About my Mom’s illness
(long) (CW/TW illness, cancer, disability)
Thank you to everyone who has offered support over the past two to months, as my mother has been seriously ill since July 10. Her condition continues to be very serious, but she is making slow progress with speech and physical therapy and is now able to speak for herself.
She said “home please” and whether she lives or dies, she wants to do it at home. She isn’t able to do things for herself right now. She can hold people’s hands. She can say a few words. She can nod “yes” or shake her head “no.”
She is starting to touch her face, and hopefully will be able to assist with things like washing her face soon.
She is able to listen to commands and do things like open her mouth to assist with mouth care tooth brushing etc.
She is being fed through a feeding tube that goes directly into her stomach, which requires her to have a clean environment to reduce the risk of chronic infection. She can’t sit up by herself, so she has to have her bed at an angle to reduce the chance of pneumonia. She has chronic pain associated with her bone cancer, multiple myeloma, which makes her physical therapy difficult as she has to have her pain managed.
Her bone cancer made her hip bones turn into swiss cheese, so she fractured a hip. Bone fractures related to her cancer are very painful. Every day we are forced to make a choice between keeping her in pallative care, to make it so she has the best chance of survival, or entering her into hospice care, so she can be comfortable not in as much pain. But hospice care means throwing in the towel and stopping heroic life saving measures.
This is extremely stressful for everyone in the family, and reducing tension between family members and keeping stress to a minimum is important for us right now.
I will repost this to my blog and you can expect to hear some more candid messages from me about this situation. I appreciate you keeping the prayers up and remaining hopeful. This is the time to hope for the best but prepare for the worst. That’s where our family is at right now.
Sumiko Saulson 
Sending prayers ❤ Love you both
Thinking of you, sending good thoughts.