The waiting stage. End of life.

All weekend, hospice and facility have told us our mom was going to go anytime. She had started what I thought was Cheney stokes breathing, but was pre Cheney Stokes. Agonal. Apneruistic. All of these things have a stage and term for them. So we got call today she will pass today. Hah. No. Our mom is stubborn and unpredictable. Always.

Her hands have curled. She is mottling. We removed oxygen because she is mouth breathing. We started it. Hospice stopped it. We restarted and stopped again. It is not helping at all. We were there for 9 hours today. No change in breathing with stopping oxygen. Our mom's respiration on oxygen fluctuated between 9 and 12.

On morphine. Which was increased in dosage and frequency, her respiration is at 16! It makes easier to breathe, she is getting cooler to touch. But thank goodness not doing involuntary muscle contractions and twitching. Which she was doing this weekend. Her eyes are fully closed instead of half open with the muscular contractions.

Her oxygen absorption level at 54 percent now. That's poor. They could not get a blood pressure reading with an auto cuff this evening. They won't do manual because invasive.

Earlier today her BP was best in 15 years. Because is falling.

Most of end of life sign are visually and graphically disturbing. But this is the circle of life. And we need to get more comfortable with death.