A mother’s selfless giving

Leong Poh Yin continues to care for others despite her challenging circumstances. (Yahoo! photo)

Under our monthly "Inspiring People" column, we share with you the inspiring journey of one person, who has, through passion and hard work, overcome tremendous odds and achieved amazing feats. Our hope is that he or she will be able to inspire you to reach for your dreams, too. This week, we feature a mother who has spent the last 11 years taking care of her bedridden son, and yet she continues to go the extra mile for others.

Like many mothers, she makes time to talk to her son before she goes to work and after she returns home. But unlike other children, the only response Leong Poh Yin's son, Clement, gives — on a good day — is a grunt.

Clement, 32, is unable to move or speak. He has been bedridden for the past 11 years, after suffering severe brain damage from a motorcycle accident.

"When I see him like this, my heart aches. I keep praying for God to cure him," said Leong, a regular church-goer, in Mandarin.

Coupled with a painful childhood and a less-than-happy marriage, Leong, 65, has faced many difficulties. Yet, she continues to willingly reach out to help other disadvantaged children in need.

Leong, who is now Singaporean, was born in Malacca and given up for adoption because her birth parents could not afford to raise her.

Her adoptive mother, who died last year, treated her as just an additional pair of hands to help out around the house, and she objected strongly when Leong's loving adoptive father sent her to school.

After Leong's Primary Six examinations, her adoptive mother eventually succeeded in stopping her from studying by sending her to Singapore under the guise of further studies.

Leong, who ended up playing nanny to her elder sister's son, believes she was also sent to Singapore so she could not reconcile with her birth mother.

But Leong does not harbour grudges. There is no point in regretting what could have been, she said.

So, while she may have loved studying, frequently coming in top 10 in her class, Leong never studied beyond the primary level. She married at 27 and worked as a seamstress to support her family.

The divorcee did not want to go into details of her marriage, but said her ex-husband did not "manage" the family well. After her children grew up, she requested for a divorce.

In 1999, just as the divorce was finalised, Leong's youngest son, Clement, was severely injured in a motorcycle accident.

Only 10 days after he returned from Australia, Clement -- an aspiring pilot -- was hit by a car while riding his new motorbike. He was hospitalised for nearly a year and was left completely paralysed because of a blood clot in his brain.

'Unwavering compassion for the less privileged'

While caring for her disabled son 24-7 has been physically and mentally gruelling, Leong's face lights up with love when talking about her three children.  The grandmother of four proudly displays photographs of her eldest son's wedding in 2003.

Despite her many setbacks and her humble background, she still finds the time to sponsor other kids in need through World Vision Singapore. Her motivation? Not wanting other children to be deprived of opportunities as she had been.

Having been a child sponsor since 1998, she is one of the program's longest-serving child sponsors. Last December, she was given an award for being an outstanding child sponsor.

Even after Clement was injured, Leong went on to sponsor her third child. She is confident the compensation from Clement's accident -- a six-figure sum -- will be more than enough to pay his bills.

So out of her meagre monthly income of about $1,000, she still sets aside $45 a month to ensure her "adopted" World Vision child, who lives in a rural village in Thailand, has access to clean water, food, education and healthcare. Her earlier two "children" have left the programme, but she keeps all the letters and drawing they sent her in a file.

The executive director of World Vision Singapore, James Quek, praised Leong's "unwavering compassion for the less privileged".

He noted, Leong is a "shining example of selfless giving; and her devotedness to the cause of helping the poor inspires us daily as we serve needy children all around the world."

Refusing to feel sorry for herself, the former seamstress who built her business from scratch now works as a ham promoter. Based near her four-room HDB flat in Tampines, the job gives her a stable income and distracts her from worrying about Clement.

She recalled, "I was very depressed (after Clement's accident). … I had paranoia. I was scared if something happened to me, there would be no one to care for Clement." Thankfully, friends distracted her then with mahjong, she laughed.

Leong credited her church and friends for supporting her. She said, "There will always be troubles in this world, you just have to trust God."

Her final parting words? "Be optimistic. When you face difficulty, share your troubles with your friends and let them help. Don't keep your problems to yourself, one person can't handle it all."

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