GROWING UP, CHRIS ROBERTS WAS EMOTIONALLY BLACKMAILED BY HER MOTHER

In my garden, and on my hands and knees, I was trying to catch my pet rabbit, who had darted underneath the shed’s raised wooden floor.

My mother, who was helping, bent down to look under the floor. Suddenly, my bunny shot out, causing my mother to jump and bang her nose on the shed.

She started to loudly cry.

I put my hand out to her – to comfort her – but it only made her cry louder.

After a few minutes, the sobbing subsided and she grabbed me to say: ‘You are the reason I am still alive. Never leave me. Without you, I wouldn’t want to live.’

From that moment, I knew that she was emotionally blackmailing me. Her dependency weighed heavily on my little shoulders – one shoulder for her to lean on and the other for her to cry on.

I was only three years old.

My arrival into the world wasn’t exactly picture perfect. In fact, my mother didn’t know she was pregnant until she was in the last groans of labour.

She’d assumed that, because she was terminally ill with tuberculosis – an infection that affects the lungs and can be deadly if not treated – that she couldn’t get pregnant.

Then suddenly, here I was, proving everyone wrong.

UNHEALTHY ATMOSPHERE

My mother wasn’t married to my father, and after my birth, he left. Heart-broken, my mother became bitter towards all men.

From then on, I was her rock to lean on and she was my burden to bear. But I wouldn’t realise this until much later.

I’d even go so far as to say that she was cloying and overly dependent on me – but I wouldn’t realise this until much later.

As I grew up, it seemed normal not to have a father or any friends and I spent days in my sick mother’s bedroom occasionally having her read to me.

One of the few good things I can thank her for is my love for books and appreciation of the written word.

I DIDN’T HAVE DOLLS OR FRIENDS TO PLAY WITH

But on the days I spent with my mother, I didn’t have dolls or friends to play with. Instead, I would spend hours dressing and undressing her feet, which were sticking out from under the bed covers.

Looking back the whole thing sounds very strange. And it was a very unhealthy atmosphere for two reasons.

One, because of my mother’s highly contagious tuberculosis – it spreads through the air so, if she sneezed or coughed, there was a chance I could contract it. And two, my mum would smoke 30-plus cigarettes a day, meaning I was inhaling the fumes.

It wasn’t long before the inevitable happened and I too contracted tuberculosis. I was only four.

I didn’t get full-blown TB, but a ‘shadow on the lung’ that made me lose weight.

At this point I was sent to an open-air school – which was essentially a school where all the classrooms were designed to be partially outdoors to allow for fresh air and good ventilation to ultimately improve pupils’ health – for children with disabilities.

Despite having very little experience of being around other children, meeting my new classmates never fazeed me.

I was just so happy to be around other people – to have a life outside of my mother’s illness.

But she made it clear that I was not allowed friends. She wanted exclusive rights to my time and if I ever tried to protest, she’d just wear her poor health and loneliness like a coat of many colours.

Frankly, I was trapped.

When I reached my teens though, I’d had enough of her control over my life. And, after discovering boys, I went right off the rails dating every boy I could.

When mum found out, she was furious. I knew it was jealousy – she didn’t want me to find someone that I might fall in love with and then leave her.

‘’Men can’t be trusted. You’ll be much happier living with me’, she would tell me.

But I didn’t care. I just wanted out from under her thumb.

It was then that I met my first husband

MODEL FAMILY

Thanks to him and his family I was able to come to terms with my unusual childhood and then felt I could confront many of my hang-ups about sickness and dysfunctional families.

And even though he was perfect son-in-law material, I now see that I married him as a means of escape.

Only six months after my marriage, my mother emigrated to Australia, claiming she had nothing left in this country to live for.

She would repeatedly ask me to join her and then make me feel guilty when I refused, insisting how wonderful life would be for just the two of us.

Predictably, my first marriage didn’t last, and we split up after seven years. I never regretted it – it showed me what normal family relationships should be like.

My first husband came from a middle-class nuclear family that had a balanced regard and love for each other. It was beautiful to know it was possible.

Ten years after my marriage to my first husband, I married my second and soon felt ready to be a parent.

SOLE CUSTODY

I’d started to come to terms with my dysfunctional childhood and let the distance in miles between my mother and me create an equally large emotional distance between us.

But, as time went on, my family grew and despite everything, I wanted my mother to meet her granddaughter.

So, my husband and I flew out to Australia with our toddler but the trip only served to confirm what I already knew. My mother virtually ignored my daughter.

She wanted sole custody of me with no husband or child. I was distraught, and quickly returned home with my family.

For a long time, my relationship with my mum had a negative impact on my life.

My mother passed away on Valentine’s Day 1987 in Australia. Although she had been ill for around 40 years, her passing was sudden and unexpected. In fact, I had spoken to her on the phone only the night before.

This was unusual in itself, as we only ever spoke on the phone on birthdays and at Christmas, but something told me I had to call her that evening.

Obviously, I was upset at losing someone I had known all my life, but was not bereft, in spite of it being the death of my mother.

SHE SHOULD HAVE BEEN LOOKING OUT FOR ME

I know she was sick, but I still feel like she should have been the one looking out for me. I was just a child after all.

Maybe my life didn’t get off to a conventional start, but I’ve made up for it since.

It is no longer dysfunctional, but happy and fulfilled. As well as a lovely family, I have a job I love and even received an MBE from HM Queen Elizabeth II for services to my local community.

It goes to show, you can change your path, no matter what obstacles – or people – are in your way.