That night I waited for the women to finish their cigarettes so I could escape from my hiding place.
‘She’s going to blame herself,’ one of them said.
‘Yeah, I probably would too,’ the other agreed. ‘I’d feel like a failure—being a mother—you know?’
‘Yup, with drugs and alcohol these days, it’s very hard. If you can get them to eighteen . . .’
Eighteen. That parental, magical, safe number. Many times I had said to Phil that if we could just get all our sons to eighteen I knew they would survive. Christopher died seven weeks before his eighteenth birthday, and one day before the start of spring.
chapter 5
I hated baking. Having seen my early attempts at wowing my children with special homemade cakes, my friend Deby, with the best intentions, bought me the Women’s Weekly Birthday Cake recipe book.
‘How can you stuff up a number one?’ she guffawed when I set Nic’s first cake on the dining table.
She laughed even harder when Ben’s number four, laced with chocolate icing and smarties, was backwards. When I thumbed through the book looking for an easy recipe for Ben’s fifth birthday, I settled on a castle. I was glad we didn’t have girls. Who but a professional baker could possibly make a doll or an open-lidded jewellery box?
The castle looked easy enough—two squares on top of each other and upside-down ice-cream cones for the turrets at each corner. White icing—no problem. I even stuck some red paper on toothpicks for the corner flags, which wasn’t in the picture. All was going to plan. The boys were fighting over who would lick the knife and I told them to wait till I’d finished. I could tell they were impressed as I slopped the first mound of icing into the centre. I delicately smoothed it over the surface then up the sides of the cones. Each boy was entrusted with inserting a flag, their hands hovering over the cones anxiously.
Suddenly all the cones fell over under the weight of the icing which, I discovered, was too thick. We resurrected them sans icing and tried with another batch. This time the icing was too thin and dribbled down the corrugated curves in unappetising lumps.
‘It doesn’t matter, Mama,’ Ben said. ‘It’ll still taste good.’
And it didn’t matter, as halfway through the party Ben cut his head open on the corner of the wall while riding on the shoulders of an older boy. We spent most of his birthday in the doctor’s surgery.
The boys loved their birthdays. They got to choose their favourite meal to eat at home or we’d take them out to a restaurant. We each bought a present for the birthday boy and I’d tie a balloon in a loop at the back of their pants or shorts. The birthday cake was the grand finale and there would be several more disasters before they each opted for a bought cake.
Christopher asked for a football when he turned eight. It would be his last homemade birthday cake. He invited his friends to the local football oval and we played games until they became bored and set up their own teams. When it was time for cake, candles and happy birthday, the teams gathered around while I took out the cake from the esky. Silence. Then laughter, the loudest from Deby who declared, ‘It looks like a turd.’
The boys and two girls giggled at Deby’s irreverence—I was devastated. ‘It does look like a football,’ Christopher said, wrapping his dirty arm around my waist.
I was happy to cut it up and pass it out.
chapter 6
I don’t remember the last time I saw Christopher. Maybe it was on the Saturday before, at his rugby match, but it could have been Sunday. I just don’t remember anymore. He had given up on his family, his school and many of his close friends. He lived with Ally and although he came home occasionally to say hello or to pick up some clothes, he was always anxious to leave.
He moved slowly through his days looking for something to do. His only commitments were his twice-weekly training sessions and the game on Saturday. He didn’t want to come home because there was tension there. Phil and I were scared—frightened of Nic’s illness, petrified we were going to lose him. We huddled around Nic, shadowed him, checked on him constantly. He had also left school, forfeiting his scholarships.
On Tuesday, two nights before Christopher died, I called him just to hear his voice and to find out about his appointment with Gordon. The next day he was to see his clinical psychologist. Both would tell me later they had asked Christopher if he was suicidal. He assured them he wasn’t.
He was out to dinner at Avalon’s local Thai with his ‘adopted’ family when I called. He seemed happy and was talkative for a change. I was jealous he was able to fit in with someone else’s family, be close to someone else’s mother. I knew he’d been drinking.
