For the Love of My Mother

Összefoglaló

This moving book should carry a reader warning - take two days off before opening. Right from the very first page, the hapless reader is gripped by the pace of events, as well as sheer incredulity that such dreadful things could happen to someone so young just a few decades ago. "For the Love of My Mother" is the moving story of Bridie Rodgers, who was detained for begging on the streets of Dublin aged two and a half. Put up for trial in an adult courthouse, this homeless and abandoned toddler was sent to an Industrial School in County Galway and for the next thirty years was incarcerated in some form of institution. It was the birth of her son, conceived after a traumatic teenage rape, which gave her a reason to fight for a future. Despite being separated from him and sent to work in one of the infamous Magdalen Laundries, the focus for the next forty years of her life was to remain a presence in her son’s life, determined that one day she would be a mother to him. She succeeded. This book is written by that son, John Paschal, using his mother’s memories as a testament to her unfailing love for him and her struggle for survival against all odds.Bleak as it may sound, the book is actually a gripping portrayal of the camaraderie and solidarity of the women incarcerated in the Laundries as supposedly ‘fallen’ women. Robbed of their children, liberty and of all basic human dignity, toiling from dawn till dusk, many simply went mad. Virtually imprisoned, the only escape from the aundries was to be signed out by a family member - whom in many cases were responsible for sending the women there in the first place. For most this institution was a life sentence. Moments of kindness shine through, as do the smallest details that sustain the survivors. In Bridie's case, a tiny lock of her son's golden hair that she managed to take before he was taken away from her. The moment when Bridie and two other women eventually escapes is eye-opening. Up until that moment, the reader could be following the narrative of someone in late Victorian England. But it was 1967. The women knew nothing of the modern world at all. Phones, music, television - everything was a shock to their institutionalised systems. Bridie managed to flee to England, where John Paschal also moved, and at this point the book describes their struggle to form a relationship. Despite all her years of pain and hardship, John found it hard to accept this woman as part of his life and deliberately lost contact with her. Amazingly, she manages to cope with it, until, years later, he learns how to accept her as part of his life - and a lot more besides.