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My head is spinning out of control tonight & my heart is breaking. I do NOT understand why older people have to suffer at the end of their lives......especially when they have been good people and never hurt anyone
. WHY??
I watched my Dad pass in March from one massive painful seizure after another...due to an infection from shingles that entered the spinal cord and went to his brain. It was horrible to see him suffer like that. He tried so hard to tell me something important several different times....but he was unable to verbalize anything to where you could understand him.

Few weeks later....my Mom (who was in the moderate stage of Vascular Dementia) had a stroke. Now has aphasia and can barely speak but very few words that you can understand. She is bedridden. This stroke has really messed with her head and I am not sure she even knows who I am now except the mean ole b*tch that changes her diapers......but she remembers my Dad. Oh how she remembers him! She calls out his name all day, I just keep telling her he isn't here right now & that has satisfied her until today. Today when I said that she began crying. It broke my heart. Between the dementia and the stroke, she would not understand if I told her Dad had passed and she must think that after 70 years, he has deserted her. She is under care of Hospice and probably won't be around much longer and here I go again, not being able to understand things she is saying to me.

I just don't get the cycle of life. It just seems wrong that it has to end this way. Nope.......I don't want to live to be in my 90's.......NOPE, NOT AT ALL~

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(((((((callie))))))) I am sorry for your pain. Life isn't fair and we see many examples of that here.

As far as eat healthy and live longer, I think that a healthy lifestyle usually means a healthier old age and the ability to engage in and enjoy life, as much or more as a longer one. Of course, that is not true for everyone.

I think both you and your mum are grieving your dad, and there is no way around that - just something you have to go through. Come back and vent and share whenever you need to, and do something good for you.
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Callie girl. I lost my dad before xmas but thankfully he didnt suffer like your dad and now mums vascular dementia although shes not suffering its so hard to try and grieve for one when you are watching another go downhill. we all want them to go peacefully in thier sleep but this very rarely happens to anyone. Just your time with her now and you will find peace one day and only remember the good times.
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Thank you jeannegibbs! Sometimes it just becomes too much & I feel so overwhelmed. One day I will fall apart....but not now, too much to do and I have to be strong for Mom. I just don't think this type of 'end of life' is fair at all. I know we are not given a choice...but I will never understand why it has to be this way.
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Hugs, Calliegirl. I am so sorry you were dished this double portion of grief. Why, indeed? I have no answers.

I don't think many of us would want to live into our 90s only to have to experience what your parents are experiencing. But it is not really a choice we have, is it? I remember being surprised that my aunt did not want to live to a very old age. She'd seen her own mother with dementia in her last years (it was called senility then) and she had worked in a care center, caring for people she had known in their prime. Ironically, she did live to be 100. She never developed dementia or other chronic diseases, she had no major pain, and she was alert and coherent to the end. She chose to live in the same care center she had worked at. Her quality of life was pretty good.

My own attitude about taking care of my diabetes and eating right, etc. is not about trying to live longer but trying to maintain good health as long as I do live.

Again, I have no answers. But I extend my sympathies to you in this painful time.
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