Honourable politician, proud mother.

Sharon Carstairs talks about her most important role.

Sharon Carstairs corrects me just moments after our conversation begins.

“Don’t call me Senator,” she says.

“I have to stop using the title ‘Senator.’”

And then, bursting into laughter, she adds “I can still use the title ‘The Honourable’. You can still call me ‘The Honourable.’”

Right then. The Honourable Sharon Carstairs it is.

It’s just the latest distinguished moniker she can lay claim to, after a career of distinguished monikers.

But the former president of the Liberal Party of Alberta, Liberal MLA for River Heights, Leader of the Liberal Party of Manitoba, Senator and now Honourable, Carstairs says there is one moniker that trumps all the others. This, despite the fact that it’s a side of her she’s rarely talked about.

“The thing (the public) really didn’t know about me was that I was... and am... a mother.”

It’s a title she holds close to her heart, and it’s precisely for that reason she kept it out of the limelight. She wanted to protect her kids, and her kids wanted no part of the publicity.

“In ‘86, my very first election campaign, I used their picture in the brochure, and they asked me not to do that anymore,” she says. “I think I was one of the very few politicians whose children were not on the Christmas cards. They refused.”

But from the start they were a driving force in her life, and to a certain degree they played a key role in her decision to enter politics. She was living with husband John in Alberta at the time, happily parenting their toddler daughter, when she got pregnant again. Immediately, however, things went terribly wrong. Her blood pressure skyrocketed, to the point where doctors recommended a medically induced abortion. She didn’t, however, and went on to safely deliver their second daughter. But her fate as a parent was sealed.

“I knew even before she was born that this was it,” Carstairs says. “I was told that if I survived this pregnancy, no more children, because there was a good chance I would die, or my baby would die.”

It was a tough pill to swallow because, “... all things being equal, I would have wanted more children.”

Fast-forward a decade. Her kids were getting older, and the restlessness kicked in.

“I had all this pent-up energy,” Carstairs says. And politics looked like the perfect outlet.

So with two daughters in grade school, Carstairs took on politics. And politics welcomed her to it. By the mid 1970s, she was president of the Liberal Party in Alberta. It was a good fit, but life only got better when the family moved to Manitoba, when her husband was transferred here. Immediately, Carstairs says, she fell in love with both the city and the people. They found a “wonderful home” on Wellington Crescent (“the housing market was booming in Calgary, so we got top dollar for our home there,” she explains), and the neighbours, even more wonderful.

“I was like a kid in a candy store,” she recalls. “Immediately people started to introduce themselves, say ‘come for dinner,’ or ‘come for drinks’, my girls felt welcome, it was fabulous.”

And though that was more than two decades ago, she is still sentimental about their lives here as a family. It was here that daughter Jennifer learned to ride horses,a passion that lives with her today. And it was here that they all developed a love for the theatre, thanks to regular outings at the Manitoba Theatre Centre.

And don’t get Carstairs started on the Corydon district, that to this day, remains one of her favorite hotspots for dining out.

“Cafe Carlo,” she says. “John and I love to go there.”

Carstairs political career, of course, also thrived here, especially after the historic comeback the Liberals celebrated in the late ‘80s, with Carstairs herself leading the way.

Through it all, however, she never forgot her private role as mother. And though she balanced the career versus homemaker roles with great success, it wasn’t without a struggle.

“It’s a terrible guilt (working mothers face), “ Carstairs says. “It’s like we were all raised Catholic.”

In her case, she says, she was lucky enough to have a housekeeper who was not only efficient, but the key to running a smooth household. She made sure the fridge was stocked, the laundry was done and the kids were fed. She also became a close family friend.

“No question, I couldn’t have done this without her,” Carstairs says.

Despite that, neither Carstairs nor her housekeeper could protect the girls from everything. There were times, she says, when it was hard to be known as Sharon Carstair’s daughters, especially when they were in high school.

“That was a time when we were the only Carstairs in the province,” she says. “So it didn’t take much to make the connection... and yes, I think they resented it.”

But that didn’t stop them from supporting their mother, and that didn’t stop Carstairs from supporting her daughters. Again, she quietly but consistently embraced her role as mother, whether in the Manitoba Legislature or the House of Commons. A role she was terrified she’d lose, when her oldest daughter was diagnosed with Non- Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, back in 2006.

“She’s fine now,” Carstairs says. “She’s in total remission.”

In fact, today both daughters are thriving. And once again, it’s Carstairs role as mother that’s still a dictating force in her life. They moved to Ontario. And Carstairs and her husband decided they couldn’t stay here, without them. So they packed up and moved to Ottawa.

“That is the only reason we’re not in Winnipeg anymore,” Carstairs says. “We wanted to be closer to our daughters.”

It was also a good career move, despite the fact that as of this fall, Carstairs is officially a retired politician. But no surprise, she’s not resting on her laurels. Between regular visits with the girls, Carstairs is indulging in the same passions she carried with her in the Senate. Issues like how Canadians care for the elderly, and how we care for the terminally ill. She’s long advocated for better resources and in fact, today, she’s awaiting the green light on a research proposal she’s put forward to the Network Centre of Excellence. If she’s granted the funds ($24 million), she and a team of researchers will study and propose solutions to the problem.

She’s also involved with May Court, a nonprofit hospice for women.

But while the Honourable Sharon Carstairs jumps into this role as private citizen advocate, she’ll always embrace her role as a Winnipegger, who spent some of the best years of her life here, as a mother.

“I’ll always love Winnipeg,” she says. “I’ll always remember it as a wonderful place to raise a family.”