from world travel to real life

I'll get back to catching up on our travels soon, but I need a place to go for a moment where I can organize my thoughts.

Sadly, my incredibly kind mother-in-law has a brain tumor, and my partner and I have now been in DC for almost three weeks, waiting for her to come out of intensive care in the hospital.

The days blur together into a strange mix of visiting Mutti (our nickname for my mother-in-law) in the hospital from morning till night, coming home to eat at odd hours and then rushing back to the hospital, and yelling at the television while watching World Cup soccer. (And the darn psychic octopus isn't helping.)

The bad news is that Mutti's tumor is at least a grade 3 (out of 4, 4 being the worst), and she hasn't been able to do much since her operation. The good news is that the hospital is taking good care of her, and she's coming back slowly but surely.

She is awake now for much longer, she squeezes our hands, she tapped her toes when an upbeat Roberto Carlo song came on (we brought in some music we thought she would like), she waved goodbye to her husband when he was leaving the other night, and she even smiled at my little sister-in-law's boyfriend today.

So, we have hope, but it's been a tough process. For the record, Mutti was the epitome of health before all of this brain tumor business: in Mexico, she did yoga every morning and walked miles on the beach, she ate tiny portions of food (usually salads) and drank gallons of water, etc. We were all shocked.

The other rather remarkable positive is that the entire family (with wives, babies, boyfriend and all) is here, going to see Mutti day and night. But my in-laws are amazing like that-- everything else (jobs, medical school, house-hunting...) gets pushed back if the family needs us all to be here.

Well, that's basically it. I guess I just needed to get that off my chest. I haven't told anyone other than my parents and brother about Mutti's brain tumor because we still don't have complete information yet.

Thanks for letting me vent. If you can, send some healing vibes to Mutti. You'd love her if you knew her, and I think she could use all the support she can get.