Tuesday 28 March 2017 13:28, UK
Jason Day is awaiting updates on the health of his mother before deciding whether to compete in the Masters next week.
Day withdrew from the WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play just six holes into his opening match against Pat Perez, before giving a tearful press conference in which he revealed his mother, Dening, had been diagnosed with lung cancer earlier this year.
She underwent surgery in Columbus, Ohio on Friday, and the family are waiting for doctors to issue a prognosis and a treatment plan after conducting a number of tests.
Day remains hopeful of playing in the opening major of the year and announced he would travel to Augusta National for a practice round on Friday while being kept informed of his mother's condition.
"Obviously, I'm still nervous because we're still waiting to see if it has spread or not," said Day, who lost his father to cancer when he was aged only 12. "From there, we have to kind of come up with a game plan whether to go chemo, a form of chemo radiation, or something else.
"It's still kind of a bit of an emotional time for me. Obviously, I've been hanging out with my mum a bit and seeing her and she's recovering well. She's a tough lady, but it's hard because I look at her and she's on the pain killers and all that stuff, what she needs to do to recover.
"But I can't help but think of my dad when I see her in that situation because when they go through such a traumatic surgery like that it just can be tough.
"Currently I'm scheduled to play Augusta, but if things don't come back the way we want them, I don't know what's going to happen."
Day, who admitted in Austin that he "could not comprehend being on the golf course", added that he had not practised since flying to Ohio to be with his mother ahead of her operation last week.
"I haven't touched a golf club," he said. "It's very, very difficult to even think about playing golf when a loved one is going through such a traumatic experience. Once I get past this initial stage, hopefully I'll find some balance and I'll be able to kind of move on and really focus on getting my game back.
"Unfortunately, I'm human. I like to feel like I'm always on it, I'm always ready to go and trying to compete and I want to get back to that stage but sometimes it's very, very difficult."
Day has not finished any lower than 28th in his five Masters appearances with three top-10s, including being runner-up in 2011 and third two years later.
