My mother is a graduate of the school of tough love. A migrant from the warn-torn Middle East to a Western world where you can order your milk through a mobile app, she understood both the opportunities that Australia provided. And, its challenges. Perhaps that’s why she is so disciplined. So firm. And, so very protective of me and my four siblings.
For most of my life, that was the version of Mum that I have known best. Resentful of the incessancy of her questions as an adolescent, as time has passed, my emotions of annoyance have been replaced with an intense appreciation for her ability to always have the answers. And, with each passing day, I have come to see her as so much more than the resilient woman who hemmed my school uniform and always knows where the crunchy peanut butter at the back of the pantry is hidden.
Much as I wish I could I know there is no way I could possibly repay her. However, when the opportunity to treat her to an escape at the beautiful Devasom resort in Khao Lak Thailand presented itself, it seemed a reasonable place to start …
Solitude and belonging
We arrive at the limestone-landscaped coastal enclave that is Devasom – situated on a quiet stretch of beach in Khao Lak, Phang Nga – as a small, slightly mismatched unit. My mother; my sister – celebrating her first Mother’s Day with my new nephew; and me – Daughter. Sibling. Aunty. Three generations, each carrying our own handbags and unspoken habits.
Located roughly 75 minutes from Phuket International Airport, and sitting across seven acres of tropical gardens, with a smattering of suites and villas scattered across the greenery, there is an immediate sense of space. Visible physically. And felt emotionally. As though everything at Devasom has been designed to breathe. Including its guests.
Mother knows best
Few things reveal life’s contradictions quite like travelling with your mother as an adult. No longer a child tugging at her sleeves (Well. Not all the time) and orbiting her routines. Nor, a hurried companion fitting her into your own. But, two women suspended somewhere in between.
And, Devasom provides the perfect backdrop to explore this contrast of distance in togetherness.
Here, time loosens its grip. And, with the Andaman Sea stretching out with indifference it becomes completely acceptable to be quieter, slower and less certain of what comes next. Unlike mornings in Sydney, with Karl Stefanovic blaring in the background, here we’re woken by light – pale and gradual – slipping through gauzy curtains of our villa. Almost reluctant to intrude. And, it is here, in these small, unguarded hours, that I begin to notice the shifts.
For me the adventure starts with a sunrise walk along the beach, quite unlike my regularly scheduled gym routine. For my mother in a deep sleep she is never afforded at home. But, we unite over breakfast. Joined now by sister, nephew, and, a spread heaving with tropical fruit, still-warm pastries, and traditional Thai fare. Should you feel the inclination to start your day with a bowl of spicy fried rice .
While other guests swan around in caftans and indulge in acai bowls, I watch my mother from across the table as she sacrifices her steaming hot cappuccino and waits till her daughters have eaten. Then stacks the piles of dirty plates to simplify the cleaning process for staff.
It is a gesture so familiar that it almost goes unnoticed. Before it strikes me – as I tuck into a plate of fermented rice noodles at 8am – just how much of her life has been made up of these small, exacting movements. Tending, adjusting, ensuring. And, how rarely anyone asks her to stop.
Our buffet is followed by a breathwork class. And, while I have previously sat in sound baths, yoga classes and icy cold plunge pools in the name of work as a wellness writer, for my mother who has spent the years rushing between carer for her ageing parents and her own reluctant-to-really-transition-to-adulthood-children, I know it feels faintly indulgent. The kind of thing she would never find time for in suburbia.
Yet, there as we three women sit cross-legged, guided into slower, deeper inhales, I notice my mother hesitate. In that almost imperceptible way that someone does when they are unused to being asked to simply receive. Breathe in. Hold. Release. Her shoulders, usually held just a little too high, begin to lower. Not all at once, but enough.
Later that night, as we tuck into peanutty satay skewers, steaming bowls of Tom Yum clear soup, stir fried prawns with kapi shrimp sauce and coconut ice cream at the Michelin-suggested Takola Thai restaurant, I notice a discreet yet genuine change. Mum lingers. Just that little bit longer. As if she is grateful to be granted a grace that allows her to be nowhere else but here.
In the days that follow, my mother is encouraged to enrol in Devasom’s range of activities. There are spas. Bike eco tours. Japanese floral arrangement classes – an activity that, on paper, feels almost too delicate for our slightly sun-dazed state. But it is the latter that turns out to be one of the most rewarding and revealing.
There is a quiet discipline to arranging flowers this way – a respect for empty, unfilled space, for asymmetry, for allowing each stem to exist without interference. I watch my mother approach it cautiously at first, then with growing confidence. She adjusts a single branch, steps back, and then – unexpectedly – leaves it as it is. “It doesn’t need anything else from me,” she says, almost to herself.
Soul sisters
Travelling with my sister also adds its own texture to the days at Devasom.
