Thursday - Relief

Dad has been sleeping soundly for almost 4 hours - finally.  He has been extremely restless, having terrible delusions, and bad dreams.  After I wrote my blog entry last night, he told me I had to find a way to kill him, that he couldn't live this way any longer.  I had very mixed emotions.  Of course there was no way in the world I could have killed him, but in a sense, I was relieved to know he knew the end was near and he wanted it to come sooner rather than later.  The most troubling to me was how upset he was.  I gave him his dose of anti-anxiety medication, then 2 hours later his anti-psychotic medication and his morphine.  He fell into a deep sleep that lasted 6 hours.  I slept well, too.  Then at 5 AM he was yelling for help.  He thought he was in a box, he referred to it as a tomb one time, full of snakes.  I got him calmed down, but the restlessness and agitation went on all day.  He wanted to sit up, but would get so exhausted he had to lie down, but he couldn't sleep.  Then he wanted to sit up ...

He ate one bite of pudding and had less than a cup of water all day.  We know he's getting parched, and I keep giving him eye droppers of water, but it's hard to get him to swallow. It's not that he can't swallow, it's more that he forgets to.  I tell him to swallow but it's hard for him to follow instructions.  He does not ask for food or water, except occasionally he says he wants a hamburger.

This afternoon he had more pain than we've seen, curling up and moaning, so Dave called Hospice again.  They gave us directions to greatly increase his morphine, and Beth came right over with suppositories for the anti-psychotic medicine (so he could relax and would quit seeing snakes, bugs, his friend Johnny that died - and evidently left behind in WWII - people in the room watching him, etc.)  He fell asleep after the morphine, so we have yet to use the thorazine.

Beth told us our choice is between Dad having pain and hallucinations, or perhaps being comatose.  We are choosing comatose, though he is not there yet.  I should say we will choose comatose if that's all we can do to relieve his pain.

Chad stopped by tonight.  He told us a few interesting things, like patients with this same "terminal agitation" often yell out things but he's not convinced they believe it themselves.  That reminded me that when Dad would say he's stuck, and I told him he's not, that he is free, he had enough sense to recognize I was giving him "psychological sh*t."  :-)  Several times, he asked me who those people are in his room.  Mostly I would say, There's no one here, just me."  Yesterday I said, "They are angels."  He turned to me and said, "Horsesh*t."

He can be delusional, but the second I make up a story, he recognizes it!

I don't know if he had a friend named Johnny that died and was left behind somewhere during the war, but I do know the concept is a nightmare for Dad.  I constantly reassure him we are with him and will not leave him alone.

I told Chad about Dad's minimal intake of food and water.  He said dehydration can result in a type of euphoria rather than distress.  I just googled "dehydration near death" and the few articles I read have made me feel better about it.  Information is good.  Lack of information is scary.

Since starting this, Dad woke up, I did my first suppository planting (sure hope I got it right!), talked to Steve about his visit tomorrow, and Dave is talking to Dad trying to get him calm and restful for the evening.  I need to go help.