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Where is your mom's advance directive? That should have told you her wishes. You shouldnt have to be making these decisions or second guessing yourself, or wondering what you think she may want. She should have had that in place before surgery.
Your mom sounds like a fighter, so I bet she will work to improve her situation. She is not done with her rehab yet or healing. She has a long way to go. Be greatful she is there and you have her. Dont worry about second guessing yourself. Move foward from where you are right now, and be greatful that you have her. Say all those things nice you want to tell her, because if she is gone you cant.
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I have found via personal experience and reading that guilt is a very common emotion during these things. My own personal guilt was that I made the staff feed my dad leading to a bout of pneumonia and also that I wasn't there when he passed.

From what I understand, if I had done those things "properly" I would have then felt guilt about something else. The psyche often looks for things to feel guilty about .

I think in this case had you stopped life support, you may have later felt guilty about that. Not that you should have felt guilty then either, but based on what I understand, people in our positions often unconsciously look to feel guilty. I don't know, maybe its a coping mechanism.
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goldie1 Dec 2019
well karsten i learned from the psychologist that feeling numb is the bodys coping mechanism.
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No, often it isn't black and white like imagined. However, you must let go of the guilt, else it kills you.

After my mother suffered an ischemic stroke, there was an opportunity to administer an injection, which could have extended her life or killed her. I said no to the injection as she was 94 and there was a greater chance that it would have killed her. I came to terms with that decision as POA and don't hold any guilt.
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goldie1 Dec 2019
well llamalover i had poa as well for mom and the docs were talking about a feeding tube which everyone was saying no might cause an infection,, well if done correctly it wont so i gave the ok and guess what it didnt.. im glad i gave her the extra time, her living will said no but i over rode it and nobody was crying about it. rest of family was paralzed with indecision. she passed away in a nursing home, with the food tube still there and the oxygen levels falling, it was her time.
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I certainly do agree with lealonnie, when its her time nature will call it just like it did mom. mom was 92 on her second stroke when nature took her out 3 months later, her first stroke was 4 years b4 that, she recovered beautifully pyhsically, mentally was another story, the dementia was a trip, that progressed slowly to alzheimers, she was on a feeding tube, oxygen levels falling slowly, organs were slowly failing, etc. i would personally have felt gulity if i would have taken her off, was not my place to decide whether to live or not..i learned in school and from voluntering to let nature take its course.
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Kind of... I had the DNR filled out , right to die.. and she was older... but one hospice over another is different.. my hospice team was not on duty...

The gal who came in, just said to crush morphine pills and slide it in her cheeks.. She forgot the ATivan... It was not fun ....

Angel.. that's my name for him... came in the early am, and got the ativan onboard, and got her angled so she wasn't choking/gasping/struggling... God, Thank you for your Angels !!!!

It really takes someone special, to know how to take care, and prepare someone for their final breath before death..

NOthing you can do will be right or wrong.. just know you loved her AND SHE KNOWS THAT...You need to forgive yourself and she has already done to you. She forgives you.. she knows you were trying to do the right thing.. doctors have the control sometimes...

DNR the right to die is so important, and we don't talk about it that much.. too deadlly... I suppose...

I have one already... not 60 yet,,, but the time will come.. my family knows what I want... not to be a burden... If I am not capable...do not plug me in... but do know that I need the hospice cocktail...at end of life...
I am ok... death is ok... A close friend told me that.. I finally get it.. Death is OK...
It happens..
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BBB2019 is correct... take copies of DNR living will,,, and if she is in a facility... make sure the POLST paper is taped above her bed.. with your phone number, and doctor phone number etc... NO QUESTIONS ASKED..

I was away when LO had an issue.. I did not have POLST copy above the bed...