It is certainly grounding watching the sibling who you once held to ransom after she borrowed your favourite skirt without asking, move through motherhood. Like a quiet mirroring of your own upbringing, refracted through a new lens. The habits you once shared begin to diverge. And yet, in certain moments, they collapse back into something recognisable.
Little Mattias (all nine and a half months of him) darts between us, equally at ease in all directions, pulling us into games, giggles, and a kind of shared presence that feels both chaotic and anchoring.
However, the resort’s child care offering also gives us unexpected pockets of space as a gentle reprieve. And, for a few hours, we are not defined by roles. We become simply ourselves again. Or, at least closer to what we would like to be if we didn’t have to stress about superannuation funds and the price of groceries. We speak in half-finished sentences, pick up old rhythms, laugh at things that make no sense outside of us.
One afternoon, with the sun dipping below the horizon, as our guide Bao directs our awkward efforts of canoeing through the mangroves, while the flickering movement of our oars rustles the lagoon waters and sunlight fractures through the trees, we are thrown back to our 20 year old selves. Just two sisters navigating the world. Allowing curiosity to set the pace. And discovering things for the first time.
We don’t have an “A Ha Oprah-esque” epiphany, But, in those moments, I believe that both of us realise how rare it is, as adults, to meet your sibling without the scaffolding of responsibility.
The child as a compass
A blonde-haired, blue-eyed, smiley novelty to the staff, Mattias may not have yet spoken his first words. But, over the course of his stay at Devasom, he undoubtedly comes to understand “Cute”.
Although he does not care for itineraries or intentions, he is drawn to the smallest things – clinking cutlery against ceramic, the sticky texture of a soft dragon fruit, sand slipping through his fingers. And so, without ever declaring it, he begins to set the pace.
We follow. Mornings stretch longer because he insists on noticing the fallen frangipani in the pool . Afternoons soften because he tires when the heat settles too heavily. Even our conversations shift – interrupted, yes, but also loosened, less concerned with conclusions and more content to exist in fragments. There is no urgency to arrive anywhere beyond the moment in front of us.
It is in these small recalibrations that I begin to notice something else – the way my mother, his grandmother, responds to him.
Not with the efficiency I have known growing up, nor with the quiet, constant vigilance that has defined so much of her parenting, but with a kind of openness that feels almost unfamiliar. She cuddles him harder. Lingers in his laughter a little longer. And, she allows herself to be pulled into his world, rather than organising it around him.
There is a softness there. Not new, but perhaps long buried beneath years of necessity. And in following him, I realise we are also, gently, following her – not the mother we have always known, but the woman she might have been, had there been more room for lightness, for play, for things that do not need to be optimised or controlled.
The child, in this way, becomes our quiet compass. Not leading us forward in any grand, directional sense, but guiding us back – to presence, patience, and a way of being that asks less of us, and in doing so, gives more.
The Ritual of Returning
While our days are sometimes divided, evenings at Devasom become our anchor. We gather, sun-warmed and salt-stung, as the shy shifts from aquamarine to tangerine and then pitch black. The air is punctuated by the stars and the pathways lit up one by one as lanterns cast soft, flickering shadows.
We never rush dinner. Why would we when courses arrive so gently, thoughtfully? Local seafood, fragrant curries, dishes that feel rooted in place rather than designed to impress. My mother, who at home often eats quickly, almost absentmindedly, begins to slow down. To taste. Comment. Ask questions.
On our final night, as we settle in for a meal at the Mediterranean-leaning Beach Grill & Bar positioned beside the supersized, split-level resort pool. As we savour cheesy woodfired pizza, citrusy salads, seared scallops, and sticky mango rice it feels like we have all the time in the world.
At this point, Mattias has fallen asleep against my sisters shoulder, the kind of deep, unselfconscious snooze that only comes from days spent entirely outdoors, oblivious to the live fire show around him.
My mother reaches out, absentmindedly brushing a strand of hair from his face – a gesture so instinctive it feels almost like muscle memory. I realise then that so much of what she has given us has been invisible in its consistency. The steady, unremarkable acts of care that rarely get named, let alone celebrated.
And yet here, in this place that asks nothing of her, she seems – if not entirely different – then at least newly visible. Not just as our mother, but as a woman who can sit still, take up space, and decide that something is already enough. With love.
On mothers, daughters and distance
Travelling with your mother as an adult and sister as a mother is paradoxical. At once, familiar and new.
Sometimes we slip back into old roles without meaning to — child and caregiver, protector and protected. And, other times the relationships even out in ways that surprised me. In seeing my mother and sister outside the routines that defined them for so long, I also see how travel gave has given them permission to be lighter, curious, playful, even vulnerable.
Travelling together as adults also sharpened the contrast between generations. One of you wants to over-plan, the other wants to wander. One values comfort, the other spontaneity. Yet somewhere between delayed flights, shared desserts and long walks in unfamiliar places, you often find a rhythm that doesn’t exist at home.