How I Lost My Mother: A story of life, care and dying

by Leslie Swartz

Overview

How I Lost My Mother is a deeply felt account of the relationship between a mother and son, and an exploration of what care for the dying means in contemporary society

The book is emotionally complex – funny, sad and angry – but above all, heartfelt and honest. It speaks boldly of challenges faced by all of us, challenges which are often not spoken about and hidden, but which deserve urgent attention. This is first and foremost a work of the heart, a reflection on what relationships mean and should mean. There is much in the book about relationships of care and exploitation in southern Africa, and about white Jewish identity in an African context. But despite the specific and absorbing references to places and contexts, the book offers a broader, more universal view. All parents of adult children, and all adults who have parents alive, or have lost their parents, will find much in this book to make them laugh, cry, think and feel.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781776146970
Publisher:	Wits University Press
Publication date:	03/01/2021
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

Leslie Swartz is a clinical psychologist and a distinguished professor of psychology at Stellenbosch University, South Africa. He also has honourary attachments to University of Johannesburg and Western Sydney University, Australia. He is an experienced researcher known especially for his work on disability studies, disability rights, and mental health issues in South Africa and elsewhere in Africa. He has received numerous awards, including, in 2019, the Science-for-Society Gold Medal from the Academy of Science of South Africa. In addition to his scientific work, he has an interest in the use of creativity and the arts to effect social change, and he has worked on a number of projects using photography and other forms of visual expression for research and activist purposes. His memoir Able-Bodied: Scenes from a curious life (Zebra Press, 2010), received considerable critical acclaim.

Leslie Swartz is a clinical psychologist and Professor in the Department of Psychology, Stellenbosch University. He is the author of How I Lost My Mother (2021).

Table of Contents

Introduction xi

Part I Finding

1 The Weeping Rose 3

2 Be sociable 15

3 Goodwill 27

4 The trouble with nerves 42

5 The archives 62

6 Nadine Gordimer, Anne Frank, Elsie Cohen and me 78

Part II Losing

7 Shouting loud 95

8 Coming home 106

9 Avoiding surgery 121

10 Closing in 127

11 Scar tissue 140

12 Care 154

13 What ends? 171

Part III Afterwords

14 Death admin 187

15 How Host my mother 201

Notes 211

Bibliography 215

Acknowledgements 219