I'm serious, don't smoke.

If you haven't started, don't ever, if you've started STOP.

NOW!

My mom is slowly dying, little by little. I keep wondering, how would she be, had she never smoked a cigarette in her life. She started at age 18 or so, when she was dating my dad. My dad smoked cigarettes then, moved on to cigars, which he smokes to this day (something I really don't get, considering my mom's problems).

She stopped smoking in 1993. She was 57 at the time. It was one of the best things she ever did for herself. But by then, she'd smoked for almost 40 years. I have memories of her smoking about 1 pack a day or more for the longest time. She'd send us out to buy them sometimes. We, her four daughters, hated it.

The sad thing is, she started developing problems after she stopped smoking. She found herself short of breath, easily tired. After a visit to the pulmonary specialist, she discovered she had asthmatic bronchitis or something like that. She always told us she always had chronic bronchitis, just like her dad. Did she want to believe her smoking habits had nothing to do with it? Probably. She has COPD, it's a smoker's disease. It is not only shortening her life, it is also making her last years very, very difficult.

I don't talk to her about whether smoking caused all this, it doesn't make sense to make her feel bad about it now. It's too late. Her day to day life consists of struggling for every breath of air she takes. Every move, every action causes exhaustion. In addition to her lung trouble, she also has congenital heart failure, diabetes, arthritis, bouts of gout and she has bad knees, that could be replaced, if she wasn't forbidden to have surgery. Surgery would probably kill her on the operating table.

Years ago the thought of being in a wheel chair was awful to her. Now, outside the house, it's the only way she can go places. She can get up, and with a walker move a little, but only very carefully, and without bending her knees, or she'll fall. When she needs to get up from her chair, she needs all the strength in her arms and hands to push herself up, her legs just can't work that way anymore.

Now, to be honest, my mom is pretty heroic to me. When I say "fighting for every breath of air she takes", I'm not kidding. The woman FIGHTS. She doesn't want to kick the bucket just yet, so she tries and tries and tries to live just a little longer. She finds so much joy in life still, she doesn't want to be done. She loves my dad, and loves her children and grand children.

Her world has gotten smaller and smaller, and she's dependent on others for every thing. But she spends a lot of time behind her laptop, she chats with me and Kate and we use our web cams to see each other. She orders lots of clothing online, for herself and also for the grandkids. She even uses Hyves, the Dutch version of Facebook and MySpace.

Her current hospital stay is the longest to date. She's hoping to be released this coming Saturday, if everything is all right, and if her sputum test results come back negative from the e.coli bacteria that infected her lungs. She cried this morning, when the doctor gave her this tentative going home date. She was happy she heard the words "going home". This time, like last time, she thought she wouldn't get to go home again.

Home is where she loves to be, with my dad, a man who deserves his own post. A man who was all manly and such, who now cooks dinner for the two of them, and waits on my mom hand and foot. Everything she needs, she gets from him. Now he was told he cannot smoke ANYWHERE in the house. He does sometimes in the Kitchen, keeping the door closed to the living room, where my mom usually is. But he cannot do any of that anymore. I honestly don't understand how he can see my mom go through all this, and not throw all of his cigars away. He thinks cigars are less bad I guess. Go figure. I wish he'd just stop.

Being sick because of smoking is a horrible thing. It's hard on the relatives too, to see your loved one suffer like that. It's an awful way to live the last years of your life, it just can't be worth it. In the days my mom started smoking, it wasn't really considered all that bad. (I watch the tv show mad men, it's set in 1960, and everyone smokes, including pregnant women). Now we are so much more aware of the dangers of smoking. Just stay away from the nasty stuff, please, for yourself, for your children and loved ones.

And before potential thieves think "oh great, an opportunity", we left daddy at home.

To the right: in the pool with Cousin Pam (pronounced in Dutch: Pahm)

Leaving daddy at home has always been fine, but this time mommy won't suffice. She misses daddy and her boys and her peanut. She misses them terribly actually. Today, when we saw the men of our household on the webcam with the dog, she was overcome with sadness.

When she talks to daddy on the phone, she'll say "Daddy I misses you." She might add an "I want to go home." But she doesn't get so deeply sad. That's it for me, no more web cam. I know her daddy and her boys will miss that. Perhaps one sided webcamming might work, without seeing them, we'll see.

Other than that, Miss Kate is quite happy with the attention she gets from Opa. She's looking forward to Oma being home from the hospital. The reason for our trip is the very fact that Oma was admitted to the ICU a little over a week ago. She's now out of the ICU, and given time to recover as much as is possible, given her condition.

Oma went into the ICU on a Thursday and we were at her bed on Saturday, it was that scary for a bit. They were going to put her on some kind of mask that is meant to help inflate the respiratory system so she'd get more air/oxygen. They'd do that for 3 days, if that didn't work, they wouldn't be able to do anything, and it'd mean good bye.

Fortunately she responded very well to added medication (she can open up her own pharmacy) and didn't need the treatment with the mask (sorry, I don't know the medical terms in English). After a few days she recovered enough to leave the ICU.

This morning the doctor cautiously mentioned a possible return home on Friday. For a hospital stay that started with an intake person asking my mother if she'd taken care of her funeral wishes etc., that's pretty good. For the record, if someone comes into the ICU, I don't think you should ask the patient if they've figured out their funeral. Ask the family if it's necessary, don't show the patient that you've pretty much given up on her.

We will be writing up some wishes for the time when it will really be over. Hopefully it'll be some time away, but with her general health condition, every day is a gift, really. She keeps coming back, to a point, she always loses a little ground, has to give up a little bit, but the woman has a fighting spirit of which I am in awe. She's so grateful to be able to live at home, and to be with my dad. My dad takes care of her so well. He waits on her hand and foot. Every meal is prepared by him, he brings her every drink she needs, every snack she wants. He heats up her shoulder wrap at night, makes sure her feet are warm, and much, much more. He's completely amazing.

This marks the first time I've flown back to the Netherlands in a hurry. It was that serious. In case things would have taken a turn for the worse, I didn't want to take the chance that I'd regret it later if I hadn't gone.

Luckily I'm able to work (somewhat, it's not easy to arrange time around hospital visits and caring for Kate.) I should really head off to bed, since it's close to midnight here in western Europe.

Being in the Netherlands makes me come up with lots of things I'd like to write. Coming home, even like this, is always a welcome opportunity to eat typically Dutch things, to be part of Dutch culture and customs a little bit again.

I don't think I would want to move back here, I love living in the United States, but there are some things...

More about that later, maybe, if I have time, and if my mom's health situation continues on this path and nothing serious happens.