‘I am not your mother’

Carien Grobler tracked down her biological family when she was 35 years old. With a mother who sold her body to men and brought seven other children into the world, it was anything but a fairy tale encounter. What lay ahead was a long journey of forgiveness and acceptance.

Fourteen years ago, the greatest birthday gift awaited me in two pink stripes on a stick. I checked again, and again, and eventually believed it. Nine months later, I held my own blue-eyed boy in my arms. When I felt his breath on my neck for the first time, I knew I would give my life for him. I would also fight to the death if anyone tried to take him from me.

I can’t say the same about my biological mother. On the contrary. She offered me up. In the same way you let someone know your dog had puppies, should they want one.

My realization of motherhood shattered something inside me. How you can carry a baby inside you for nine months and then give her away eluded me. Every attempt to make sense of it only further fuelled the uncertainty. Like rain pouring into a bucket until there’s no more room and the water floods the whole house.

Then I called. The call I wanted to make thousands of times, but never had the courage to do. “She only had a personal number,” the social worker said, half numb over the phone. “Without an ID number, we can’t trace her.”

She sent me a brown envelope. One that my hands didn’t want to open. So, my husband did it, and he read: Cornelia Johanna Susanna Reneke. Cora. Who had her first child at 14. In a reform school, of all places. Another one a year later.

A year before me, there was a boy, he got to stay. I took the report from my husband, but I couldn’t find the reason in the black letters that swam in front of my eyes. The only logical explanation I could think of was that he was male. The girls were left like unwanted puppies at the hospital. Literally.

During the nine months of her pregnancies, Cora didn’t bother to let anyone know that she didn’t want the babies. It was too much trouble. She simply packed her bag in the hospital and left us there.

In the days that followed, I read the report over and over again. Later, the paper curled and my fingerprints settled in the white spaces.

“She definitely didn’t experience signing off the babies as traumatic. She has no emotion about the babies she gave up. It appears she also shows little discretion regarding sexual relationships. It already became pathological. The possibility that she could have more children is not excluded.”

And she did. When I tracked her down seven years later, there were three more daughters. So, eight in total. The last one she kept, but only because the father was willing to marry her. The sister before me is dead. Drowned at nine months in a tub. Conveniently?

“No matter how angry I’ve been with her all my life, I’ve always harboured the thought that she regrets the decision she had to make. I always though she carries a bit of shame and self-blame.

But not Cora. Amidst drug and alcohol abuse, she and Hantie, her twin sister, sold their bodies.

While I tell my children that they were born out of love, she conceived babies from her vile relationships with a multitude of men.”

I would do everything all over again

When the sister born after me tracked her down, Cora made it clear: ‘I am not your mother.’ Her first words to the kind soul with the tiny heart that is now a part of my life. Later, Cora also mentioned that she would do everything the same way again. One thing was certain: Cora carried no regret or self-blame with her.

I could never argue with her about this. Nor about the fact that my youngest sister remembers how she had to keep strange men’s children busy while  him and Cora disappeared into the bedroom. I could never tell her how angry I am, because shortly after she denied her parenthood a second time, she died. On my birthday, my day, which will never be mine again.”

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A magical moment

The moment you see someone of your own blood for the first time is almost magical. If you had to wait 35 years to hug someone who looks a bit like you, who is like you, and with whom you connect as if you were never separated, it’s sacred.

I immediately loved my younger sister. Because she speaks her mind, shares my moods, my empathy for others, my sense of humour, and my love for life. But also, because she’s her. A person who was given to me and whom I wouldn’t exchange for any money.

I marvelled at her, but also at our three little boys who look like triplets when they sleep. Who undoubtedly inherited their mothers’ stubborn genes, but would also calm down quickly.

Cora chose never to be a part of these people’s lives. No matter how hard I tried to understand it, I could never find a place in my mind to tuck it away. The less I understood, the more I realized that some things aren’t meant to make sense.

Sink and swim

No matter how deeply it struck me, Cora’s words were the truth. She wasn’t our mother, just a vessel we entered this world with. She would never swim for us. Full stop.

The sinking days could still come regularly and may never pass, but at least I’m not sinking alone anymore. Sometimes it’s my turn, and then my sister’s hands are there to pull me up. Other days it’s my turn to pull her up.

In between, we laugh, because no one’s share in life is deprived of humour. In the midst of the pain of rejection that sometimes lies so close to the surface, we can always find something in our story to smile about or laugh out loud.

When my arms get too tired to hold my head up, I marvel at the two blonds that I can call my own. Then I feel sorry for Cora.

She never allowed herself to experience that kind of love. Above all, I feel grateful. Because I know better and know the warm joy when two little bodies settle on top of me because they want to be close to me.