My mum always put in a smile on my face

I was really close to mum growing up, very attached. Much more so than my father. All us siblings were close to our parents.

Dad would work during the day on a building site and mum would do the night shift, so we rarely saw mum and dad together, except on weekends. Dad was a strong disciplinarian, but mum knew how to communicate better than dad, she was always there to put a hand on our shoulder when we needed it.

She was always the one that put a smile on our face. Mum has a fantastic sense of humour and always made us laugh. Her side of the family are really like that and she carried that on, she was the youngest of seven and definitely the liveliest of the bunch.

In terms of my football career, she would wash my boots, have my bag ready, have my clothes washed and folded, she was always like that. She would come to every game. Mum was incredibly supportive throughout my playing career.

When I became a coach, she would always come and watch those games as well. When I lost a game and was disappointed mum knew how to shake me out of it. She’d say, 'Ah c’mon, nobody died, it’s only a game', She understood that football was my life but she was great at reminding me that it was only sport.

She was really good in taking a lot of those pressures that I put on myself away, whether I was playing or coaching. To see her go through what she's currently dealing with, it’s the absolute least I can do to help her.

Mum’s recovery

Mum is at home now, she left hospital after six weeks, after having 40 treatments of radiation done. The tumour has decreased and some of those symptoms have gotten better, however she has lost her short term memory permanently, which has its own set of challenges.

As people know with brain tumours they can come back, or the tumour can increase. My mum has a very aggressive tumour so while she is on the road to recovery there is a long way ahead of her yet.

The whole ordeal has brought us all so much closer. The impact its had on my father, the way he has supported her has been incredible. My sister Mariana has been instrumental in lending support both personally and professionally. She’s been instrumental in helping me put together a campaign to raise funds.

My younger sister Angela has been really affected by this ordeal. She’d actually booked and paid for a well deserved trip to Hawaii with mum and was supposed to leave the day before we found out that mum had brain cancer. 

It really has brought us so much closer together to see our mum go through this. Mum is the absolute rock in the family, she is the glue that keeps us all together.

After I went public with mum’s diagnosis, the whole football community were very generous and loving, it just urged me on to do something. So, I thought this would be a very good idea and we could really make an impact and make a difference.

As told to Con Stamocostas