Did I Ever Tell You?
Genevieve Kingston
People say, don’t they, that to lose a child is the worst thing that can happen to a person. But Genevieve Kingston’s memoir, Did I Ever Tell You? might chronicle something even worse: a child’s loss of a mother.
Long after the umbilical cord is cut, a child remains part of their mother; or perhaps it is more accurate to say that the mother remains part of the child. The child owns the mother and has a right to every aspect of her being. The mother owes it to her child to be alive, so that the child can be nurtured through babyhood into the toddler years and beyond to school and college.
When Kingston’s mother, Kristina, was diagnosed with an aggressive form of breast cancer, her younger child was three. When she died, Genevieve was almost 12. For those intervening years the cancer was as much a presence in the home as the family members: four people, a boy, Jamie, his younger sister, their mother and their father, Peter.
Whilst the two parents, alongside Tippy the dog, tried to make childhood normal by following the tight proscriptions of an American upbringing, some things became peculiar and particular to their circumstances. The children did not go to summer camp; instead Peter constructed a network of ropes and swings in the garden and Kristina employed a children’s entertainer to organise activities.
Kristina ‘fought’ the disease with a Dr Gonzalez whose strict regime prohibited most foods and beverages alongside any conventional medical intervention. Despite an almost religious adherence to the rules, a vertebra in Kristina’s back broke as she was helping Genevieve move her bed. An ambulance was called.
The hospital explained that now the cancer had spread widely throughout her body and was terminal. Chemo- and radio therapy would help prolong life but there was no longer any hope of ‘beating’ the cancer.
Realising that she could not save her life and that she would die within a few years Kristina turned her thoughts to her children and their future. She prepared two chests containing small, wrapped parcels and notes for the key dates that they would experience without their mother. In Genevieve’s chest were items for her birthdays – up to the age of 30 – and for her first period, her graduations from school and college, her driving licence, her engagement, her wedding, the birth of a child.
There is also a sketchbook with notes attached to photographs of the items, in which Kristina speaks about the milestones of her child’s life and her hopes for stability and happiness. Her words are transcribed in the memoir and they are sometimes hard to read. She knows that she is absent, that her children are adrift in the world without her guidance.
Interestingly, Jamie and Genevieve’s mother squirreled away other souvenirs. As they grow older and start to look in hidden places the siblings find video and sound tapes as well as a file full of other letters. When they approach their mother’s psychotherapist, they find that she has been primed to answer any questions that they might have.
Old friends too are standing by in anticipation of enquiries as to what Kristina was like. And she was valued. A group of ‘alternative’ therapists and friends acted as handmaidens to her, gathering to help her die, a process which took many years. They were also there in the aftermath to support their friend’s bereaved children.
It is from these people that the title of the memoir evolved. They constantly said, and still say, Did I Ever Tell You? The anecdotes that they tell form a strong link to the dead woman, and through the love of her friends, the spirit of Kristina is kept present to her daughter, and now, to the wider world.
Works cited
Kingston, G. Did I Ever Tell You? Quercus. 2024.
A version of this review was first published on page 17 of the Irish Examiner on 18th May 2024. it is reproduced here by permission of the Editor.
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