My dad phoned this morning. It's not good news. The cancer is invasive, and in my mom's lymph nodes ... don't know if it's spread anywhere else. Apparently the doctor said she needs to decide if she's going to try the chemo, or just ... leave it. I don't know what chances he gives her if she does go for the chemo.

I was not prepared for this. I thought it would turn out to be one of the easily-treated ones.

My dad sees the doctor at 10 tomorrow (SA time, that's 4am our time). And he speaks to a doctor in the UK at 5pm tomorrow. And he's faxing my mom's details to my aunt, who works at a hospital in Toronto. They'll give us a second opinion. My parents are considering doing the chemo in the UK rather than SA ... it'll be cheaper. But only if they think the standard of care will be as good. And only if my mom decides to do the chemo.

My dad wants me to come out sooner than the 27th ... I need to wait till he's spoken to the doctors, though, before I try to change my ticket. It may be that I end up joining them in the UK instead of in SA.

Bobby says I must just go whenever I need to, and stay as long as I need to, he'll take care of everything here.

I just can't stop crying. I never knew a person could cry so much.

I took Sophie to a play this morning with the homeschool group, and I held it together during that, and during the picnic afterwards. I couldn't bring myself to tell anyone in the group. I knew if I mentioned it I'd start crying and not be able to stop. I started to cry again as soon as I got into the car to come home and I haven't stopped since. I feel badly for the kids, they are not used to seeing me falling apart.

I can't bear this.