Simply Complex
A daughter’s reflection on love, resilience, and growing up with a mother living with schizophrenia.
Simply Complex,
Life with my Schizophrenic Mother
My mother’s life was filled with hardship, tragedy, and, ultimately, a remarkable triumph of the human spirit. The woman I knew was brave, determined, resilient, and simply complex. She carried the scars of a painful past, but she also carried a strength, humor, and wisdom that came from surviving experiences few people could ever imagine
To truly understand her, one would first have to understand the world she was forced to endure. She was orphaned at the age of fourteen, left without siblings, without a family to lean on, and without anyone to protect or guide her. In the dead of World War II, in worn torn Poland, she was a young girl forced to navigate life completely on her own. She lived in poverty, surrounded by danger, uncertainty, and fear, never knowing what each day would bring. Survival was not a choice for her—it was a necessity.
During the war, she witnessed horrors no child should ever have to see. She watched her cousin get shot in the back by the Nazis while attempting to cross the town border. They were trying to reach their uncle’s farm, knowing that he always kept milk and eggs for them—basic necessities that had become rare and precious in a world where hunger and desperation were everywhere.
To survive, my mother endured situations that were both humiliating and terrifying. Every single time she tried to visit her uncle, she was forced to polish the boots of Nazi soldiers, the very people responsible for the suffering and destruction surrounding her. They took her pens and whatever small belongings she had, using their power to intimidate and control her. Yet even in those moments of fear and helplessness, she found ways to endure. She learned how to navigate danger, protect herself, and survive by leaving school at the age of 14 to work in a sewing factory.
But her story did not end there. I want to take you through her incredible journey of leaving Poland and making her way to Canada as a young woman, only to face another life-altering challenge when she was diagnosed with tuberculosis.
I want to share the story of how she found love, married, and became a mother to three children.I want to share how, amid building a family and a life, she developed schizophrenia.And, I want to share how our family watched her struggle with her diagnosis, her medications, and her treatment.Her journey through mental illness was not easy. As a family, we experienced the fear, confusion, and heartbreak that comes with watching someone you love, battle an illness you do not fully understand. But we also witnessed her courage, her perseverance, and most importantly her healing on the other side.We watched as she found stability again and rediscovered love with the man who stood by her side through it all, remaining with her through her final years.Her story is truly fascinating. Her bravery as a young girl was extraordinary, and some of the stories from her life were surprisingly humorous. While writing this, I have laughed, I have cried, and I have uncovered emotions I had buried for years. Yet when I look back, I can see clearly that every experience she endured, every challenge she overcame, and every moment she fought to survive helped shape me into the person I am today.
My greatest hope by sharing her story is not just to honor her, but also in the hope that it may help other families who are living with a loved one affected by schizophrenia. Although we have come a long way in understanding and treating mental health conditions, we certainly have a long way to go. My mother’s life was a journey of survival, resilience, love, illness, healing, and hope. It was a life marked by unimaginable challenges, but also by incredible strength.
This is her story.
Stories, reflections, and lived experiences.
Where My Mother Ended and Her Sickness Began
A story of a childhood shaped by love, loss, and the gradual realization that something in my family had changed.
The Unthinkable Happened……..
Leaving Montreal was supposed to give my family a fresh start, but instead it marked the beginning of one of the most frightening chapters of my childhood.
Where My Mother Ended and Her Sickness Began
There were many layers to telling the story of my mother’s life, and at times I struggled to put the pieces together in the right order.I do not want my mother to sound like a monster, because she was far from that. She was a woman who became very ill, and that distinction matters.Before fear, confusion, and the painful memories that would come later, there was love.My earliest years with my mother, especially my preschool years, were filled with warmth, comfort, and moments I will always cherish. Some of my happiest memories are of her love, her presence, and the feeling of safety I once knew as her child. She taught me so much, and all that she taught me, I carry with me to this day.But illness can slowly change a person, and for a young girl, it was difficult to understand where my mother ended and her sickness began.As I began putting together the story of her life, I realized that although this was my mother’s story, it was also mine to tell—because her illness shaped my childhood, my family, and the way I came to understand love, fear, and loss.So, I begin where my own memories first started to shift—when I was old enough to realize something may have been wrong.I was eight, maybe nine years old, when I remember saying to my father, “Dad, I think Mom is mental.” Of course, that’s not language anyone would use now, but I was a child and didn’t know any better.We lived on the West Island of Montreal, in the suburb of Dollard-des-Ormeaux. From the outside, we should have looked like a normal suburban family. But by then, my mother was beginning to show unmistakable signs of psychosis.Even something as ordinary as grocery shopping could turn into a nightmare.As we moved up and down the aisles, my mother would suddenly target someone with her shopping cart, deliberately crashing into them. Then she would loudly accuse the startled stranger of hitting her first. She would call them Nazis, scream profanities, and curse at them with shocking vulgarity.I remember feeling utterly humiliated. I wanted to disappear, to crawl under a rock while everyone stared.But there was one incident, when I was about nine years old, that truly solidified the realization that our family was different.We were driving out of our suburb onto a main road where construction crews were working. A small backhoe was reversing nearby. I can’t remember every detail clearly now, but I think my mother should have stopped and waited. Instead, she kept driving forward.The backhoe clipped the side mirror of her car. My mother slammed on the brakes, jumped out of the car, and erupted. She screamed hysterically at the driver, hurling obscenities at him in a rage that felt completely out of control.The driver looked horrified. He kept apologizing and backing away while my mother continued shouting at him.That was the moment I realized I might actually be afraid of my own mother.When my father came home from work that evening, I ran to him. I had to tell him what had happened. Again, I remember saying, “There’s something wrong with Mom. I think she has a mental illness.”I can’t clearly remember my father’s response, but I do remember his anger toward my mother. Looking back now, I don’t think his anger helped her — or any of us — considering the state she was already in.But as a frightened little girl, all I really wanted was reassurance. I wanted my father to tell me everything was going to be okay. I wanted him to protect us and to get my mother the help she so clearly needed.Those early days of my mother’s illness taught me to watch for every warning sign—to stay alert for what might come next. They also opened my eyes to my father’s shame, frustration, and helplessness. He didn’t know how to carry it all, and in many ways, that was the beginning of when I felt I had to.More to come......
