something was wrong. Mum was in St Vincents, Melbourne after having a seizure at home and Dad was ringing to tell me they had found a brain tumor.
She had been experiencing blinding migraine like headaches for some time and the doctor had put it down to just that, migraine. Mum had never suffered from migraine before and this should have been a trigger for the doctor to question further. Mum trusted him though and just got on with things until the afternoon she got another headache and decided to go lie down. Dad and my brother Nick were in the house, so luckily Dad was with her when she started to fit.
They flew her to Melbourne to stabilise her and do an MRI, where they found the tumor. It was a
menengioma, supposedly the best type to get as they are usually easy to remove and benign. Mum's was neither benign nor easy to remove and over the next three years she became more and more ill with subsequent relapses until January 2008.
During this time I was having a hard time at work. I was doing a stressful and unrewarding job for a boss who I felt took advantage of me and failed to support my work. I was traveling backwards and forwards to Australia every six months or so and it was beginning to take it's toll. I had been refused a secondment into another department and after placing a complaint about my boss was instead moved to work with another manager. By January I was starting to settle into a new role and feel happier in my job with the support of my new manager.
A few days after New Year 2008 I called home and spoke to Dad. Mum was OK but the left side of her face had started to droop and he was concerned. They had an appointment with her surgeon the next day and some of Mum's friends had recommended Dad pack an overnight bag as the likelihood was that they would end up back in Melbourne for more tests. The friends were right and Dad drove Mum to Melbourne to see the surgeon again in the afternoon of the same day. She was sent for an MRI which showed the tumor was back and more aggressive than before. Mum was at the end of the road.
I returned to Australia a few days later to spend the last few weeks of Mum's life with her and helping out my Dad. It's one of the toughest things I've ever had to do. If you can imagine having to wash, clothe, and feed your parent as they slowly become someone you don't recognise you might be getting close to what I experienced.
The tumors in Mum's brain were growing around her cerebellum and pressing on the auditory nerves. This meant that she progressively went deaf and communication became very difficult. For a time she was able to read our conversations on a white board a friend had loaned to us, but even that became and effort in the end.
I lost huge clumps of hair as a reaction to the stress I was under, even getting two little bald patches which now have short hairs about 3 cm long growing out of them. I had dark circles and huge bags under my eyes and my mental health suffered too. During this time I discovered by accident that I had a half brother who had been born to my mother before she had met my father. This further complicated what was already an incredibly stressful time in my life.
While I loved my mother dearly the daily grind of being stuck in the house and unable to leave eventually got to me. I asked the nursing staff, who came each week, to support me in getting some respite care and convince Dad that it was the best thing to do. With their help I was able to convince Dad to place Mum into
Cobram District Hospital. The nurses there were expecting us at some stage as this was where Mum was to be cared for in the final stages of palliative care anyway.
As it turned out the day we took Mum in was the last possible day we could have moved her on our own. She deteriorated to the point of requiring a lifter just a day later and had a major fall out of bed the second night she was in the hospital. The nurses felt awful about the fact she had the fall, but it was just a symptom of how ill she was. Her balance was completely gone and yet she still thought she could do things for herself. She was now a danger to herself.
A couple of days later she was moved to the palliative care suite. This was a lovely area where Dad and I could also stay overnight to be with her. On the night before Mum died, three weeks after we had first taken her in, it was my turn to stay. I sat with Mum for a couple of hours from about 4am after her breathing became very laboured and she was given a morphine
nebuliser. By the morning she was in a coma and I contacted the rest of the family to let them know that we were very close to the end.
I wasn't with Mum when she died but Dad was. A small fact I am very glad of. I did all I could for her. To this day I can remember helping the nurses wash and prepare her body for collection. The nurses talking quietly to Mum, telling her what they were doing as they prepared her for her last journey. I don't know if it was for my benefit, but I suspect they do it as much for themselves as the family and the dead. Their own way of coping with the loss of someone they have come to know.
From the time I left the UK to my return it was about three months and my life was turned upside down. I had ended a relationship which for me was unsatisfactory, I was making him miserable and I couldn't cope with my own needs and his. I don't regret the break-up, just the way I did it. I could have handled it better and spared him some of the hurt.
I returned to work just two weeks after my mum's death and tried to rebuild some semblance of normalcy in order to deal with my loss. In the time I had been away my department had undergone some major changes and I had to get my head round a lot of change in a short space of time.
In the midst of all of this I found myself starting a new relationship with someone who is lovely but has their own issues to deal with. Due to my own experiences I can accept his need for space, it makes me sad but I can live with it. Not one to let grass grow under my feet I don't feel I can wait round for something that might never happen though.
Last week all of these factors came to a head, and so what seems like a fairly rash decision on my part, to go forth into the world and travel for a year, is actually the confluence of a number of events. The company I work for has given me the golden ticket to allow me the opportunity of a lifetime. I would be stupid not to grab it with both hands and run with it. One of my first loves is travel and the last four years have meant that all my funds have gone into travel to Australia.
It seems I have four months in which to execute my plan of attack. Four months which I am going to put to good use. Life is not a dress rehearsal, nor is it for the dead. I plan to make the most of the one life I have and learn to live in the moment again.
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