The power of a mother’s intuition

Bonni Suckling depicts her mother’s intuition in a fictional monologue of her late son, Jed Brady Thomas-Suckling.

You can listen to this article below, or by using your favourite podcast player at pod.link/oncologybuddies

The knowing

My name is Jed. I liked Buzz Lightyear, Ben10, Cars, my family, and my stinky dog. I liked playing with my Bakugan dinosaur eggs and watching cartoons.

I liked it when the sun came in through the curtains in the morning and made shapes on my blankets. I liked smooth peanut butter, but not the crusts. I loved throwing stones in the river with my dad and watching them bounce. Boing, boing, boing, PLOP! I was nearly four years old.

I was busy being me, doing all my little boy things, when something started to feel strange inside my body. My legs didn’t always listen. Sometimes my head felt heavy and ouch. But I didn’t know the words for that yet. My mom saw it first. Not in a big, loud way. Just in little things, like the way I walked wobbly, or when I stopped laughing like I used to. I didn’t laugh loud cos it made my head feel sore. Sometimes I got very cross for no reason at all.

But she knew.

It felt like a whisper in her chest, tugging at her again and again.

Mom says: “It wasn’t one big moment. It was lots of little ones, a stumble here, a tantrum there, a strange look in his eyes. I couldn’t explain it properly. I just knew something wasn’t right. I knew my child. And I knew I wasn’t paranoid, even though I was told I was…again and again.”

She took me to the doctor, a lot of times, even more than a lot. She asked questions. She pushed for answers. People told her it was probably nothing.

But the whisper inside her kept getting louder.

One day, the doctor sent us for a scan. Maybe cos mom was making a noise with her outside voice and tears.

They took pictures to look inside me.

And that’s when our whole world cracked.

Mom says: “Nothing prepares you for that moment. I wasn’t expecting brain cancer, not in my sweet boy who was still in nappies at night and crawled into bed with me. I thought maybe it was his ears, or something with his balance. But a tumour? That word didn’t live in my world. Until it did.”

The protection

After that, she held my hand really tight. I think maybe her own legs didn’t want to walk anymore. But she stood up anyway. She stood up for me, sometimes with her outside voice, again and again.

Sometimes her eyes were wet and red and puffy. But her mouth kept smiling big; my mommy smiled big for me.

Mom says: “Looking back now, I realise what that feeling was…intuition. That deep, quiet knowing that something is wrong, even when no one else can see it yet. It’s not loud. It doesn’t come with flashing lights or a checklist. It’s more like a pull in your chest, a whisper that doesn’t go away. It shows up in the middle of the night, in the way you watch your child breathe, or how you notice the way they don’t laugh quite the same. It’s not magic. It’s motherhood. It’s the part of you that’s wired to notice the tiny shifts, to feel what can’t yet be named. It’s the invisible thread between a parent and their child, and when something tugs on that thread, you just know.

I should have pushed more. I let them reassure me when something inside me wasn’t at peace. That stays with me. I did what I could with what I knew at the time. And once I truly understood, I didn’t stop. I fought with love. With hope. With everything I had.”

The reality

I don’t live here with my mom, dad, and stinky dog anymore, not here on earth. But I live in how my mom speaks now (with her outside voice). She can be so loud about childhood cancer. I live in the way she helps other parents trust that little voice in their hearts.

Mom says: “Jed taught me that being a mother means listening to the things that can’t be measured. The things that don’t show up on blood tests at first. He made me believe that love isn’t just a feeling, it’s a sense. And it’s powerful. Please trust that. That whisper might be the only early warning there is.”

And if you’re a doctor, or a nurse, or a teacher, or just someone who hears a parent say, “Please help”. Listen. With more than your two ears.

Listen with your heart. Because sometimes, love knows what science doesn’t. Not yet.