My mom is awesome.  She’s always been there for me but man has she had a brutally tough few years as of late.

• She had a brain tumor.
• She nearly died from complications.
• She needs two new knees.
• She had more complications from the tumor.
• She may have a touch of Alzheimer’s.

And this is all within the past three years.

My dad called me last night and pretty much tore a strip off of me for not calling lately.  I normally just visit once every two weeks when I’ve got the Ankle Biter and I don’t worry too much about it.  I mean, I’m not that far away and I’m always around if they need to get a hold of me.

So I haven’t talked to my mom in about two weeks.  He gave me the HUGE guilt trip for that and y’know…he’s right.  Even though my schedule got turned around a bit with Ankle Biter and Sunshine, that didn’t excuse me from NOT calling her to say “hi”.

Turns out I’m going to feel guilty for quite awhile.

Y’see, my mom went to Halifax yesterday to visit a specialist who looked at her knees.  I think the right knee specifically (isn’t it terrible that I don’t know for sure?).  She was hoping to get a recommendation so that she could travel out to Ontario and get the knee operated on.

Once the visit was over, she was on her way out to the car when…somehow…she slipped on the asphalt of the parking lot (it was raining).  I mean, she literally was ten steps out of the hospital (it’s a covered walkway to a parking garage) and…somehow…she ended up breaking her femur.

BREAKING HER FEMUR.

Now, the femur is the longest and largest bone in the human body.  It wasn’t just a crack, either…an ambulance driver immediately came over and said, “Wow…now that’s BROKEN.”  He ended up getting her rushed through the emergency room and they began pumping her full of pain medication.  So I’m not sure how, exactly, she did it…but she royally fucked her leg up.

My poor mom is turning 64 this year.  This is NOT a good thing for her to go through.

She’s scheduled to have an operation sometime today and it could be up to a year before it’s fully healed.

She was in so much pain that she just wanted to die.  She told my father to just let her die.  That broke his heart and it tore me up to hear him tell me about it.

So needless to say, I’m going to have a LOT of making-up to do when Ankle Biter and I visit her this weekend as she should be home by Friday night (fingers crossed).