Dear Mammy,

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Yesterday I sat with my daughter as we faced yet another challenge that life unremittingly throws at us like the universe throws space detritus at the surface of the moon. I told her it was good to be able to talk to her because I never had the chance to do that with my mother, who died of cancer when I was 22.

I wrote many letters to Bridgid from abroad but somehow never got the chance to tell her how much she meant to me, how she shaped the woman and mother I became. If I could write to her now, I would say this:

YOU used to say that when we’re born we are ‘stamped’ with whatever life is going to give us. Life seems gripped by patterns; at least I think so, considering your difficult life, mine that followed, and my daughter’s, a woman who has so much of your courage in her.

Where to start? I’d need a book, not a letter. I was your seventh child, May and Nuala came safely early on, four boys were miscarried, and then I arrived, a small puny wheat-stalk, when you were closer to 50 than 40. I wasn’t that far past my third milestone when my father, who had been very ill for some time, died, as a new year approached. I know him only from photographs and family stories.

Your elder daughters gave you four grandchildren. You never knew my two or their children. Now, as a mother and grandmother, I could comprehend what that meant physically and emotionally to you. You never moaned about what life had thrown at you. The years passed with me believing you were somehow invincible and that you’d find a solution to everything.

Growing up with you, I inhabited a world in which I was a spoiled youngest, doted on by everyone. Then pneumonia struck and I hovered between life and death even before the scar of my father’s demise had a chance to heal. Penicillin had been discovered and May’s savings for her wedding went on injections. I pulled through with you constantly by my side, supporting me when weeks in bed left my legs without strength. You had to cut my matted blonde hair, which saddened you. By odd coincidence, my son was born at the very hospital where penicillin was given to the world.

You spent your childhood in a home raided by Black and Tans, with a mother whose sons were being hunted by solders with guns. You carried dispatches in the handlebars of your little bike, smiling like an angel as members of the British Army frisked your brothers at checkpoints. I was blessed to grow up in Howth at a time when it was safe for children to run around the fields, the cliffs, the mountains. I was skinny and short but labelled ‘Spitfire’ at home because you always taught me to fight my own battles, not to be a cry-baby, and not be afraid to stand up to those who appeared bigger or stronger. You let me find my own way, stepping in only if there was injustice in a fight or knowing there was more to it than I could handle.

As a teen given freedom to grow, I knew your worth even though it never occurred to me to tell you. Although you had to work hard to bring me up with ill-health dogging your heels, you fed every instinct I had, whether it was with watercolours, pencils, music, books, dancing classes and more — a thing I did with my children. You always led by example; preaching was not your thing. I was allowed to go to dances and stay out late. I followed your example when I lost my beloved Andreas. I worked to give my family what I could, remembering you in need of some necessity but giving the money for something I wanted, saying: “You’re young, you need it more than me.” Odd, these patterns: Andreas died young too, just before Christmas.

You still come to me in dreams all these years later, and in times of anguish I wake up from a nightmare calling for you just to realise you are only in my heart and mind and I’m alone. But the sense that your spirit lingers near me sends me back to a peaceful slumber.

You took Andreas to your heart, instinctively seeing in him the goodness that had drawn me. You bought each other gifts that first Christmas we shared. There was not to be another one. When news came that you were seriously ill it was like a punch in the stomach. Going home and seeing the tall, strong-bodied woman I had always known reduced to skeletal proportions was horrifying. You hung on while I stayed, but not long after that you gave up the ghost and I was not there to hold your hand. That sadness and regret I will carry with me to my own grave. My last glimpse of you was sitting up bravely in a hospital bed waving me goodbye, your green eyes filling with tears.

I have your eyes and when Cypriots tell me how lovely my green eyes are, I proudly say: “I inherited them from my mother.” I see you in Lara, my grand-daughter, who is a redhead like you. Her eyes are honey green as they say here, glossed over by a light brown. She has your expressions and your grin. I know you’d love Andreas and Elpida, who are more Greek to look at than Irish. But the Irish genes are there, too. They also have part of you in them.

I know I was blessed with you, and in spite of all the hardships, I consider myself lucky to have had that childhood, that time, that unique mother I think of every day. You, Bridgid, have given me more than money can buy; you gave yourself tirelessly, making me understand that love is limitless. And that legacy is something of which many would be envious. Colette Ni Reamonn Ioannidou, Cyprus