The Unthinkable Happened……..
Our family's life in Montreal was about to take a dramatic turn.The rise of the separatist FLQ movement— and the violence that accompanied them—was taking a growing toll on Anglophone businesses throughout Quebec. As uncertainty mounted, many companies were forced to make difficult decisions about their future.The American company my father worked for ultimately decided that the risks of staying in Montreal were too great. They felt closing that office, and transferring him back to Toronto, was best for everyone.In an instant, that decision changed the course of our lives, setting in motion a chain of events that none of us could have foreseen.The idea of leaving Montreal weighed heavily on my mother. She was very unhappy about the
move and struggled to accept the thought of starting over. It was difficult for my father to understand why she felt that way. From his perspective, returning to Ontario offered the opportunity for a fresh start. He believed that returning to Toronto would be beneficial for
her—that being back in Ontario, closer to familiar surroundings and support, might help her regain some sense of stability. My mother saw it very differently.My dad had very little time to find us a home in a decent neighbourhood where my mother — and the rest of us — could settle, while also trying to cope with her worsening mental health.Looking back, I am quite certain my father was panicking. He carried the weight of supporting our family, the responsibility for uprooting us and bringing us back to Toronto. I can only imagine the pressure he was under as he tried to do what he believed was best for all of us.Most weekends, he flew to Toronto to find us a house, leaving us behind in Montreal. We stayed
with my mother and hoped for the best, but things were spiraling. Her paranoia deepened, and she became convinced that my father’s employer was connected to the Nazis and was plotting to take her away from us.It is difficult to explain what that felt like at my age. I found myself trying to reassure my own mother that what she believed was not true. No child should have to carry that kind of stress.One memory from that time has stayed with me; when my father was away, the neighborhood
seemed to change. Parents grew hesitant to let their children come to our house to play. Even then, I understood why. Their uneasiness wasn’t aimed at me, but it still hurt. I felt the quiet isolation closing in around our family, and it left a lasting mark on me.Reflecting back to that time, the growing separatist movement in Quebec—and the violence that reached its peak in the October Crisis—added another layer of anxiety to our neighbourhood. Ours was a predominantly English-speaking community, and the kidnappings, the murders, left many families frightened and on edge. As the tension spread throughout the
province, it was an especially unsettling time for many Anglophone families in Quebec. As a child, I didn’t fully understand what was happening, I only sensed that something had shifted, and that the adults around me were more watchful and protective than before.All I knew was that I went to bed frightened, and I woke up frightened. My mother's incoherent
ramblings about the Nazis were confusing and, to a nine-year-old, terrifying. I was too young to
understand that her words were the product of a serious mental illness. At the time, they felt absolutely real.My father eventually found us a home in a new subdivision in Mississauga but the house was
still under construction, so we had to move into a rental home and wait for our new house to be completed.I have very little memory of the move itself. What I do remember is starting Grade 5 in a new
school, quietly hoping that my mother wouldn't create the kinds of public scenes that had become a regular part of our lives in Montreal. Like most children, all I wanted was to fit in. I desperately hoped that, somehow, this new beginning would be different.Unfortunately, our hope for a fresh start did not last.My mother found a job at Kmart, and we were genuinely excited for her. We hoped the purpose and routine might help her begin to heal. It lasted only a week.One afternoon, she came home unexpectedly. She sped up the driveway, parked on the front
lawn, jumped out of the car, and began shouting profanities. Through her anger, she told us she
had been fired.To this day, I don't know the real reason she lost her job. I can only assume that the behavior we
had witnessed at home had begun to surface in the workplace as well.Living in that rental home with my mother, whose mental state had become profoundly unstable, was the hardest period of my childhood. There were daily outbursts, escalating violence, and a constant sense that we never knew what might happen next.She often drifted into conversations with herself, laughing for no apparent reason. I remember
asking, “Mom, what are you laughing about?” She would smile and simply reply, “Nothing, dear.
You wouldn’t understand.”At the time, I accepted her answer because I didn't know what else to do. Looking back, I realize those moments were another heartbreaking reminder of how deeply her illness had taken hold.Then something unthinkable happened.One night, I was jolted awake by screaming. I found my mother hitting my father with the steel
pipe from the vacuum cleaner. She screamed at him while he did everything he could to protect
himself and us from the chaos.I do not know how long it lasted. Time seemed to stand still. I remember feeling terrified and
helpless, unable to understand why it was happening.The next morning, I woke to find my father with a packed suitcase. Without saying much, he was preparing to leave. He looked at us quietly and said he could not do it anymore. He needed to go away and think.With those few words, he walked out the door, leaving us alone with a mother whose mental illness was growing more severe.As a child, I didn't understand the impossible position he was in. All I knew was that my father was gone, and the only parent I had left was slipping further and further away from us.I often think about how different things were then. There were no cell phones, no text messages, no way to know where my father was or when he might come back. There was simply silence.Each morning, we got up, got dressed, and went to school as though everything was normal. We smiled when we were expected to smile, answered our teachers' questions, and pretended that life was okay. But behind our front door, our world was falling apart.
This was the last birthday party I had. It was August of 1970. Although my mom was very unstable, she wanted me to have a party with my friends before we moved away. I was so grateful she did that for me.