Mom is dying of cancer, sister is in prison

I’m staying anonymous for obvious reasons.

My sister is in prison for a month for threatening to kill a nurse while she was in a manic episode in a psychiatric ward. She has a severe type of bipolar, type 1, and rapid cycling with psychotic features. She’s been in and out of the hospital about 11 times since November.

The prison she was sent to is called Leclerc women’s prison in Laval, Quebec. It’s notoriously in inhumane conditions. You can find many articles online on it. The federal government shut it down in 2012 because it didn’t meet modern prison standards. The provincial gov’t reopened it. There’s mice, bedbugs, pipes leaking sludge, maggots, and horrible water. The inmates wear winter coats in cold seasons because the heating and insulation is so poor.

My sister is only there for a month to be assessed by a criminal psychologist, and they’ll determine if she was criminally responsible or not for the threat. If she’s innocent, she won’t have a record. She can only call to landlines. Apparently she’s in isolation now, so I’m praying she didn’t do something reckless.

I’m really sad about it. On top of this my mom is dying of cancer. She has 1-2 weeks to live. She’s in palliative care at the hospital now. She’s had stage 4 colon cancer for 3.5 years now.

I don’t know if I should tell her about my sister being in isolation and not being able to call my mom. My mom’s social worker at is trying to contact someone at the prison to see if they can arrange a phone call with her at the hospital when the family gets called in. My mom is only 43. My mom had me at 17, I’m 25 and my sister is 22. I also have a 20 year old brother and our half brother is only 5. I feel horrible for him.

I just needed to talk about this and get some support. TIA ❤️