Dancing with Mom

My father is sick. His tests came back positive for prostate cancer. The doctors decided to do nothing. One because the cancer hasn't grown in three years and two because he is seventy and they only expect him to live another 10. Maybe. So they are not going to do a thing. Ok I can accept this. No biggie. So I called to see how he is but Peggy answer instead. Dammit. So I go though the usual talk about how much the worse the weather in sunny Sacramento is compared to snowy Seattle, I ask to speak to Wo-wa. Of course Mom wants to know why and when I state I was concerned about his health she asks why again since I never asked about her health. So I ask about her health and she states that right now she is fighting with the doctors at Kaiser Medical offices because, according to them, her heart is just fine. But she is convinced that she needs open heart surgery because she can not catch her breath. Never mind that 8 different doctors told her to lose weight because she too heavy for her small frame but she insist its her heart. So chance she gets, she goes and gets a EKG for $400 and believes one day soon a brilliant doctor will come and declare her dead and she can celebrate her “I told you so” attitude in casket with her very ungrateful children surrounding her.

Since Mom spent her whole life trying to catch some disease or break a bone, literary would be a miracle that it never happened. If anyone else is sick or hurt in anyway she is definitely is too and always worse. A good example of this is when my sister Sheri had some kind of arthritis in her hip which cased her to limp a little.  Well once Peggy got an understanding that Sheri's hip was not up top par she started limping. Not slightly, but full blown limping as if she was in some horrible car accident that happened while the rest of us were asleep. I asked her why is she limping and she announces that her hip just gives out every now and then and it must be arthritis and when she went to the doctor’s to get is checked she was told she needed surgery to heal this condition. Then she left the room limping horrible on the opposite leg.

After about 20 minutes of this I am sicker than your father routine I ask again about Wo-wa and his health status. She states that it really isn't all that serious and that she hopes that he dies first and soon, as she wishes to get all of the money he has been hoarding her whole life, so she and her daughters can go shopping. Somehow I know the shopping part does not include me and as much as I hope my father has hidden money somewhere, I suspect he has a hidden family somewhere out there like all old men his age.

I hang up after 30 minutes, having not spoken to my father, as usual. I can only pray for his health.