‘When you come home be careful of the blind possum,’ I told him.
Every night ‘our’ possum would crawl up the driveway, banging into the concrete walls before finding the spot by the fountain where we scattered quartered apples and bananas, one day past pleasant eating.
‘Is he still alive?’ Christopher asked, not having seen him for a few weeks.
‘Yes. He’s at the top of the driveway. Don’t run over him.’
‘You’re funny, Mum. You know he’s going to die. Something will get him.’
‘I know but I don’t want it to be you.’
I knew he’d stay at Ally’s and wouldn’t come home that night but I hoped he heard the longing in my voice. I wanted him home so badly. I needed the normalcy of my family of five again but mostly I wanted to watch him, though his daily absences did give me respite from the constant tension of negative parenting. Don’t do that, don’t go there, get off the phone, walk the dog, don’t drink, don’t smoke, don’t, don’t, don’t. I felt guilty I couldn’t love him in the way he needed and I was hurt that he didn’t seem to need my love.
Phil was gentle with Christopher, encouraging him towards good behaviour. I was angry he was adding to the family stress.
While Nic lay about, drugged and miserable, Christopher was partying, drinking and smoking dope. I didn’t realise then that he was self-medicating.
I lived in fear for Nic and the phone call from police or a friend that Christopher had wrapped his car around a telegraph pole. I’d had calls before. Once, when Christopher was twelve, he was staying at a friend’s house when they met up with two older boys in the grounds of a primary school on a Sunday. The police arrested the two sixteen-year-olds for breaking into the canteen and although the two younger boys were innocent, the call was intended as a warning. Christopher was full of remorse.
Then, when he was fourteen, he disappeared on Halloween night. He was staying at Jack’s house but a call from his mother in the early hours, asking if the boys were with us, sent us all into panic. I called the local police to tell them our sons were missing.
‘So is everyone else’s son on this night,’ the bored constable said.
‘But he’s never done this before,’ I retaliated.
‘That’s what they all say. If he’s not home after twenty-four hours, and I’m sure he will be, you can contact us again.’
Phil and I drove around Avalon and its surrounding suburbs for hours. We eventually found them at the home of their friend Erica. They had got into a fight with a group from the western suburbs which had it in for the ‘beach boys’. Erica’s mother was woken and while they told tales of their conquest, she looked over Christopher’s injured hand, confirmed it wasn’t broken or sprained then bandaged his raw bleeding knuckles.
‘I’m sorry I didn’t call,’ Christopher said when I grounded him for a week.
‘He’s such a gorgeous boy,’ Erica’s mother said. ‘He was just protecting his mates.’
That’s how Cricket got away with everything. All he had to do was smile, say sorry, promise not to repeat his misdemeanour. Everyone loved him, except for a few of his school teachers who couldn’t see or didn’t care to pander to his vulnerability. Those who loved him did and tried to nurture him. His personality was infectious. He was loving, protective, loyal and generally honest
. He was his group’s leader but few saw the fear he kept corked—except for one night, and that was excused by his friends as too much alcohol.
He had just turned sixteen. He and his mates were at our house for a barbecue. Phil and I had gone out to dinner. When we arrived home, one of his friends intercepted us at the door to tell us Christopher was upset. We raced out to him.
He stumbled towards me and threw his long arms around me and slumped to put his head on my shoulder. He was sobbing.
‘I’m sorry, Mum, I’m sorry,’ he said over and over again.
I led him inside and tried to seat him but he wouldn’t let me go.
‘What’s wrong, Cricket?’
‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry.’
‘What for?’
‘I’m scared.’
Two friends walked in and heaved his arms around their shoulders and carried him to the lounge room where I had covered the floor with mattresses so they could all stay the night.
In the morning he told us he’d had too much to drink and wasn’t really scared.
‘You’ve got to stop drinking, Cricket.’
