Lesson Learned

On the off chance that I have any other readers on here other than my immediate family members, you may or may not know that my mother is a breast cancer survivor.

Last year at this time she had just finished up her cancer treatments, and was still not feeling back to her usual self. During that time and for the many months before, she was at home a lot taking it easy, allowing herself to recover. This was not typical for her, because when she was healthy she was always busy with organizations or friends.

This year, now that she seems to be back to her old self, she has also gone back to her busy schedule. This week, frustrated with her lack of availability to talk to me on the phone, I complained to my mom that I "liked her better when she had cancer". We had a good laugh over it and moved on.

When I hung out with my friends this weekend, the subject of my mom came up and I shared with them the cancer comment I made to my mom. The joke was on me, however, because when I told my friends what I said they all immediately STOPPED LAUGHING and STOPPED SMILING and looked at me as if I had told them I just killed my dog. Can you say AWKWARD??!!

I had to explain to them that it was just a JOKE and that no, I don't want my mom to be sick I just want her TIME. Grasping for straws I said.. "well, my mom laughed" and quickly changed the subject.

The moral to this story is.. don't share morbid family jokes with outsiders. They won't get it, and they might think you're a bad person. Lesson learned. :)