Having cancer

Wishing your mother the best. Love her attitude!

Thanks everyone. Truth is, I don’t think she has any idea how hard the chemo will be. But what do you do? Talk her out of it? Of course not. So, we’ll see how it goes.

But get your colon checked!

Best of luck to her, Tyler - I hope she’s able to fight it off!

Mom update – today they put in the port for the chemo, then she’s meeting in the morning with the oncologist. Then later tomorrow she’s having dental surgery, to get it done before the chemo starts. She said the chemo will probably start on Dec. 10, the day after her birthday.

She told me all this on the phone tonight, and sounded pretty upbeat. Then she told me something that made my jaw drop. The other day she got a phone call from a woman who had used some ancestry DNA site. Turns out the woman and my mom share grandfathers. The grandpa, it seems, had had an affair with a co-worker. The woman calling was the daughter of the son born of that affair (which would have happened probably 90-100 years ago). My mother never knew until now of the affair, nor of the offspring. And this new cousin had, as part of all this, located some other cousins that my mother had lost track of 50 years ago.

So my 86 year old mother, on the cusp of starting her battle against cancer, learns she has a first cousin. Or half-first cousin, or something. She was incredibly excited.

I can’t even.

That’s amazing, we had our own family moment due to this kind of thing too!

My Mom got a message from someone with a very close family hit. To make a long story short, my right-wing, religious zealot Aunt and Uncle dumped their “first” child in an orphanage 2 months before they got married. Then had another child, yep… 9 months later which they kept. Later adding 3 more.

The irony here, is this Aunt and Uncle are horrible people. They’re racist, xenophobic, hate gays, feel anyone who doesn’t think or worship like they do should be wiped off the face of the Earth. And they’re also anti-vaxxers. At any rate, turns out that wasn’t the end of it. She’d also had a kid in high school which they hid from their current 4 (5) kids. So the very people who are first to bring their religious authority down on those around them had a lot of skeletons in the closet. Their kids, who for 30-40 years thought they were it, actually have 2 more siblings.

That’s awesome! What a cool thing to divide your mom’s attention from a crappy situation.

My “family surprise” story has been moved to another - possibly more appropriate - thread.

Damn, does everyone have unknown family members? Mine is my older half brother, who my mom had before meeting my dad and gave up for adoption. My two younger brothers and I had no idea he existed growing up. My mom didn’t stay in contact at all until he did the searching and reached out to her when I was about 25. At the time,he was in Chicago and she was in Oregon…so she called me and asked if I would willing to make first contact. So that’s how I met my brother for the first time, complete with sister-in-law and nephew, before even my mom had met him (other than as a newborn).

Maybe? I don’t know any in mine (that may change.)

But I have several friends who have learned of unknown siblings recently. I think this is the flip side of easy DNA profiling and whatnot. Even if it isn’t DNA that proves things, parents of people now seem to be coming clean, perhaps due to better testing, or just perhaps that it’s finally the “greatest generation” that is now within this elder timeline and they are starting to spill secrets.

That’s the coolest thing I’ve heard all week! I think you’ve got a whole screenplay or novel here. Or at least a short story.

-Tom

edit: eh, I’ve thought better of it. Why crap up a perfectly good thread with my family drama? Anyway, best of luck to those of you with family members fighting cancer.

I had that same thought when I was posting my tale, but posted anyway.

Having reconsidered and being a Man Of Action, I have created a new home for my story and I encourage you to share the epic tale of dive^2 family life there.

Good idea. Sorry to derail things with my mother’s surprise.

I was happy to read something like that here. Any tangent is a welcome one.

I thought her experience was kind of magical too. She’s going through a rough time and this is an added bit surprise. Those are part of her experience too.

Update #1 – my mother has gone through 2 rounds of chemo (every other week) and has had no serious side effects. Her mood is very upbeat. She did, though, suffer a nasty fall while waiting to be driven to the oncologist to have the pump removed, and her face is very black and blue.

Update #2 is about the newly-discovered relative mentioned above. My brother and his family visited her yesterday and he later texted me that she mentioned that this woman who claims a DNA match is going to visit in the spring. My mother is very excited.

Then… she mentioned in passing that she’s giving some money to this woman, who says she needs it for more ancestry research.

Jeezus. My scam alarm bells immediately sounded, as did my brother’s.

To recap: my mother, battling cancer at age 86, has found great joy in the discovery of a first cousin she never knew existed, a woman who called out of the blue after a DNA match, and who coincidentally wants money. Oh, and my mother is on a fixed income with very little savings.

My brother is going to get the woman’s name and do his own research. We’re not sure how much money is being talk about. And I won’t allow this woman to visit without one of us being there.

Am I wrong to be skeptical? This surprise has meant a lot to her at a difficult time.

First off, very happy to hear your mother is being so positive about the situation. I’m no doctor, but it sounds like she is handling the chemo very well so far.

Second, you are not wrong at all. Be very skeptical. Just reading your description of the situation sets off immediate alarm bells in my head. This mystery person wants money now, but won’t visit until spring? I mean God knows weirder things have happened, but no way would I take that at face value.

You are right to be skeptical.

It shouldn’t take much money to prove this. Just ask the woman which DNA service she used (23andme, etc), and submit a sample from your mother. The results can show you any relatives who have also used the service. It costs about $100, and you won’t have to give this woman a penny.

Great idea, thanks. The woman told my mother she used Ancestry.com. Coincidentally, my brother had received an Ancestry.com kit as a gift last year, and had done the test. He told me today that this woman’s name is not on the list of matches that he received.

He also did some google fu on this woman. There is a woman by the same name (a reasonably common name) and address (it’s in a different state), but as far as he can tell, the woman is in her 30s. The caller said she was in her 60s. There is also a woman with the same name in her 50s in that state who showed up on a criminal list, with a conviction for embezzlement.

So all that said, I’m 99.9% sure this is a scam, and my brother, sister and I must now tell my mother. She will be heartbroken. If she dismisses us, we will insist that she do an Ancestry.com test before resuming contact with the woman, as @AWS260 suggested.

I hope there is a particularly special place in hell for those who try to con elderly, sick widows out of their meager savings.

Amen.

Wow I can’t believe someone would run a scam like that. How awful :(