Mother's final wish - to see son wed.

This is a story of love. Love between a newly wed and love between a mother and child. 

Theresa Tan, Snr Social Affairs Correspondent, wrote it, and it is about a mother’s dying wish to attend her son’s wedding. 

Mdm Ng, 71, was diagnosed with stage four pancreatic cancer in July this year, and doctors gave her about one year to live. Fearing that his mother may not be able to attend his wedding, Mr Chia Fu Yong, 35, and his fiancée for four years, Ms Tan Mei Xuan, 28, decided to tie the marital knot on the auspicious 10/10/2020. 

Fu Yong said: “I was afraid she wouldn’t be able to see me wed. It’s very hard to say how long she has left.”

But it was not easy to make the arrangements. Mdm Ng was bedridden, and being cared for at home. She could not sit up for more than 10 mins without feeling pain. She also could not speak freely. 

Thanks to the charity Ambulance Wish Singapore, they made mother and son’s wish come true. They laid her on a stretcher, fetched her to the wedding at Marina One from Dover Hospital, and even arranged for a standby nurse to attend to her needs. 

The chairman of Ambulance Wish, Dr Ong Yew Jin, said: “Mdm Ng could barely speak, but she managed to whisper to the nurse and our volunteers that she was very happy.”

“She was mostly quiet throughout, so seeing her break into a smile as she shared how happy she was was a memorable moment for us.“

Her son said: “I’m very happy I fulfilled her wish. I felt she hung on for my wedding.”

Lesson? One, it is about the tireless love and devotion of a mother. This love is unseen, yet the power it gives is unerring and unforgettable. 

It is apt here to remind us that many things bring us pleasure of a temporal nature, especially the ambitious pursuit after material gains. But a mother’s love is not readily tangible, yet it is proven to be internally transforming and enduring. 

I recall that Helen Keller once said: “The best things in life are unseen, that's why we close our eyes when we kiss, cry, and dream."

For me, that is the love of a mother, that is, maternal empowerment. Ironically, what we can’t see and touch is the fundamental drive of humanity, giving a life the purpose embodied to give, to sacrifice and even to die for another. That is why I could so readily identify with these words from Helen Keller: -

"They took away what should have been my eyes (but I remembered Milton's Paradise).

They took away what should have been my ears, (Beethoven came and wiped away my tears) 

They took away what should have been my tongue, (but I had talked with God when I was young) 

He would not let them take away my soul, possessing that I still possess the whole."

Indeed, when we kiss, cry and dream, we enter into a world where we retire our sight completely and allow our ethereal soul to connect with another, just like the love of a mother that reaches out to hug her sons and daughters. The union is as close a bond as when one nurtures a life within her womb, and the two lives practically intertwined as one. 

Let me end by reminding myself what I once wrote about motherhood years ago. It is the safe harbour we all return to when the storm of life hits real hard. For who can forget the years of tireless labour, thankless most times, yet, the decades of sacrifices go undimmed, unceasing? 

Motherhood is the cornerstone of every relationship. And should you take away that pivotal maternal cinderblock, the whole structure of a person from birth to adulthood (and beyond) becomes unstable.

Mind you, you will be hard pressed to find hypocrisy in a mother’s nurturance. There is often no glamour in it. In anonymity, her generosity is seldom illuminated. That’s the real acid-test of parenthood; for it is its own reward. 

Mothers also don’t win any award along the hardscrabble, but life-sharpening, journey. It is a job beyond the 9-to-5. It is 24, 7, 365. The breaks come when they are asleep. But by then, you are oblivious to the world too (in your jadedness). 

I feel that God made it that way because the first person you see is the one who nurtures you even before you come into full existence. That enduring bond of connection defines all other bonds of varying closeness as you take upon your own journey when it’s time for you to nurture your very own. 

Her labour of love for you, though at times imperfect, is the same labour expected of you when you first lay your eyes on your newborn. It is a familiar and nostalgic vulnerability you see in yourself when she first took care of you unconditionally, unwavering. It is a legacy passed on, because the legacy you first received makes a timeless soul connection that bonds you to your own offspring. 

There is thus no prize for motherhood except the joy of a bond that grows even stronger through every trial of life. No prize, because it is priceless. 

In truth, she can’t live forever, you know that. She can only give you forever in the time she has with you. And it is a forever that you pass down to your own child, as your own child passes down to hers or his. 

That forever is the bond that stories of love and devotion are diligently woven together by a community that has received and given love the way a mother has given hers.