I do now.. I never go out of town.. and the one weekend I did... something happened... I left family to get home anyway they could... I took the car and drove...
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All you can Do now is Let the Doctors do what fgthey can do. Stop beating yoursel fup. My sister is stil doing This because she Pulled the Plug on Mom last Year, Dear..Let it Go. Focus on her Now...xx
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When faced with a complex situation such as this, I think to myself the following: I made the best decision I could make given the information available to me at the time. Life including end of life decisions is so complex and no one can predict the future. I don't think any of us can be 100 percent sure of another person's feelings on any particular subject. In moving forward if your mother is unable to make decisiods regarding her care, take the medical information presented to you and make the decision by evaluating what the resultant quality of life may be. Please don't beat yourself up. Life is hard enough as it is.
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If she has an advanced directive, use that as your guide. If there isn't one, do the best you can regarding her wishes. DNR?
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I think you made the right decision at the time. I'm 76 and fairly active in all aspects, and I would hope my family would not give up on me so easily. My mother, however, is 98 and has wanted to die for many years now, especially after my stepdad passed 4 years ago. The decision to pull the plug on her would be a no-brainer. If your mother is truly at the end of her life, you will know when to say, "let her go". My mother has bounced back from so many death days to make a full recovery. It can happen to your mother also. Trust your gut.
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Rehab! Therapy! Sometimes it is a slow, difficult process and sometimes the results end up looking nothing less than miraculous. If Mom is intact cognitively, anything is possible including getting back to her life as it was before a "routine" cardiac catheterization (kind of an oxymoron). Don't give up until she tells you to. And since she is fighting to live, keep giving her lots of reasons to suceed.
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From research I've read and from anecdotes I've heard, what helps the most is if your mom can tell you what she wants. This helps people feel better about difficult decisions because they feel like they are simply carrying out someone's wishes rather than actually making the decision. Take the opportunity with your mom having a clear mind and talk to her about quality of life. At what point, if any, would she not want any additional treatment? What does an unacceptable quality of life look like to her. If you think she wouldn't want to be on life support indefinitely, ask her if she would be willing to be on it--and for how long--if there was X% chance of recovery to a quality of life that would be acceptable to her. The Conversation Project has a website with several tools and guides you can use to have a discussion about this with your mom. You'll never be able to anticipate every possible scenario but the more you can understand about what she would want, the more confident you can feel in the decisions you end up making.
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Dear Squatch,
Yes, we're still going through the doubts and second-guessing -- two years later! My husband had a severe stroke 2 years ago this month at age 72. The neurosurgeon indicated that he would not recover functions and would succumb to pneumonia or sepsis within a year, so was giving us the option of stopping the treatments that kept him alive the first two weeks in ICU. The palliative care doctor gave a more balanced prognosis, along with more positive possible scenarios. (Try to find a "palliative care doctor" or at least a chaplain!) I just had to give him the chance for some recovery and some semblance of a satisfying-enough life, but I am still wondering what would have been best. It sounds like your mom has a much better prognosis!
We hoped the feeding tube could be removed at some point. The speech therapist called his eating attempts "recreational eating" which made me mad -- I wanted them to help get him to the point of "nutritional eating." But they were right. Although he can safely swallow with careful supervision, the brain damage prevents him from wanting more than a few bites, if that. All the doctors and the chaplain assured us that it would be ethical and legal to remove the PEG at any time in the future since it is keeping him alive artificially. However, I hope I never have to make that decision again.
He also has expressive aphasia, with unreliable yes and no nods and occasional words that are hard to interpret. We had never completed advance directives. (He had only told me previously that he never wanted to be in a condition where he had to use a urinal, but I couldn't take that seriously! Now he wears diapers.) Be sure to discuss with your mom what she would and would not want to live with, with the caveat that when the time comes she may very well change her mind, and you may again have to use your judgement.
I never expected this status quo to go on so long; I thought he would get much better or worse in the first year. He's basically not eating, walking or talking, and sleeps a lot. But for now, as long as he is medically stable and shows momentary enjoyment, it's still one day at a time.
I think you made the right decision. I hope your mom continues to improve, and has many satisfying years to come. But if not, at least you have given her a chance. My heart goes out to you.
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OP here. Thanks so much for all these helpful replies. Mom is doing well FTMP. She is able to drink and eat level 2 foods now, which was a great Christmas present.

She has told my brother and I that we should have "let her go." I was expecting to hear this. She doesn't seem to dwell on it and is actually pretty upbeat and in good spirits most of the time. She seems focused on getting better, and she is (yes, painfully slow it seems, but day by day.)

She is very sharp minded and quick witted. The nurses love her. To be clear, I'm glad she's still with us. I just hope she has a quality of life worth living. It's too early to know yet.
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Squatch, as you said, second-guessing does no good. The awful conundrum is that if you choose to continue life — the right or wrong aspects will be shown to you whereas if you let someone die — then you’ll never know. If you could see into the future after pulling the plug, and know that she’d mentally cognizant and sharp, but needing rehab and a feeding tube had you not pulled the plug and let her die — well, this guilt is much better than that guilt, no?

As someone who is ADAMANT that I’m not to be kept alive if it’s likely I’ll be on life support for good, my perspective is clear: If I can think and speak perfectly upon coming off of support and there is hope that I can recover my basic functions — give me a chance at life because I’ll fight my way back. But if my mind will be shot — if I can’t speak, have brain damage, or am otherwise no longer what makes me “ME”— pull the damn plug and overdose me on something just to make sure I go. To me, your mom’s condition, at least the way you describe it, is much closer to the first situation than the latter.

So for whatever it’s worth — I think you made the RIGHT decision this time.
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