Aunty Doris and Uncle Allen were Kevin's uncle and aunty and thought the world of Kevin and myself.
But they got more and more hurt and upset with him when we found out he had a criminal record a mile long all to do with false pretenses and fraud. This we found when he went missing for over four months. They both supported myself and Neb and had us over to dinner many a time. Aunty Doris became like a mother to me and was my constant confident until they both died in the 1990s.
I had to move on with my life and found myself in 1982 commencing the first Women's Studies group to be started in South Australia and it was a year old course. So I went off to Tafe to do this course about three days a week for one year.
I was always home when Neb came home from school as the tutorials were always over before three pm. I also began to learn remedial massage and competed the course in that along with Peristaltic massage where you used a Dr's blood pressure tool. I got really interested in natural therapies an
and felt I could use these in time to come which I did.
I began to do massage from home and could do it while Neb was also home. I seemed to attract older people but also terminally ill people. One dear man used to see me once a week and when Oliver died he had left a card in his belongings to be given to me with around $500 in it. I was in tears yet felt so special as I had helped him allot.
I met Tanya who came for massage and she worked for a very big Company. When she first came I noticed her balance was not good and she was dragging one leg. I did the treatment I knew how to help her but kept telling her she ought to go to her Doctor. Eventually she did and it was diagnosed she had Motor Neuron disease a very quick auto immune illness with no cure. Within six months she was in a wheel chair and as she only had a very elderly mother who could not look after her she was put into a hospital for terminally ill people. It was so sad and I began visiting her twice a week at the hospital to massage her and to give her some company. She relied on me as had no one else to care for her. She was around about fifty at the time. As she got so bad where she could not move and would try to keep me by her side as I could see the fear in her eyes as I left. Once she was in a position in bed she could not move anything of her body, yet her brain was functioning very well. I could understand how scary it was for her. This illness is the worst I have ever seen. It was a blessing when she passed away.
Tanya had been writing a book about women's sport in South Australia and the manuscript was always beside her bed. I always wondered if it would ever get published and if so who would do it. Many years latter I was in a book store and saw her book. A group of sports women had got it published so I felt so happy it had been achieved.
Around this time I was lonely at times as had no real friends but made new friends who were doing the women's study course which was great for me. I was asked out to a singles group so when Neb was at his fathers during the weekends I would attend these groups and met my dear friends Maggi, Laraine and Jo, who I am still close friends with today.
At one point we decided to break away from the Catholic Single group and we started up one of our own and called it North Side Singles. We had a committee and had meetings planning what and where we would have our meetings and also many house parties. This was my real introduction to alcohol and even though I really did no like it I began to drink for the effect it gave me. I met and went out with various men but no one special. I just enjoyed being involved in the club we had. We used to go way for weekends and tried to make the club a happy caring group for lonely single people. We had to try and screen people so we didn't get any unsavory people so the group was all above board and it did retain its good reputation.
Also around this time Kevin was arrested and was in jail at Yatala and requested to see me. I went a few times and decided he was not worth waiting for and finally went through divorce number three. Aunty Doris and Uncle Allen agreed and helped me through this time. I changed my name by deed poll giving me name number five.???
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