Chapter 6

Being Mother in Exile

There is no word strong enough for the pain of being a mother separated from her children.

People say, “You were brave.”

But I didn’t feel brave.

I felt broken — like I had torn my own heart in half and left it behind in Yangon.

For nearly two years, I lived as a mother without arms. I couldn’t hold my children when they cried. I couldn’t comb their hair, tuck them in, or smell their skin after a bath. I could only hear their voices on the phone — small, tired voices trying to be strong.

“Wann kommst du, Mama?”

“When are you coming, Mama?”

And all I could say was, “Bald. Very soon.”

But “soon” meant months, and the ache grew deeper.

I would send them photos of snow. Little videos of me on a tram. I tried to smile. I tried to sound cheerful. But they could hear it — the silence behind my voice. The loneliness that no German class, no meal, no kind stranger could erase.

There were nights I dreamed of them — in school uniforms, holding lunch boxes, laughing under mango trees. Then I’d wake up to grey skies and a bed that was too quiet. I would reach for the phone first thing, needing to hear their breath just to feel real again.

And finally — finally — after years of distance, they came.

June 2024.

The moment I saw them walk out of the airport gate in Hamburg; my knees nearly gave way. They had grown. Their faces were longer, their eyes wiser. My little girl ran first. My son followed, slower, as if unsure whether this was real.

We held each other for a long time. No words. No need. Our hearts had been speaking across borders for years — this was just the moment they came home.

Being a mother in exile taught me something fierce:

Love can stretch across borders.

Hope can survive in silence.

And the bond between mother and child is stronger than fear, time, or even war.

Now, we are three again. Together.

But even in this new safety, the work is not done.

There are new fears now — schools, racism, questions I can’t yet answer.

But I am here. We are here.

And every bedtime hug, every school lunch I pack, every morning kiss — they are proof that we made it

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