Lara Heaney, 37, knew she had to carry out her mum’s dying wish
WORDS: MATT BARBOUR, FRANCES LEATE
Her face creased in amusement and tears poured from her eyes as my mum pointed to the toilet in our hotel room. ‘There’s an instructions manual and everything, Lara,’ she laughed, as I lay on the bed in fits of giggles. It was July 2013 and we’d just checked into our hotel in London for the night, to see Mum’s idol, Robbie WIlliams, play at Wembley Stadium, and Mum had discovered we had a fancy toilet with buttons and levers. For the rest of the weekend we struggled to work out how to get the lid open, which my mum Ann, 57, found hilarious.
When I, my older sister Sarah and our younger brother David were growing up, Mum had a hospital job operating machines during heart surgeries. But she was always taking us on weekends away to see her beloved Take That or making up silly little games to play at home. When we were sick she'd sit with us on the sofa and watch Disney films. Of course, all three of us adored our dad Andy, then 54, too. But it was Mum who always put a smile on our faces. As I got older, I remember seeing her sipping a mojito, reminding us that life was to be enjoyed.
SHOCKING NEWS
Eventually I started working in an aquarium, while Sarah moved to Australia and, in 2013, gave birth to Toby. Mum and Dad flew out as much as they could to visit and adored their new grandparent roles.
In November 2015, aged 29, I announced my engagement to Sean, then 33, and Mum couldn’t have been happier. We set a date for October 2016 and began making plans.
But in March 2016, Mum had just got back from visiting Sarah, who was pregnant with her second baby. She admitted she was exhausted. By now I lived in Newquay, Cornwall, and Mum was at the family home in Leicester, but we spoke on the phone all the time. ‘It’s just jet lag,’ she told me. But one night at home with Sean, Dad called. He was so upset as he told me Mum had been diagnosed with stage 4 pancreatic cancer. I couldn’t catch my breath. My mum couldn’t have cancer. She just couldn’t.
The next morning, Sean drove me to Leicester to see Mum in hospital. She was sitting up in bed smiling. ‘After spending my whole life watching what I eat, now they want me to have cream instead of milk to help me gain weight,’ she said, avoiding any talk of cancer. ‘Oh Mum,’ I choked, holding back tears.
Days later, I was there when the oncologist explained the cance
