Mom is 80 and drives a diff locked 80 series Land Cruiser she bought new.....mom is cool.

Million other things I love about her. The one thing I dont...she is always late...drives my dad and me nuts...but she is actually getting better not worse.

My grandma(moms mom) was amazing, she just passed a few years ago at 102...she had seen some stuff

I’m kind of amazed at how derailed this thread is.

In some ways, my mom is asshoe.  I have to hand it to her, though - she's tough, and a hard worker.  

She was born during WWII, in Germany.  After the war, she lived in a refugee camp where they had nothing, and her father beat her.  Due to the beatings, she tried to run away, and fell seriously ill.  They thought it might have been tuberculosis, so she spent 6 months quarantined in a sanatorium. As she got older, she had to deal with all of the creepy drunks in the camp.

In the early '50s, her family came to the US, where she was tormented for being a DP.  She had a ballet and piano teacher who was an old Russian woman who was big into corporal punishment.  Her father was still heavy-handed, too.  One time her father beat her because she broke a window, causing a cut to herself that required a trip to the ER.

As an adult, she got married to a guy who broke her nose, twice.  Their first child died in infancy after the doctors failed to properly diagnose a liver problem.  Her in-laws blamed her, somehow.  She finally got divorced, and her husband hid all of his assets, never paying a dime to her or the children he had with her.  She ended up living in a black neighborhood where they tried to run her out with constant threats, and by attacking her children.  They learned to leave her alone after she fouggt back.  At some point, she managed to get out of the neighborhood, but then had her house burn down after one of the kids decided to play with matches.  Firemen stole her jewelry for their trouble.

She finally met my father and they got married.  Her mother got cancer and died, and her father had his legs crushed by a drunk driver.  She ended up taking care of her father, since her sister and brothers didn't want anything to do with him.  He was no longer able to be physically abusive, but he'd get pretty nasty when he'd drink, which he did a lot of after the accident and death of his wife.

Her marriage with my father was great, but he died suddenly after 18 years.  A short time later, her father died.  Since then, both of her brothers have died, as well.  The only living relative that she knows of, other than her kids, is her sister, to whom she hasn't spoken in years.  Her oldest son recently had a stroke after a bad fall.

Now almost 80, my mom has issues with arthritis in her hands and spine, vertigo, angina, and muscle tears.  She has had rotator cuff repair on both shoulders, carpal tunnel release on both wrists (twice), and a repaired tendon in her elbow.  She lost feeling in part of her hand after slicing the nerve while rummaging through a drawer.  Her ankle aches frequently after she broke it falling down the stairs (and refusing to immediately go to the doctor) , and then rebroke it falling on the same stairs.  She also has issues with diverticulitis, which has landed her in the hospital - in one instance, about 10 years ago, resulting in a clostridium infection.  

Despite all of this, she still constantly tries to do housework and yardwork that someone of her age should never do.  Despite working herself into the ground, she refuses to take a break, and refuses help because she doesn't want to wait for someone, or feels like she is imposing.  She also refuses to drive anything other than a stick-shift, despite the fact that shifting hurts her neck and shoulder.  I'm trying to get her to move in with us, but she won't leave her house until she fixes it up.  We finally convinced her to sell her car.

Maybe she's just nuts, and the craziness keeps her going.  I couldn't have done it all.  She's about as tough as they come.

She did not kill me.

Yeah it was like that.

Summa y'all are fortunate MFers.  I escaped mine by opting into foster care at 12 yo.  
Shell be gone soon. Haven't seen her since 85.  I pity her for the dysfunction she was born into, but
sorry Ma, explaining to your 5yo that she wished she'd had an abortion instead of marrying the sperm donor has to have consequences.

She was way nicer of a person than I could ever be. Would talk to people in the checkout aisles in stores like she'd known them for her whole life. Far more intelligent and a beast at microsoft excel. Miss mine. True angel.