‘Yeah, I know. I will.’
He kissed me on the cheek before grabbing his surfboard to catch the high tide.
We were at home when he called us from his boarding room the following year.
‘Mum! I’ve done something really bad.’
My heart stopped and I took a deep breath.
‘What, Cricket?’
‘I’m really sorry, Mum.’
‘What have you done? It’s okay, you can tell me.’
That’s when he confessed he’d been caught smoking dope, then a few weeks later, cigarettes. That’s when we first met Professor Parker.
Gordon Parker is a distinguished, humble and quietly spoken man. He is Professor of Psychiatry at the University of New South Wales and the founder of the Black Dog Institute. He has written several books including—with co-author Kerrie Eyers—Navigating Teenage Depression and Tackling Depression at Work. He exudes a caring warmth which put us all at ease on our first appointment. He spoke to Christopher privately first, then invited Phil and me into his office to share his plan to help our son. I trusted him instantly and was relieved he would try to get Christopher back on track. At the time Nic was floundering at Rivendell as psychiatrists there struggled to diagnose him. On our second visit with Christopher to Gordon, I summoned the courage to ask if he’d see Nic. He didn’t hesitate.
Both Christopher and Nic deeply admired and respected Gordon. We never had to struggle to get them to keep their appointments. ‘He’s a good guy,’ Christopher said after the initial appointment and we knew, from him, that was high praise.
In a few short weeks Nic became reliant on Gordon, not making a move without speaking to him first. Gordon was and still is Nic’s hero and mentor.
chapter 7
It was the last day of spring, Saturday, August 31st, 2002. Christopher had been dead for thirty-six hours. If he was still alive, he’d be driving to North Sydney with Jack to the oval where Shore’s First Fifteen would take on Newington in the season’s penultimate battle. Christopher’s team-mates had decided the day before that they could not play. They all said they couldn’t go on the field without their mate. After several meetings Jack tearfully suggested that Cricket would have wanted them to play. The team reluctantly agreed. A 500-strong guard of honour stretched across the entire field and Ben and Nic were asked to lead the players through the pitched tunnel of arms. Wearing black armbands, the team bowed their heads in a minute’s silence, as did every private school team that day at three o’clock. Phil and I sat on the deck at home with a handful of friends and received regular updates.
Murgy had just finished his match in the Second Fifteen and was sitting under a tree at the oval. He was distraught and being comforted by some friends when he was asked to fill in for an injured player in the Firsts. He didn’t want to, but—thirty minutes into the game with Shore behind seven points to nil—forced himself onto the field. At halftime, the players gathered in a circle and were told by Captain Danny Clark that they all had to lift, had to fight, had to win for Chris. The scores were deadlocked with five minutes left on the clock. Suddenly, the ball was passed with speed and accuracy to Jack who took off in a sprint like never before and scored under the posts. Shore won 20–13.
Rugby was crucial to Christopher. Playing in the top team for his school and being with his close mates gave him a high which blanketed his depression and anxiety—at least while he was playing or training.
When he was a young boy he would sleep in his rugby guernsey with his rugby ball under one arm, Bunny under the other. On Sunday mornings, Phil would take him down for kicking practice and during the week I’d throw him passes in the driveway.
It was this same rugby ball along with his boots which Phil put into his coffin. One of his team-mates, also named Chris, asked us to put in the much-cherished socks he had worn when he was selected for the prestigious Sydney Schoolboys team.
Nic put a Playboy magazine by his feet; Ben, a can of beer near his right hand. I wanted to put Bunny near his head but Phil said I’d regret it so I put in a condom instead. Bunny is now in my bedroom on top of a chest filled with all that I have left of Christopher, including the videos we filmed on a hired camera when the boys were very young.
Christopher loved making people laugh. One of the videos was shot in our tiny bathroom. The boys, aged five, four and two, were all undressing and laughing. The bath was filling high with bubbles.
