SnakebyteXX
09-27-2005, 06:58 AM
[ QUOTE ]
It was 1/05, my mother's cancer had come back with a vengeance. The hysterectomy she had 10 months previous was only a band aid to give her a little more time against the cancer that was rampant throughout her system. She was given 6 months to live at the most. 3 weeks later I was informed by the Hospice people she had contacted that it was time for 24/7 supervision. I had just visited her 2 days before, we celebrated my 32nd birthday. I took her to her hospital appointments, we had some lunch at Black Angus. Those are the last memories I have of my mother being coherent and able.
I hired a nurse and we moved into her apartment. The night before the nurse came I helped my mom out to her porch for her last cigarette. She was dopey and could barely move. She took 2 drags of the cigarette and forgot about it as we sat outside and she watched some kids play. She was smiling, I couldn't tell if she was there or not. I just made sure she was comfy.
That night she slipped into a coma. The hired nurse showed up and I immediately questioned her dosage of meds, we discovered she wasn't really on much. She was flinching uncomfortably, but unable to speak. Her Hospice nurse had made her fill out a "relative pain scale" document, this was my mother's instructions on how much she wanted to be sedated during her last days. She had chosen to be kept completely pain free. The Hospice people brought a hospital bed and oxygen machine and instructed the hired nurse and I on the administration of my mom's meds. Ativan every 4 hours, Morphine Sulphate (20MG/ML) in increasing dosages every 2 hours, 2 morphine patches/day. My mother was going to die and it was my job to make sure she was pain free. The more pain she was in, the more morphine she got and the quicker she would die.
By the 6th day I was giving her 1 ML of morphine every 2 hours. I prayed for my mother's quick death, it was hard to see her in that state, knowing she was never going to wake up. Hospice told me how it would end. It happened exactly the way they described. Eventually the cancer and morphine would shut her kidneys and liver down, her body would become toxic with ammonia and after an intense 4 hours of rapid breathing and intense fighting to stay alive she would die. I held her hand and we listened to her favorite music together as she died in front of me. I didn't want her to be alone. She was 59 and had been smoking since she was 17.
My deepest thanks goes to Hospice. They helped me to help my mother die in her own apartment, peacefully. They are truly angels.
My father is 65, my parents divorced when I was 2. He's been smoking since he was 16. He used to be a strong man, 6 feet tall, 190 pounds. Now he's 5'9 and weighs ~130 pounds. His emphysema is so bad these days that he can't slowly walk 50 feet without having to stop and take a hit off the oxygen tank. He stopped smoking when they prescribed the tank for him a year ago. He doesn't tell me what the doctors are telling him, I know he's hiding the truth. I just try to spend some time with him while I can.
F*cking cigarettes. <hr /></blockquote>
web page (http://www.craigslist.org/eby/rnr/100243278.html)
It was 1/05, my mother's cancer had come back with a vengeance. The hysterectomy she had 10 months previous was only a band aid to give her a little more time against the cancer that was rampant throughout her system. She was given 6 months to live at the most. 3 weeks later I was informed by the Hospice people she had contacted that it was time for 24/7 supervision. I had just visited her 2 days before, we celebrated my 32nd birthday. I took her to her hospital appointments, we had some lunch at Black Angus. Those are the last memories I have of my mother being coherent and able.
I hired a nurse and we moved into her apartment. The night before the nurse came I helped my mom out to her porch for her last cigarette. She was dopey and could barely move. She took 2 drags of the cigarette and forgot about it as we sat outside and she watched some kids play. She was smiling, I couldn't tell if she was there or not. I just made sure she was comfy.
That night she slipped into a coma. The hired nurse showed up and I immediately questioned her dosage of meds, we discovered she wasn't really on much. She was flinching uncomfortably, but unable to speak. Her Hospice nurse had made her fill out a "relative pain scale" document, this was my mother's instructions on how much she wanted to be sedated during her last days. She had chosen to be kept completely pain free. The Hospice people brought a hospital bed and oxygen machine and instructed the hired nurse and I on the administration of my mom's meds. Ativan every 4 hours, Morphine Sulphate (20MG/ML) in increasing dosages every 2 hours, 2 morphine patches/day. My mother was going to die and it was my job to make sure she was pain free. The more pain she was in, the more morphine she got and the quicker she would die.
By the 6th day I was giving her 1 ML of morphine every 2 hours. I prayed for my mother's quick death, it was hard to see her in that state, knowing she was never going to wake up. Hospice told me how it would end. It happened exactly the way they described. Eventually the cancer and morphine would shut her kidneys and liver down, her body would become toxic with ammonia and after an intense 4 hours of rapid breathing and intense fighting to stay alive she would die. I held her hand and we listened to her favorite music together as she died in front of me. I didn't want her to be alone. She was 59 and had been smoking since she was 17.
My deepest thanks goes to Hospice. They helped me to help my mother die in her own apartment, peacefully. They are truly angels.
My father is 65, my parents divorced when I was 2. He's been smoking since he was 16. He used to be a strong man, 6 feet tall, 190 pounds. Now he's 5'9 and weighs ~130 pounds. His emphysema is so bad these days that he can't slowly walk 50 feet without having to stop and take a hit off the oxygen tank. He stopped smoking when they prescribed the tank for him a year ago. He doesn't tell me what the doctors are telling him, I know he's hiding the truth. I just try to spend some time with him while I can.
F*cking cigarettes. <hr /></blockquote>
web page (http://www.craigslist.org/eby/rnr/100243278.html)