My story Three weddings and no funeral

Determined her mum wouldn't die without seeing her married, former Australian Womens Weekly editor Cath Bennett made a pact that saw her become a bride three times in two months.

It wasn’t really the time to be making deals. We were in the middle of the Covid pandemic, I had briefly swapped New Zealand’s gilded cage for the clinical confines of Mum’s English care home and doctors had warned us she might not live to see Christmas. But I wanted to give the most important woman in my life hope – something to live for. Looking at Mum slumped in a wheelchair, wearing a jovial festive jumper, her brave smile belying the pain in her eyes, I took her hand and made a promise. I told her if she could just fight and get back on her feet – metaphorically, if not physically – then I would get married.

Mum had been waiting for me to tie the knot ever since I emigrated to be with my Kiwi partner Phil Stephens in 2006. In reality, she had probably been waiting for it my whole life. I was now facing the fact she probably wouldn’t be there.

What followed was a miraculous bounce back to health by my mum, Rowena Bennett. And her unexpected and continuous recovery led to a series of romantic events on two continents, across a variety of locations, with Mum not only helping coordinate it all, but also walking me down the aisle.

Aisle be there

It was a happy ending that seemed highly unlikely back in 2020, when, following a horrendous tumble down a flight of stairs that saw her hospitalised, Mum was unexpectedly diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer, which had spread to her spine. The whole family was in shock – not least because just months earlier, Mum’s brother had died of Covid while battling the same cancer.