74. [Me as an only child and my parents' end-of-life planning] A story about how being too stoic about pain might actually end up causing trouble for those around you.

Last Saturday, I took my 87-year-old mother out shopping.

But, her way of walking was a bit strange.

Well, she always walks quite slowly and looks like she's struggling, but she seemed to be favoring one side, so when I asked her what was wrong, she said,

"When I got up from bed the day before yesterday, I felt dizzy and fell. And now my lower back hurts."

That's what she told me.

Hmm. This is bad. The term that immediately came to mind was the typical elderly

fracture from a fall.

When I said, "Isn't that a broken bone?", she replied,

"It doesn't hurt that much. It's better than yesterday."

Yeah, zero credibility. When people get old, all their senses dull. They become so insensitive to things like heat and pain that it's genuinely shocking, so I can't trust her words at all. I thought I should take her to a doctor because this was serious, but it was already,

Saturday afternoon.

Hmm. It didn't seem like an emergency room situation, so I thought I'd wait until Monday to take her. Then I remembered,

I had my first meeting with the care manager scheduled for Monday at 10:30 AM.

Oh, what should I do? I don't want to delay the meeting with the care manager any further. Hmm. I'll try to squeeze in an X-ray first thing Monday morning as a gamble. Hospitals have long wait times, so that's impossible, but maybe I can get lucky at a local clinic.

So, I arrived at the clinic at 8:00 AM on Monday, waited for it to open, and rushed in. As a result,

one rib!

It was cleanly broken (crying).

But, as expected, the clinic's efficiency is high. Despite how crowded it was, my mother's X-ray and examination were finished in about an hour, and I managed to make it to the first meeting with the care manager. I'll continue this story tomorrow.

You can read the previous stories in this magazine.