My mother's beloved cat gave me asthma. At 12, I was sent to boarding school. It was me or the cat, and she chose the cat...

My mother's beloved cat gave me asthma. At 12, I was sent to boarding school. It was me or the cat, and she chose the cat.

.. By Amanda Craig Published: 11:54 EDT, 9 June 2024 | Updated: 11:54 EDT, 9 June 2024 e-mail View comments My mother Zelda is beautiful.

And now, almost 97, she is still intelligent, funny, gentle and charming. Today I have a wonderful relationship with her, but for many years it was so bad that I used to wonder whether we would ever speak to one another again. When I was a child, I didn't (unlike some little girls) want to be her, but I loved her so intensely I would have died to protect her.

She was a kind of real-life Cinderella who had lost her own mother aged just two. I never would have guessed that our own love as daughter and mother would later go wrong due to a very unlikely protagonist — my mother's beloved cat, Marina. Before this, though, my mother truly was a kind of heroine in my eyes.

Born in South Africa , she obtained a first class degree in history of art at Wits University in Johannesburg and became a journalist. She met my British father, Dennis, also a journalist, while they were both working on the country's premier newspaper, The Star. Today, Amanda has a wonderful relationship with her mother Zelda, but for many years it was so bad that Amanda used to wonder whether they would ever speak to one another again They were both quite well known, and eloped to Venice to get married in 1958.

I was born in Johannesburg a year later. But .