Mother's Pain

In the middle of the 1950s, a young mother was hospitalized in the county maternity hospital. She looked like she was in her fifth or sixth month of pregnancy. She told doctors with a depressed expression that the fetus was nearly 10 months old.

After several more days, a baby boy, was finally born, but pitifully thin. The young mother looked at her poor child and cried sadly. The child's growth and subsequent hardships left scars on the mother.

That mother and child were my mother and me.

My mother told me that when she was pregnant, my father was being scrutinized and suffered a lot for nothing in a political campaign launched by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). My mother lost her job due to my father's issues. My mother, who was most in need of care, could only cry. This brutal political campaign greatly hurt my mother physically and mentally, and also hurt me. I was born as weak as a kitten.

After I was one year old, my parents were troubled by the "Rectification Movement" (another political movement). I lost the loving warmth of my family. The following movements like the Great Leap Forward and the Great Famine rendered me, a congenitally deficient child, extremely skinny. My immune system worked poorly and I was allergic to a lot of things. I was seldom spared any of the common childhood diseases or seasonal illnesses.

After I got married, the burden of supporting a family, intense work, and the pressure to excel were like three huge mountains crushing me. At first my hands were injured due to fatigue, and then I incurred a lumbar strain and later foot and leg problems. At that time, I was only in my 30s, but I had blurred vision. My situation once again caused my mother's heart to ache.

In 1994 I was so fortunate to start to cultivate Falun Gong. I looked like a new person: the diseases were all gone, and I was fresh and energetic inside and out. I felt so wonderful after I had got rid of all my former illnesses. Also that year, all my siblings began to practise Falun Gong as well, and they also became very healthy. Thereafter, my big family was filled with peace and harmony, and my mother's heart was joyful.

Whenever one of us siblings went to another town to teach people the exercises, my mother always supported us and took care of our children. Whenever we bought Falun Gong books, she wanted to pay for them, but none of us let her.

After July 1999, my siblings and I were all persecuted. My mother was once again devastated.

After the onset of the persecution, I was ordered to a brainwashing centre every day. On the way from my place of work to the brainwashing centre, I was watched like a prisoner by someone assigned by my employer. One day as I returned to my work place after the brainwashing session, my supervisor did not allow me to go home and tried to force me to write a guarantee statement to quit cultivation and a "regret statement" to slander Falun Gong. Another day after I was sent to the brainwashing centre, my supervisor, the CCP secretary, and some other officers went to my parents and told my 70-year-old father to write a guarantee statement for me. My father put on his old glasses with shaking hands and took the pen and paper from them while my sick mother sat on the bed, shivering in fear. Then the CCP secretary yelled at my mother, "If your son remains so stubborn, we'll send him to jail." As he yelled, it was as if his words were heavy weights that fell on my mother's heart, and her heart almost stopped functioning. As soon as they took the paper, which my father had to write against his will, and left, my mother fell into bed.

When I came home from the brainwashing centre, I saw my mother sitting in bed sobbing. When she saw me, she couldn't help crying, "Oh, my son, how can we live? We cannot live with a bad conscience. But if you do not follow them (CCP), they'll do evil things to you! My son, your mother cannot stand it anymore." I knew what she meant. She wanted her sons and daughters to be grateful, but she could not bear for us to be persecuted. I had mixed feelings about my mother's difficulties. It was agonizing for me, but at this point I had no way to assuage her suffering.

During those days, the harassing phone calls from my work place, the bleak news from the outside, and the propaganda on television hit my elderly mother like heavy blows, one after the other. My poor old mother was so scared and so sad. All day long she had to face this overwhelming terror. That and her great concern for her children reminded her of the suffering she had had to endure during previous political movements. Thereafter, the siren of a police car, dogs barking, the phone ringing--all these caused her arrhythmia and a sudden jump in her blood pressure. For my elderly mother, each day in torment seemed like a year.

A year later, my mother became seriously ill. One day she sat in bed after she had been given some injections, and when she saw that nobody was around, she let me sit down at her side and said in a very low voice, "I can no longer get over this disease. It is due to the CCP secretary's threats." Mother's words were like thunder in my ears and shook me so greatly that I almost could no longer think. I couldn't figure out what she meant. After a short pause, she said, "Do not tell your siblings. Do not begrudge that person." From her peaceful expression and calm tone I saw the inner tolerance and harmony, which I knew originated from Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance.

The next day my brothers and sisters all sat around our mother's bed as she received a fluid infusion and ate a piece of steamed bread. Suddenly the telephone rang in the living room, and my younger sister said that my supervisor at work wanted to talk to me. When I came back after answering the call, my poor mother had left us forever.

My mother passed away because she was scared to death. My heart hurts because of sadness and pain.

On the second day after my mother's death, when we were mourning by her, a well-intentioned friend who came to offer condolences quietly told us, "They (CCP) are getting ready to arrest Falun Gong practitioners again. The police officers will also ransack their homes. Please be prepared." At that very moment it seemed as though I saw her, still so scared that her entire body was shaking with fear. My tears flowed like a spring.

There was no mourning music at my mother's funeral so that she might get a little peace instead of being frightened.

This story took place in a so-called "stable" and "harmonious" country, in a Falun Gong practitioner's home. Living in China, people have witnessed this tragic persecution of Falun Gong practitioners. They all know that hundreds of thousands of practitioners have been detained and cruelly tortured, and thousands of them were tortured to death. But who knows how many of their families--kindhearted old parents and innocent children of Falun Gong practitioners--have suffered and died as a result of this red terror.

Chinese version available at http://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2009/1/2/192688.html