Thanks all - my mom died...

[Guest guest]

Hi All,

thanks for all of your kind words

and advices.

 

I have only read through half of the messages you guys

posted here. Im slow and read only a few at a time.

 

Im sort of in denial mode here.

Surrounded by my brother and aunt, and have been

around them since it happened.

My brother keep me busy going to places for his job.

 

So basically im protecting myself, kinda " enjoying "

my avoidance while it still last, which wont be for very long.

 

Its still very painful, but i somehow have this thing

where i can push things deep inside, for a little while at least.

 

I have to say one thing thats on my mind tho:

My mother had advanced pancreatic cancer, yes.

IT had spread to her liver and a bit to her lung, yes.

She had water in her lungs, and so a drain in each of her lung to drain out hte

water, yes.

 

But...

 

One day we re told by the top doc that we ll take it one day

at a time, see in the next 24,48,78 hours how things go.

That she cant be hooked off the drains, for now at least,

and maybe forever. But we ll see if theres anything we can do.

 

HE then said that a particular palliative place we were considering

wouldnt accept the drain machine so thi9s place was out of ther question.

 

Then, the next morning, im being told by my aunt that

they unplugged her from her drains and whatever antibiotics/

and that water kind of liquid that feed you - because the cancer

is spreading a lot and basically we need to end her misery.

 

Just before they did that, she could talk loud and had some vigor

(altough she couldnt get out of bed). The doc was even impressed

of the amount she had eaten of food(even tho it was still little

compared to normal people).

 

The next morning tho, after being unplugged, she could barely talk.

and the next morning she was simply breathing once every 20 seconds, fighting

for her life, not moving, eyes almost closed.

And they gave her 6 hours to live until her heart would stop and die.

She fought, you could sense it as she was breathing, sometimes

as she was breathing a little sound would come out.

She couldnt even move her fingers.

 

Then at night over 10 hours later, she was still fighting,

much later than they anticipated(she had a strong heart),

but was breathing every 5-6 seconds, until she heart eventually gve in.

 

What im getting into is, she started from eating more than the doc expected, and

being told we d see over the next day and days

and see the pallative options, and she talked quite loud with her vigor.....to

being unplugged without being consulted, not speaking

anymore 24 hours later, fighting to breat and die the next day.

 

My 2nd brother, the one we dont like that was the only one there

beside my aunt at that moment, told me that they say she might live

another month if she was still hooked up, but she would just start

to suffer more and more so whats the use. My aunt said they say it was

1 week, but from how she was doing, i think it would have been a month.

 

And you know how they say pancreatic cancer is often 3-6 months,

and my mom was at 8 months, well the 1 month prediction might have

turned out to be 2.

 

This means she might still have had a chance, but was unplugged

very quickly, about 15 hours after the doc told us we ll see how things go and

take it from there.

 

My mother was tired of being in bed and had some pain, and was

very unhappy there. But she also only heard there was nothing

that could be done, so of course she probably was thinking

she wanted this to end soon.(but btw, it wasnt even her decidsion to be

unplugged, it was a bunch of docs)

 

I knew there was still some hope, but when all the " pros "

keep hitting her with the impossible diagnotic..

 

Its no concidence she lasted almost double the time before her heart gave out.

She just wasnt ill enough to go - they had to let her

drown in the water in her lungs and remove the " water bag thing

that feed ill people " and all, for her to die asphixiated and deshydrated.

 

Everytime someone fill in papers for us and ask " cause of death? " ,

i cringe and i just wanna say " asphyxiation and deshydratation " .

They basically had to kill her for her to go away.

 

 

If at least they had given us a warning of the upcoming unglugging,

giving us a last chance to talk to her(because when they unplugged her, 10 hours

later when we saw her, she could barely speak and

we often couldnt understand), and if we could have heard it straight from her

mouth that she wanted to go - it would have been different.

 

She was doing not so bad and we never heard anything directly from her

about wanting to go, and we re told, through my aunt, that they decided to and

proceeded to unplug her.

 

Im not going bezerk over this, as i know one can go crazy

going through the " what if " game,but i really feel like i and my mom

were cheated of a last hope - and the docs were so typical

of the medical world in their " lets cut/remove/drug/theres no hope " world.

 

Wish she had been in an alternative treatment center as well.

 

Ok, so this email got long as i wanted to share this.

 

 

thanks again everybody here, i will eventually read all the replies

you guys did, about 2-3 per day.

 

thanks again

youre a great bunch

 

Olivier

oleander soup , bk4529 wrote:

>

>

> Olivier,

> I too lost both my parents and a sister in April of this year.

> My sister died of lung cancer. It's not easy losing a loved one. I still miss

my mom

> who's been gone 42 years! I miss my sister too so very much!

> We still have those precious memories and we know that we must go on.

> Our parents would want that and your mom wants that for you too.

> For you to go out and find someone who needs you just as you needed your mom.

> There's so many people who needs that help. Please reach out to them. You'll

not

> only be helping them but helping yourself through this grief.

> You're in my thoughts and prayers.

> God Bless,

> Barbara

>