The person who inspired me most.

To choose the person who inspired me most is not easy, I would have to decide between my mother and father. This seems natural because they are the two people I have spent most of my life with. But for the purpose of this post I shall talk about my mother (without taking any credit away from my father because he was largely influential in my life too).

My mother, is a selfless person like most mothers are. Having spent most of her working life at Changi Prison working as a counsellor after her graduation from NUS, she gave up working full time when she gave birth to my older brother (I have and older brother, younger sister and another younger brother). And became a full time housewife, taking care of all the household chores together with our then maid, occasionally giving tuition to kids for extra allowance. She could do this because my dad was doing well enough to support our living costs. Being a housewife is nothing glamorous and as a kid then, I did not appreciate her as much as I would now. My mother did all the dirty work with regards to us kids. She taught me how to wipe my ass (something I cannot imagine my father doing), made me study (which was hard for her because I was not naughty but I hated doing homework) and she made sure there was food on the table every night.

As we grew up, she continued her never ending work as a housewife, always looking out for us and taking care of my family’s needs. It was hard because she had to look after 5 others and after we moved into our current HDB home we decided to let the maid go, leaving my mother to do most of the housework.

She never complained about sacrificing her time for us, or not being able to dance after having us (she loved to dance since young). Only after we got older and became more independent did she start going out to do things she loved. Her dance classes became the usual every Saturday. We even watched her perform a few times at the local community centre.

That was when it happened.

In year 2013, I just graduated from poly and was waiting for my NS call up. My parents went for a routine body check-up, my dad went through it and came out without any new problems. But my mother had to stay for a night and do a scope, it was supposed to be just a day check-up. My dad came home and picked me up to go to the hospital. We went to her temporary ward and she was smiling to us. We talked like there was nothing wrong.

When we got home, my dad told me that they found a lump in her stomach, it was about the size of a fist. My mother had been diagnosed with stomach cancer.  The thing about stomach cancer is that it does not have glaring symptoms. Early symptoms include nausea, loss of appetite and abdominal pain. Usually, and as in my mother’s case, the cancer is only discovered well into the later stages when the symptoms become more serious like vomiting.

Treatment started immediately. The first option was surgery to remove most of the stomach, but that was ruled out when we found out the cancer had spread to other organs. So the next option was chemotherapy, which really hurts.

From around April to August (which was my enlistment month into NS), my mother went in and out of Singapore General Hospital so often that I know the hospital layout quite well. As time went on, she spent more time at the hospital than she did at home. She lost half of her weight, and her diet changed from solid to liquid to nutrient packs injected directly into her bloodstream. It was horrible to watch her go through so much pain. And even though she was going through a lot of pain, she always hid it from us. She would smile at us whenever we visited her at the hospital as if this cancer was just a little bit of stomach discomfort. She would just close her eyes when the pain was too much, and turn her head away so we wouldn’t worry. She fought hard, really hard. She fought because the thought of leaving us on this world was more painful than the pain from her cancer.

Then came my time to enlist into NS. By that time, she was spending more than half of her time in the hospital. My dad is self-employed so he spent of all his time with her. When she was in the hospital, he never left her alone until it was 2 hours past visiting hours to go home, just to go back to at 8am the next morning. Since I was in NS, I could only visit her on weekends. At that time, I hated NS so much because I wanted to be with my mother. But I figured I could make her proud probably for the last time by getting in the Officer Cadet School (OCS).

I finally passed out from Basic Military Training in October, but my mother was too weak to come and watch my parade. The rest of my family came and we took some pictures. My dad later told me that when my mother saw my pictures she was so proud. I had a one week break before I would find out where I was posted to (OCS or not). I spent all of that one week with my mother. When I found out I made it to OCS I was so happy, and I told my mother immediately. She smiled, but her time was running out.

On I went to OCS, where the tough training meant that I had very little time to communicate with my family. I told my instructors about my situation and I gave their phone numbers to my family so that I can be contacted whenever there was an emergency. It was the fifth day, a Friday, in OCS when my instructor pulled me out and asked me to get changed to book out. I ran all the way out from my bunk to the gate of the camp, got into a cab and went to the hospital.

My mother was so tired she could hardly open her eyes for more than a few minutes before closing it again. We knew it was coming. Her vital signs dropped dramatically and she was rushed into the ICU. There, she was hooked up to multiple machines that were keeping her alive.

On the 26 of October in the ICU, she drew her last breath and dropped a last tear. Just like that, she was gone. Throughout her battle with cancer, she showed me strength that I never knew she had. Whether her strength came from her love for us or her own will to survive, it was incredible. My mother could fight a battle she knew she was going to lose with such grit, and I learnt so much from her.

After a week of mourning, I decided that I would carry on my course at OCS to become an officer. At every point during the training where I felt like giving up, I would tell myself that my mother did not give up, and I must push on. After many months of toiling, I commissioned, but I still felt empty because she couldn’t live to see that day.

My mother showed me strength, courage, and above all, so much love. I feel so bad that I cannot repay her for all her sacrifice. So now the least I could do is to make my life count. 

My mum and dad a few months after she got diagnosed with cancer.