My Mom, a follow-up

My mom left on Saturday, and she did manage to make it to Home State safely.  As soon as my dad heard her cough, however, he packed her up and took her to the doctor.  As I wrote last week, she caught a cold while she was here (she catches a cold every time she comes to visit, now that I think of it), and she developed a severe cough quickly.  This isn't that unusual.  My mom had bronchitis a lot when she was a child, so she tends to develop a cough whenever she gets a cold.  This was a really bad cough though.  So bad that she woke herself and me up coughing several nights last week.  I wanted to take her to the doctor (luckily, Mom is smart enough to buy travel insurance every time she comes to visit), but she refused.  My dad made her go on Sunday though, and it turns out my mom has walking pneumonia.  That upset me.  Pneumonia is serious. 

Beyond that, it also upsets me because it tells me that she isn't taking care of herself.  She takes her medicine and goes to her appointments, but she doesn't exercise and she doesn't eat well.  I'm not sure what to say or do about her health.  I did try to speak to my dad about it, especially about my concerns with her memory.  He just shut down, however.  He has never responded well to anything that he perceives to be a criticism of my mother, so it isn't surprising that he wasn't willing to listen to my concerns.  I also know that he thinks I overreact.  I've been thinking about that a lot lately as well. 

Am I overreacting?  I don't know, maybe.  Is this about me more than my mom?  That is entirely possible. I've never been entirely comfortable with her diagnosis, primarily for three reasons.  First, she never got a second opinion.  I think that if a doctor diagnoses you with a mental illness that will require you to take multiple medications for the rest of your life you get a second opinion just to make sure.  Second, if my mom does indeed have bipolar that means her illness went undiagnosed for a long time, perhaps for years if not decades.  That has made me rethink a lot of my childhood.  For example, does the diagnosis explain her severe anxiety over meeting new people and her hesitancy to let us have friends over when we were kids?  Third, since the diagnosis, my mom has changed drastically.  This one is the hardest on me.  There are so many things we used to do that we no longer do.  When I visited, we used to spend an entire day shopping and having lunch in our favorite area of Home City.  We'd stay up late and talk.  Archer and I would help her with little projects, like planting new flowers and hanging up pictures she'd had framed.  We'd go for long walks around her neighborhood.  We'd even get up early and go to breakfast with Archer and my dad.  On the days that we stayed with Archer's family, I would often meet my mom somewhere for a few hours, which meant Archer and I both were able to spend one-on-one time with our families.  Our visits are so different now, in large part because my mom is different.  I could list all the differences, but I think it is enough to say that I have to drag her out of the house.  More often than not if I want to go do something when I'm there, she says, "Just go without me.  Take the boys and have fun.  I'll be here when you get back." 

That isn't the only thing I'm struggling with.  I keep asking myself, "Am I just being selfish?"  Maybe she is happier like this.  She is certainly more even-keeled than I ever remember her being.  She almost never gets annoyed with my dad for his stupid jokes or his unintentionally insensitive comments.  She seems much less anxious, and she no longer gets upset about how we split our time between her and Archer's family.  So part of me feels like I should accept her as she is instead of judging her, which is how she feels I treat her.  If she's happy, and she says she is, should I just let it go and accept her as she is?  Why is that so hard?