[gusmahler]

Not Alzheimers, but a serious disease anyway.

I called my Mom yesterday. I probably haven't talked to her since March or April so. (No we aren't particularly close). After telling her about my new contact information. I segue into her with a simple question, "How's your health?" She said, "Not good. I have lung cancer."

Turns out she was diagnosed in May, but didn't want to tell me. My older sister knows and she moved in with my Mom to make sure she's safe. But my Mom made sure to tell my sister not to tell anyone. So none of my Mom's siblings know. Nor do any of her nieces or nephews. And the only reason my older brother knows is because he happened to be in the room when the doctor broke the news to my Mom. Otherwise, she wouldn't have told him at all. (And here's the odd thing--he lives in the same neighborhood as she does, only 3 houses away. Yet she wouldn't have told him, if she had the choice.)

So anyway, she actually sounded fine on the phone yesterday. A little down because of her disease, but otherwise fine. She insisted that I don't visit (along with my Mom's only grandchild).

So I talked to my sister later. Apparently, my mom is putting up a huge facade. And she does the same thing when my brother visits. She'll go off her oxygen and talk to my brother (or me on the phone yesterday) and interact with us like she's perfectly fine. Then, she spends the rest of the day in her bed because she is completely exhausted. She's supposed to be on oxygen 24 hours a day, but doesn't use it when my brother visits because she doesn't want to worry him. She didn't want to tell me because she didn't want to worry me.

She not only refuses help from my sister. She still insists on cooking dinner for her. Despite the fact that it completely exhausts her. My sister will tell her that she'll bring food home, but my mom will get off of her oxygen and cook, completely exhausting her.

My mom is also refusing any help. She won't even let my sister help her out of bed. She insists on doing it herself.

She's also very fatalistic. She was hospitalized last year for pneumonia and insisted on signing a Do Not Resuscitate order. She is refusing chemo and is no longer seeing her oncologist. Though, for some reason, she scheduled a visit with her general practitioner this week.

One of the weirdest things about her is that, despite not even wanting to tell me that she had lung cancer, I'm apparently the only one of her kids that she'll talk to about her estate. She won't tell my sister anything. She did go through her entire estate with me last year when she was hospitalized, but has since made changes to some of her accounts and won't tell my sister what she did.

She's also completely lost her faith in God. She was always a very religious person, but has recently said she "hated" God and got rid of her Rosary and Bible. While I'm not religious myself, it's worrisome to see that she has rejected God because of her suffering.

I'm flying down there next week with her granddaughter because my sister makes it sound really bad. But I won't tell my Mom very far in advance, because she'll probably refuse to let me visit.