Ben and Nic carefully lowered their bodies into the warm water followed by Christopher who jumped from a height, sending clouds of bubbles into the air. He covered his face with them and ho-hoed like Santa. Ben told him to be careful and Nic giggled, which spurred him on to stand up and launch into his favourite jingle while providing the inglorious hand movements: ‘Wash your penis, wash your penis.’
He loved toilet humour, too. One night when we were singing our Street Light Man song, I pointed out the moon which was peaking over the neighbour’s roof in the eastern sky. It was a waning gibbous moon, a plump crescent I named Banana Man. I told them to imagine it had eyes, a nose and a smiley mouth.
‘Now pretend to draw on him,’ I said.
Ben gave him glasses and Nic gave him a red and white striped cap, which he said looked like the one worn by Dr Seuss’s Cat in the Hat. Christopher gave him a ‘a big, fat bogey’ which he said was green and hanging like glue out of his nose. He folded in two, laughing uncontrollably.
When he was sixteen he asked Phil and me if it was possible to get a sexually transmitted disease from a ‘blow job’. We smiled and asked him if he’d had one. He rolled his eyes as if to say, ‘Hasn’t everyone?’ A few days later he drove up the driveway and stopped the car near where I was weeding. He dropped his pants and said: ‘See, you can. Look at all these red spots on my dick.’
I ordered him to make an appointment with our family doctor, John Eccles.
This is what I loved about him; his naivety, his openness and honesty. We could talk about anything; no subject was taboo for me, though not always for Phil, who was far more conservative and sensible. I always insisted on having dinner together around our round dining table and would encourage the boys to talk about the greater questions of life. One night we opened a discussion about homosexuality. I said there was nothing wrong with it and if they ever felt they were different sexually they must be open with us and we’d help them navigate through what could be a difficult existence (this was the early 1990s). After ten minutes of discussion, Phil, who had been silent throughout, suddenly chimed in with, ‘Or you could do yourself a favour and not be gay.’
We all laughed; I was the only one who knew Phil was deadly serious.
We were all so happy then. The boys were growing strong and seemed contented and confident. We were so proud of them, not so much for their achievements or because they were smart—but for their kindness and sensitivity to others
. When they were all at Shore, one teacher said to me: ‘What an asset the Newling boys are to this school.’
Ben loved music and started up Shore’s summer sailing school and Christopher was in the top rugby teams and won the religion award one year. Nic, on scholarship, won many public-speaking awards and his debating team was considered one of the best.
But then, at thirteen, a battlefield of combatants fought for the rights to Nic’s mind and a frightened young boy surrendered. At fifteen, when all medication was failing to help, Gordon suggested ECT, electroconvulsive therapy, which he said had promising results for some drug-resistant patients. ECT is a psychiatric treatment in which seizures are electrically induced in anaesthetised patients for therapeutic effect. It can often ‘reset’ electrical and chemical circuits that are presumed to be disrupted in those with psychotic and melancholic depression and who have not responded to orthodox antidepressant medications.
I was upset and nervous when I took Nic to the Prince of Wales Hospital in Randwick on a cold Monday morning for the first of possibly six electric shock treatments. I stayed with him while they prepared him in theatre. They asked me to leave before they anaesthetised him and attached the electrodes to his head. He smiled at me bravely as I kissed him on the cheek.
‘Don’t worry, Mum. It’s not going to hurt. Go have a coffee.’
I walked through the thick plastic flaps, down the long corridor and, feeling faint, leant against the wall until my breathing slowed. I didn’t realise I was crying until a nurse offered me a box of tissues and settled me into a nearby chair.
All I could see was the image of Jack Nicholson strapped to a bed against his will in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and I felt guilty for agreeing to allow my son’s brain to be zapped. My mobile phone rang.
I thanked the nurse and stumbled to the entrance. It was Dr Eccles with Christopher’s ‘red spots on dick’ results. Christopher had chlamydia, a very infectious sexually transmitted disease.
Missing Christopher Page 4