Tea for Sadie

I loved visiting my folks in San Francisco in the late seventies. I lived in Las Vegas with a good job and no kids. The round-trip flight from Las Vegas was a whopping fifty bucks. My dad was my rock. He was dependable and supportive, but my mom and I shared a history of more down times than up times. 

The problem between my mom and I revolved around my obesity. She saw my condition as one of neglect infused with rebelliousness. If she suggested a diet and I tried it but didn’t lose the amount of weight she thought I could, I was shamed for it. I can’t remember a time when I was not aware that I was “different.” I remember joining ballet when I was eight and having to go to a town 20 miles away from my hometown to find a leotard that would fit. My mother was appalled that we couldn’t find a leotard to fit in the ballet shop next to the Studio of Dance. “You are so fat that we are going to have to drive to Charleston! You know how I hate to drive.” 

I didn’t say anything. I just looked out the car window at the gray of the sky and the winding highway in the shadow of Saint Alban’s Mountain. I felt like crying, but I pushed the sensation deep down below the layers of my unacceptable fat. There were many conversations about my less-than-perfect figure through the years, accompanied by many Mom plans. There was the Weight Watcher Plan, Metrical shakes, a Weight Loss Wafer that was supposed to expand like a small piece of sponge in my stomach, a strict diet of 1000 calories a day, and on and on. I believed I would never be “normal,” which made me feel angry. When I was ten, I started stealing two dimes a day out of my mom’s coin purse to spend at Bob’s Market. In those days, twenty cents would buy 2 two chocolate Mallow Bars that I would stuff down as I walked back to school after my allotted lunch of a hamburger patty and sliced celery and carrots. 

As I matured, I remained a “big-boned hefty girl” after losing some of the baby fat. 

It was hard for my mom to find clothes for me. I didn’t fit in Junior sizes and wasn’t yet in women’s sizes, and “Plus sizes” weren’t yet invented. My Aunt donated some of her “bigger” clothes, but they looked ridiculous on a twelve-year-old. I endured taunts at school and had few friends. To my mom, the whole ordeal seemed hopeless. Hopelessness seeped through my dreams at night and followed me off the Middle School Bus by day.

My mom had been having trouble with dips in her blood sugar in the middle of the night that required frequent infusions of glucose and changes to her Insulin dosages. Nothing seemed to be working. My mom had been in the ER four times that week, and my Dad was exhausted. I came to help. I was a fairly new RN at the time. I had a key and let myself in to wait for them to return from the doctor’s office. I sat on the balcony of their apartment. The balcony overlooked a big pond full of lively ducks. Soon, I heard the key in the lock and ran to the door. I was shocked at the physical changes in my mom. She was gaunt, frail, and slightly jaundiced. My heart sank. I knew this may be related to something besides her diabetes. I felt cold inside and shaky. My dad said that they had ordered some tests at the hospital, and we needed to admit her there that afternoon. He went to lie down for a short nap, and I helped my mom to the couch. 

“Would you like some tea?” I asked. 

“Yes! Some of our favorite Peppermint tea,” she said. Then she added that I didn’t need any sweetener in mine. “Yes, ma’am,” I said as I rolled my eyes and dumped a heaping tablespoon of sugar in my cup.

“You never knew your Aunt Sadie,” she said. “She was my favorite little sister. There was a house of ill repute at the edge of town.” She paused, looking off into the distance. 

“A whore house…” I said. 

“Oh, yes. It was run by a woman named Fiona. We had to walk by the house going from one end of town to the other, as there was only that one dirt road, but we hurried past it quietly and kept our eyes straight ahead as we had promised Mama we would. One Sunday, Sadie and I had come from church and were heading home. I heard what sounded like a gunshot. I yelled at Sadie to run, but she was a fat child and couldn’t run very fast. I kept yelling at her to put her head down and run. I got past the house first and turned around at the end of the lane. There was a volley of shots, and Sadie fell down. I ran back to help her and felt a sharp pain in my neck and shoulder. It took some time for someone to get us to safety and send for the town doctor.”

“You have never told me this story,” I said. “What happened?” 

“Sadie died. I was in the infirmary for quite some time. No one told me about Sadie until I got home. I didn’t get to go to her funeral. I couldn’t believe she was gone. It was my fault because I didn’t care that Sadie was fat. I shared treats with her and hadn’t told anyone that she would steal food from the larder to eat after everyone was in bed. I didn’t care if she couldn’t run. I loved her just the way she was.” 

Tears were making a wet path down her face. I couldn’t believe that my mom had been through such a personal trauma. “There was a group of adolescent boys who had tried to gain entrance into her house the night before,” my mom continued. “Fiona had run them off. They liquored up and came back with shotguns to shoot out her windows. We were caught in the middle of the gunfire.”

“Oh, Mom, I’m so sorry that happened to you and Sadie,” I said, hugging her. 

My Mom drank her tea. Her hand shook as she returned the cup to the saucer.

On the way to the hospital, I thought about Sadie, the fat child who couldn’t run. I thought about my mom and the fact that she blamed herself for not making Sadie adhere to better habits. She believed she should have helped her lose weight instead of loving her as she was. She believed that had she done this, Sadie would be alive. I slowly realized that I was Sadie’s replacement. If she could make me thin, she may save my life. She couldn’t love me unconditionally because she thought it would bring catastrophe.

The medical team at the hospital thought the jaundice was coming from a blocked bile duct. She was taken to surgery the next morning. They opened her, looked around and closed her. Cancer had metastasized from her colon to her liver. She didn’t have much time left. My dad was devastated. I urged him to go home and rest. My mom was transferred to ICU where she was put on oxygen and a morphine drip. There was a window of time each 2 hours in which we could see her. During most of those times, we stood awkwardly by her bed holding her hand and making small talk. I felt desperate to tell her that it was ok between us. On the morning she died, my dad had gone to the billing office to take care of something and I had my chance. “Mom, I understand why you were so worried about my weight and I want you to know how much I love you.”

She tried to open her eyes, she gave my hand a slight squeeze.

“I remember when you were one. You ate your cheerios by picking one up at a time using your pinkie and your thumb. Those were good days,” she said. It was the last time she spoke. She died two days later.

My mother was born in 1912, before medical breakthroughs, before the Moon Landing, before the time when discussing your feelings was an important part of one’s mental health. I am now seventy-two. I have lived ten years longer than my mom lived. These days, I feel we connect through Peppermint tea. When I brew a cup and take it to a quiet place, I can imagine my mom sitting beside me. I always pull up an extra chair for Sophie and while we sip, we talk about how to navigate this thing called life, and the tea fills our bellies with warmth.