Cherish Your Mom & Dad, Unless of Course They Suck
Just the other evening I went for a walk with my Mom and girls. About ten minutes into our stroll my Mom mentioned that she felt a burning sensation around her heart. I lectured her and told her she had better call the doctor in the morning. In hindsight, I should’ve drove her to the emergency room right then and there.
The next day I got a call from my mom at work. The doctor’s office advised her to go to the emergency room immediately. She watches my five year old daughter and nine month old twin girls, so I came straight home so she could head to the hospital. Since it was late afternoon, they decided to keep her overnight for testing.
The heart monitoring they were performing and the electrocardiogram results came back fine, so I wasn’t too worried. It wasn’t until the CAT scan later in the afternoon that the diagnosis changed. The doctors found a blockage in the LAD or left anterior descending coronary artery and a few other smaller branches were also blocked. Medical terms aside, I feel like anything that goes wrong with the heart is scary shit. And it was especially scary to find out she would’ve had a massive heart attack had she not went in to have it checked out. She was a ticking time bomb.
While I was sitting with my mom awaiting her angiogram, the doctor came in. She was explaining to us that they would most likely have to put in some stents but if the blockages were more severe, it would mean major surgery.
As I was waiting for her to get out of surgery, I was thinking about how this whole thing has really put things into perspective for me. My mom is truly irreplaceable and a major anchor in my life. What would I do without her and my dad for that matter? My dad was actually watching my girls for me while I was at the hospital. He said he would rather keep busy watching them than worry the whole time at the hospital. So there I was thinking.
If your mom and dad are anything less than assholes, tell them how much you love them and appreciate them. Cherish the time you spend with them and make everyday count. Do it for them and do it for yourself.
I’m getting older. I hit the big 4-0 this past year, which means they are only getting older too, and they won’t be around forever. That thought kills me a little bit inside. What would I do without them and how would I live? My mom lives with us during the week, so I can’t even imagine and I don’t want to imagine that.
Maybe things are really hitting home as of late due to some sad events I’ve encountered in the last few years or maybe it’s just Father Time and getting older that are making me more aware that life can be cut short and can change on a dime.
A little over three years ago, my best friend’s husband went for a jog and just fell over dead at 35 years old. They couldn’t find a reason and deemed it natural causes. I’ll never forget my best friend telling me her husband died of effing nothing. Then, my husband’s little cousin committed suicide from depression and bullying at about that same time. She was a beautiful 16 year old girl with her whole life ahead of her. My sister-in-law’s father passed away last year and just last month we had to put my beloved cat, Baby Edgar to sleep. And then it was just yesterday that my mom’s surgeon came out to talk to me and told me the situation about my mom's heart. I thought she was going to tell me the stent surgery was a success but instead, the LAD artery was 90% blocked and the stents weren’t going to cut it. She was in need of a quadruple bypass immediately. Talk about the unexpected.
Life is short and full of the unexpected and as we get older there is obviously more and more loss. But that’s just it, you really don’t think about how precious the people closest to you are until something bad happens to them or they are gone forever. So do yourself a favor and tell them you love them today. Run. Go and tell them… especially your parents. I know I’ll tell my mom for the millionth time as soon as she is out of the operating room and in the ICU after her bypass. Thankfully, a nurse came out and told me that will be in an hour or so.