Footy star Tom Hawkins reveals how his mother's shock cancer death almost a decade ago is still hitting him and his family hard

Geelong superstar Tom Hawkins has opened up about the way his mother's shock death in 2015 is still impacting his family, and how he wishes she'd got to meet his children.

Hawkins, 35, has tasted a lot of success during his sparkling 356-game career, but it hasn't all been plane sailing for the triple-premiership player.

After setting Geelong's record for most games played in the loss to GWS on Saturday, he admitted his toughest challenge to date has been dealing with the devastating loss of his mum Jennie to cancer in April 2015. 

'When you lose a parent suddenly to illness, it's tragic and heartbreaking for me and my family,' Hawkins told the Herald Sun. 

'I'm lucky I have a lot of family here and teammates that I've played with for a long time – I saw Stevie [Steve Johnson] just before.

'I think if you want to play the game for a long time, you've got to be resilient, but you also need lots of support.

'That was the most significant period and challenge of my footy career, but there's been other challenges – form and at the start, there's form challenges at the end, there's body challenges at times. 

'I would love to take the passing of my mother back, but I have learnt some wonderful things through those challenges of form and injury and adversity.'

Hawkins was particularly close with his mum, and paid a special tribute to her after kicking a goal against North Melbourne in 2015 by looking up to the sky and kissing his black armband. 

Players mobbed Hawkins after his goal and heartwarming tribute, knowing what he had been going through. 

'Your mum and dad have a have a huge impact and particularly in my family, in the Le Deux and Hawkins family, we're really close and really, really tight and lean on each other a lot and socialise a lot,' he said.

'I love my family, and now I've got a family of my own, so it's sad for a lot of reasons.

'I'd love for my children to be able to meet my mum, but that wasn't to be.'

'We are always thinking about her, aren't we? Grandma Jen,' he said to one of his daughters.

Geelong teammate Steve Johnson also commented on how rough that period was for his big mate. 

'That was a pretty difficult time for him because obviously players are close to their families but he had a really special relationship with his mum, they were very, very close, that was obvious to anyone who knew him,' Johnson said.