My mother's forgetting
non-fiction, memoir
It was a four-hour surgery. I prayed with every fiber of my being, ‘Please save my mom.’ Only when I received the text saying my mom was being moved to the recovery room could I breathe a little easier. When I heard she was awake from anesthesia and being moved to her room, I finally unclasped my hands. I ran towards her room. My heart pounded in my ears. She was wheeled into the room on a hospital bed, her face expressionless except for her wide-opened eyes. Just seeing her again brought me such relief. During the four hours, she lost both her uterus and ovaries.
Not long after she returned from the operating room, the pain had come for her. She kept asking for more painkillers but the painkiller didn't even last two hours. Once its effects wore off, she would be submerged in pain and lose her consciousness again. It seemed like a kind of pain that I, having never experienced it, couldn't even begin to comprehend. If there is such a thing as hell, it was those hours of helplessly watching her suffer. I was terrified that she might die from the pain. All I could do was place a damp gauze on her chapped lips, parched from thirst, and cool her feverish body with my cold hands. That night, I spent the night reassured by the rise and fall of my mother's chest, the only proof that she was still alive.
When my mom told me over the phone, 'It's endometrial cancer,' I immediately booked a flight back to Korea. I never imagined such misfortune would strike so suddenly. From the moment I heard her diagnosis until I saw her in Korea, I spent days and nights crying. The sorrow I felt was so intense that it felt like my intestines were about to rupture. My whole body was shaking with fear of losing my mom. My thoughts were haunted by the realization that I had neglected my mother for far too long. In the ten years since I left home at twenty-two, she must have endured my father's violence alone. Could the cancer have grown in her body during those lonely years? If I hadn't neglected her, would it be different? Drowning in those thoughts, I cried and cried as if trying to evaporate every tear in my body.
When I opened the front door, my mom greeted me with her nose-wrinkling smile. It had been two years since we last saw each other.
“The only time I cried was when I first heard that I was diagnosed with cancer maybe because I was so shocked,” she replied when I asked her if she was okay. “But ever since you said you were coming, everything feels okay, even happy!”
I was surprised she could say she felt happy in such a situation. I didn’t want to dampen her spirits, so I did the best things I could do. I made her a healthy breakfast of oatmeal with blueberries and nuts every morning. After breakfast, I took her for a walk. We'd go to the trendy cafes and read books and have chats there. During those two weeks leading up to her surgery, we lived a strangely peaceful life. On the inside, I was terrified thinking about how advanced her cancer was and how much time we had left together. But at least when I was with my mom, I wanted to preserve the happiness my mom had held on to.
In the hospital room, my mom often said that it felt like she was on vacation in a hotel room.
“I once visited a friend in the hospital who had appendicitis. You'll never guess how envious I felt when I saw her so peacefully eating a tangerine in her hospital bed. I wanted to be like her, lying in a hospital bed, being served meals, and resting and doing nothing just for a few days.”
Since I was very young, my mom has run businesses like a restaurant, a fruit stand, and a second-hand clothing store. No matter what, she always opened the shop's shutter door and worked without a day off. Mom had to be so diligent because she had to take responsibility for the family's livelihood in place of my dad, who had no problem skipping work whenever he wanted to.
“Who would have thought that my wish would be fulfilled this way?' she chuckled, peeling a tangerine.
My mom laughs easily. She laughs even when there's no reason to. I still remember the nights my mom and I cried together because of my dad’s drunken outbursts. But the very next day, my mom was laughing her head off watching a TV show. I used to think she was a little strange. It was as if she had a mental eraser that wiped clean the ugly memories. Maybe that’s why I thought of her when I read Nietzsche's concept of forgetting in one of my philosophy classes.
Nietzsche, viewing forgetting very positively, says that forgetting is not just about losing memories but a necessary ability for living a good life. He says that humans can only regain vitality when we exert “active forgetfulness,” the mental capacity to intentionally forget what needs to be forgotten to live fully in the present. I've never met anyone who embodies active forgetfulness as well as my mom. Forgetting seems like a survival mechanism she's acquired in her life. Even when faced with cancer, she acted as if she had forgotten how scary it was. Despite the painful experiences she went through with the surgery, I never heard her complain about how much she suffered. Instead, she boasted to her sisters about how lucky she was to be alive and able to eat and go to the bathroom normally.
Of course, she doesn't forget everything. Every three months, during her regular check-ups, she says she's terrified of a recurrence. But she also says that whenever the doctor tells her there's no sign of metastasis, she feels like her life has been extended three months more. She says there are so many more things to be grateful for in this bonus life she's been given. The only complaint my mom has is that she can no longer drink alcohol. She's upset that she can't rely on alcohol to boost her mood when she wants to let loose. Aside from that little gripe, she is recovering very well.
The real problem is me. The earthquake that shook my life after my mom's cancer diagnosis is still causing aftershocks. The pieces of my heart that shattered haven't fully healed. I live in constant fear of another bomb going off in my life, another sudden tragedy. Every time my mom goes for a checkup, I'm a wreck, terrified of the possibility of something bad. I constantly worry about my mom and overprotect her from everything. Thinking about the possible situation of losing her, I often feel suffocated. I've had countless nights filled with dread, imagining future misfortunes that haven't even happened yet.
On the day I was leaving for Canada to resume school, my mom said goodbye without even looking at me. My goodbye was just as flat and distant as hers. We were both locked in a personal battle to suppress our sadness. But the moment her car disappeared, tears started streaming down my face. As I walked away with my suitcase, I thought about a trip that my mom and I could go on together—a real vacation, far away from hospitals and doctors. Imagining the joys of the trip, I told myself to forget the things I needed to let go of. Just as my mother forgot and laughed off the sadness and misfortune that struck her life, I too wiped away my falling tears and continued walking to the entrance to the train I needed to board.
