I had a reminder this weekend about the frustration of communicating with family while I am overseas. By now I feel I have gotten used to the way things are. I email with people, or use Facebook as a form of communication. I regularly Skype with my parents (and Skype is out there for whomever else wants to use it). I can call people, but for friends of mine it usually involves making "a date" where we set aside a time when I can call that we will both be awake and free. I call family with less formality, and my parents (thankfully) call me or text my cell phone. Aside from a few minor things which somehow get lost in translation (like my cousin being pregnant. I found out when I was home in August that my cousin was about six months pregnant and I swear no one told me, even though my mom swears she did tell me) I feel I'm mostly in the loop.
Except this weekend. My parents are avid football fans and went to the UM homecoming game (like they always do). At the game they bought some noodle bowls from a vendor to have for lunch. Within about thirty minutes my mom says she started to feel sick. She spent the rest of Saturday and Sunday morning being miserably sick. On Sunday afternoon my dad took her to the hospital because she was feeling so terrible. They decided to admit her to the hospital Sunday afternoon. Note here that no email, text, or phone call was made to me. On Monday a doctor was examining my mom and thought part of her pain was because of her appendix. The doctor explained that sometimes when your intestines get infected or riled up, it can cause the appendix to flare. However, to confirm this was happening, they needed a CT scan, and the CT scanner at the hospital in Polson wasn't working (they don't having a general surgeon either, so there was no one to remove the appendix). It was decided my mom would be transported via ambulance down to Missoula to have the CT scan and probably surgery. Note again, no email, text, or phone call to Kirsten.
It was at this point on Monday (Monday evening for me) I decided to call my mom. Normally I talk to my mom everyday, but over the weekend we had someone visiting us (more on that in another post) and I hadn't called her. She never called me either, and I assumed she knew our guest was here and she'd just talk to me later. I called her work (normal for me) and never got an answer. Confused, I decided to call her cell phone. She answered, sounding tired and horrible. When I asked her what she was doing, she explained what was going on before putting my dad on the phone (I believe because she was too weak to talk). My dad filled me in on more details.
I was upset. My mom (who is superwoman) was sick, 6,000 miles away, and there was nothing I could do about it. Also, I was angry. Why did no one tell me? Obviously my mom really wasn't in a position to call me, but why didn't my dad? There really wasn't an answer for me. The more I thought about the gravity of the situation, the more angry I got. I want and need to be informed of things which go on. My mother being hospitalized falls under the category of things which require a phone call. I had told my dad I was going to make a list for him of things which require that I am informed. He laughed. I'm not joking.
My mom did end up having her appendix out, and the doctors told her it probably was her appendix which was causing most of her food poisoning symptoms/response. So, it was something which needed to happen anyway. She is doing well and will hopefully be released from the hospital today.
Here I present the guidelines for my family of what sort of life events require what sort of communication.
Email is an appropriate form of communication for the following things:
- Setting up a phone or Skype date
- Telling me silly or fun anecdotal stories about what has been going on
- Giving me a generalized "life update" as long as nothing major (marriage proposal, pregnancy, illness, death) has occured
- Discussing details of things talked about in earlier emails/phone conversations
- Passing on information (flight details, hotel reservations, ect)
- Basically use email like you would if you were calling me in the states just to chat for a bit
Facebook is more appropriate for my cousins or friends. But it is also an appropriate form of communication for the following things:
- All of the things which applied to email can be applied to Facebook
- If you want a fast response from me because you can see I am online
- During the day I tend to check Facebook more than my email, so if there is some sort of emergency you can use this to tell me to call home or to call someone and there's a good chance I'll see it within a few hours (before I see my email)
- Unless you are some random friend I haven't spoken to in years, Facebook is NOT the medium in which to tell me you are engaged or pregnant. Seriously. Nothing hurts more than to find out in this way when I know that back in the states I would have gotten a personal phone call before the rest of the world found out.
All of the following are circumstances which require that I be informed through a phone call - or that I am texted being told to call someone:
- Sudden serious illness or a serious diagnosis of something
- Hospitalization
- Emergency surgery
- Outcomes of surgeries or treatments
- Serious injury
- Births
- Deaths
- Engagements
- Major life events
- Any news (happy, exciting, sad) which you (under normal circumstances) would have called to tell me about when I lived in the states
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