Sugar Coating Makes Me Gag

Submitted by Slartibartfast

My mother is the champion of the Understatement. For once, just once, I would love to get a straight-down-the-line, dinky-di, absolute truth answer rather than the surface sugar-coated blather that is most often dished out.

I am not, by my very nature, a negative person and I don’t automatically see the ‘bad’ in everything. But sure as shit, sometimes there is bad stuff happening (or about to happen) and I would just like to know about it.

Take, for instance, the impending birth of my first child. You would think my mother, who had gone through it twice before, would at least give me a hint as to what I was about to experience. And it’s not as if I didn’t ask for the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help me God.

But no.

She dodged. She weaved. She sidestepped. And in the end, I gave up. All I got was “mumble, mumble, mumble ... but at the end you have a beautiful baby and it makes it all worthwhile”. I really should have grabbed her by the lapels and screamed “Makes all WHAT worthwhile? So, is it going to hurt really bad, Mum?? Am I going to embarrass myself? What should I be looking out for?”. But I didn’t. I realised she didn’t want to talk about it so I let it go.

And that was fine. Until the day after the birth, when she came to visit her first grandchild and leaned over and said to me “Hurts like a bitch, doesn’t it?” and proceeded to give me ALL the information I had so desperately wanted – no, needed - before the event.

OH. MY. GOD.

So it’s not like she didn’t know or couldn’t remember. She waved away my expletive with the reasoning that she didn’t want to scare me. Heelllooooo. Crazed information gatherer here!! I fear only that which I don’t know!!

Oh wait, It gets better.

Because there’s that whole “Heart Incident” thing with my father. Not a Heart Attack, oh no no no! Silly me. The phone conversation went something like this:

“Oh no, dear, it was a heart incident. Your father didn’t actually die so that’s the difference. [insert high pitched questioning over phone from daughter] Oh, well, yes there have been some signs over the past few months. [more high pitched noise] Well, his cholesterol was up a bit. (A bit? Try 9.2 when warning range is 5.5) I didn’t want to worry you, darling, that’s why we didn’t say anything ... and it’s no big deal now. He has two stents ... well, yes, they had to put two in because it would seem both arteries were pretty clogged ...I’m sorry, darling but can you lower your tone a little? It’s a bit screechy. Are you feeling alright?”

And so on and so forth.

“Your fathers’ not feeling very well” =“His depression is hitting new lows. Now he just lies in bed all day long in the foetal position”
“ I haven’t been too healthy lately” = “Uh-oh, it would seem I have developed Type 2 diabetes”
“Your grandfather has had a little accident” = “He broke his hip. He’s 82. It’s a corkscrew break so not so easy to fix”

See, the trouble is we don’t live close by so I can’t just ‘pop’ over and do a reconnaissance for myself. I am relying on her to give me accurate information regarding the health and general wellbeing of herself, my father and anyone else in the family.

Now that you have the background, you can imagine the warning bells going off in my head as my father talks to me on the phone the other day about having lost ‘ a little weight’. He is fighting prostate cancer and the last time I saw him, he wasn’t carrying any extra around with him. He states that he’s down to 64 kg (141 lbs). That’s ‘pretty light’ for a man 1.76m (5' 9")tall (oh hell – it’s 4 kg lighter than me. There. I said it. And to be honest, that was what freaked me out the most. My Daddy weighing less than me.)

But of course, after I got a little panicky and left a message on Mum’s phone and sent an email saying “Whenever you need help with him, call me and I will be right there”, I get a reassuring email and a phone call to say it’s just been a series of unfortunate circumstances and he is feeling much better and put on a whole ½ kilo from actually eating the night before.

Oh please.
Please.
PLEASE let her be telling me the open, honest-to-goodness truth for once ...

*DISCLAIMER: I love my Mum so very much. I think she is a top chick and a good-lookin’ sheila to boot. And those rose-coloured glasses do go so well with her beautiful skin ...