Alcohol robbed me of my beautiful mum
My mum’s journey to being an alcoholic is an unconventional one. She struggled for a very long time with her weight. Eating was her way of suppressing her own personal trauma.
In 2008, my mum had the gastric bypass. Essentially, she swapped one addiction for another. This operation is the start of me slowly losing my mum.
Alcohol dictated our lives for over a decade. I often say I had two mums.
Daytime mum
There was daytime mum: caring, loving, and capable of lighting up any room simply by walking into it. She had the most beautiful blue eyes, the kind that made you feel seen and safe.
She had the best laugh, loud and contagious, the sort that filled a space and made everyone else laugh too. She was warm, vibrant, and full of life.
She supported us fiercely and gave me my love of the theatre. This was who my mum truly was.
Evening mum
Then there was evening mum, the version shaped by alcohol, the one we all feared. As the day faded, so did the woman we loved.
Her voice hardened, her eyes lost their warmth, and the home became unpredictable and unsafe.
She became verbally and physically abusive, and the person who once made us feel protected became the person we had to protect ourselves from.
Learning to mourn the loss of my mum
That contrast was devastating. I would grieve her every night while she was still alive. I learned to mourn the loss of my mum long before she was gone. I watched alcohol slowly erase the parts of her that made her.
The laughter disappeared. The kindness dulled. The light behind her eyes dimmed. Alcohol stole her identity.
No child should have to witness their mother attacking their father. No child should have to stand between their parents to stop violence, knowing that being hit themselves was the only guaranteed way to end it.
No child should have to breathalyse their own mum to check she was sober enough to drive them to dance class. Yet this became my normal.
While other children slept, I listened
I lived in a constant state of hypervigilance. While other children slept, I listened. While other children felt safe, I stayed alert.
My job was to protect my younger brother from seeing what alcohol had turned our mum into.
Many nights, I fell asleep on the floor outside his bedroom door in the early hours of the morning, simply to keep him safe.
I grieve the life she should have had
Alcohol robbed me of my beautiful mum, the woman with blue eyes, a radiant laugh, and a warmth that could fill any room. It replaced her with fear, violence, and unpredictability.
And even now, years later, I grieve not only the mum I lost, but the life she should have had, the life addiction stole from her and us.
In October 2018, my world changed forever. My mum was admitted to hospital with a severe eye infection and was at risk of losing her sight.
By this point, I had limited contact with her. Not because I didn’t love her, but because loving her had begun to cost me my own survival.
I promised her that if she admitted herself into hospital, I would come back from university in Cardiff to see her.
Within four days, she could no longer walk. After nine days, she could no longer open her eyes.
She was still there, beneath the illness
Watching my mum deteriorate so rapidly was terrifying. Alcohol had already ravaged her body, weakening it quietly over years, long before this hospital admission.
Her liver was so badly damaged that it could no longer cope with medication most of us take without a second thought. Pain relief that should have eased her suffering became lethal.
One of the memories I hold closest is of my older brother visiting her after his graduation, still wearing his cap and gown. Somehow, she found the strength to open her eyes for the very last time, and we watched the tears roll down her face.
It felt like she was holding on just long enough to see him, just long enough to remind us that she was still there, beneath the illness.
Alcohol had the final say
Shortly afterwards, my mum died from paracetamol poisoning. Not because she was careless. Not because she didn’t want to live.
But because alcohol had damaged her body so severely that it could no longer tolerate it. Even in death, alcohol had the final say.
In losing her, I felt a mixture of unbearable grief and devastating relief.
Relief that she was no longer in pain.
Relief that she was no longer trapped in a body and mind controlled by addiction.
Relief that, finally, she was safe.
My mum was free from a disease that had consumed her for years, a disease that had already taken so much from her long before it took her life.
Her story deserves to be heard
Alcohol did not just kill my mum. It stripped her away piece by piece. It took the woman with the beautiful blue eyes. The infectious laugh. The warmth that could fill any room.
It stole the mum who loved fiercely, who dreamed, who lived.
Seven years on, I am still grieving, not only the death of my mum, but the life she should have had.
Her story deserves to be heard. Because alcohol robbed her of a life and me of my mum.
Siobhan
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