A Road Once Traveled Before

I blogged the entire seven months from my mom's cancer diagnosis to her death.  I blogged so much, I actually printed it all up and turned it into a 450 page book for me to keep it all.  I look back on all of that and can remember the pain and now can see all the growth.  It was cathartic for me while blogging and is still cathartic for me to read it today.  I won't have 450 pages worth of blogging for my dad.  For all I know, this may be the only blog about my dad dying.  I don't know.  All I know is that tonight I need to get some stuff out of my head.  And this is the way that comes naturally for me to do that.

My dad is dying.  

It needs to be said.  Until today, I think I had a sliver of hope that I was wrong. But today, I feel strongly that he is dying.  

It's odd.  With my mom I had seven months to come to terms with her death.  I won't get that with my dad.  Of course, Parkinson's has taken so much from him, but I could still sit with him and chat and we could laugh and tell stories.  But he's gone now.  I mean, he's physically still there, but looking into his eyes tells me he is gone.  And I miss him already.  

Just two weeks ago, he was playing bingo and socializing.  And then it all changed.  I got a call on a Saturday saying he'd had a big fall and he wasn't acting normally.  There was concern over a brain bleed.  So, I took him to the ER.  He was diagnosed as being in almost full renal failure.  The ER doc's exact words (after several hours and tests in the ER) were, "Well, your dad is in almost full renal failure.  Does he have a DNR?"  ~ Sigh ~

Dad stayed in the hospital for three days.  He's generally not very lucid in the hospital and this was no different.  His kidneys cleared up and he was released.  My hope was that getting him home would clear him up.  Turns out that wasn't to be the case.  He has steadily declined since.  Hospice took over this past Monday.  Hospice.  How I love them.  And how I hate that they're in my life again.  

The last two weeks are what I call a very special kind of hell that you can only understand if you've been here.  The hell where one day your loved one seems like they may be improving and you get hope and then the next day is followed by a terrible day.  And the terrible days become more common.  You lose hope, you gain hope, you lose it again, you gain it and then you lose it.  Over and over.  I'm not equipped for this.  I catch my heart beating out of my chest at times.  My arms go numb.  Panic creeps up.  Am I doing enough?  Am I doing the right things?  Could I do more? Oh my gosh, my dad is dying.  I can't breathe.  And around and around and around I go.  I can't digest food.  My stomach makes incredibly loud noises as though something is alive in there.  It's angry.  My adrenals are clearly in trouble and affecting every other part of me.  I sleep, but I wake up tired every day, so it's clearly not restful sleep.  Every day is another day of wondering and waiting and worrying.  Thank goodness for work that I love that provides me with a distraction now and then.  I'm much better at helping others than helping myself (I'm a work in progress...).

I really believed that losing my dad would be easier than losing my mom.  I get death now.  I didn't understand it when my mom was dying.  But it anointed me then.  I took up its cause.  I carry its torch.  I am friends with death.  Or so I thought.  I kind of feel my friend stabbed me in the back when I wasn't looking.  I feel unprepared, confused and lost.  I hurt in a way I didn't know I could hurt.  It occurred to me that when my mom was dying, I had my dad there.  He took care of mom and I took care of him (well, I took care of mom too, but mostly, I really took care of dad).  But I don't have that now.  There is no other parent to make the decisions.  It's me.  And the decisions are big.  I know what my dad wanted.  But it's still hard to say what needs to be said and do what needs to be done.  

I'm going to be an orphan.

Sure, I'm 46.  Sure, I've been my dad's caregiver for the past several years and we didn't have the same parent/child relationship.  But he's still my dad.  And he's still here.  And soon, he won't be.  And I'll be living in a world without parents.  Of course, I knew that this would happen one day.  But suddenly I feel like I'm 10 and it's dark and I'm scared.  And I want my parents to protect me.  But they can't anymore.  

Last November, at the Thanksgiving dinner table, dad looked at me and said, "I want Michael to write my eulogy so I can hear it."  Gulp.  Okay.  So, I texted Michael to let him know.  Let's just say he wasn't all that excited about the prospect.  But he's been working on that eulogy for the past year.  And this week he finished it.  And yesterday, I told dad it was done and his eyes lit up for the first time in a long time and he said, "He did?" After clearing it with Michael, I asked him if he wanted to hear it.  And he said he did.  So I read dad his eulogy.  Few people get to hear their own eulogy.  It was the most emotional, incredible experience I may have ever had in my life.  And something I will never, ever forget as long as I live.  I couldn't get through it without tears, but by the end, the tears were flowing freely by my dad and his caregiver too.  All dad could say was "Thank you.  Thank you."  It was a gift from my brother that I was able to deliver to my dad.  You'll all have to come to the memorial service to hear it yourselves. It's an incredible tribute to an amazing man.

Today, I wrote a letter to all his caregivers explaining that it's time we all let dad do what he needs to do.  We don't need to force him to eat or be up or do anything he doesn't want to do really.  Be merciful.  Let him die well.  Give him a good death.  And it felt good to write it.  To really stand up for my dad and what he wants.  Of course, we all want him to live.  But we have no power over that and it is clear his body is done.  And the one thing I DO know... we can't stop this.  We can't fight it.  We have to surrender.  

Surrender.  There it is again.  

It's what life is all about, isn't it?  Surrendering to what is.  

His caregivers needed me to say it.  I'm the daughter.  I have to make that call.  So, I did it.  

This is HARD.  HARD <----- Just like that.  In all caps.  At the same time, I have been given a unique opportunity to practice what I preach.  I'm the gerontologist...the grief counselor...the death midwife.  This is my world.  And I know ALL the stuff.  And I know I MUST take care of myself.  So, I am doing that to the best of my ability.  But I also know I MUST speak.  This is my passion.  We have to speak about death.  We can't experience it in silence.  So I'm speaking.  Because I am all the things above.  But in this instance, I am a daughter who is losing her father.  The end.  The hospice nurse told me I have to forget all I know and just be the daughter.  She's right.  But I will speak.  I won't be silent.  I will share my pain.  Because it's real.  It's raw.  It's mine.  But I am far from the only one to grieve.  And I absolutely believe we have to share our pain to help others.  So others know that this kind of pain is survivable.  Because I know it is.  But I have to walk it...again.  I have to take step-by-step over those burning hot coals.  Just like I did with my mom.  

And I will.  I will take one step at a time.  I will feel the grief.  I will feel the loss.  I will feel the pain.  As much as I don't want to.  

Because death anointed me.  It is always with me.  And as much as I feel somewhat betrayed right now, I also know that death's hand is on my shoulder in an odd sort of comfort.  It believes in me.  It knows I can do this.  It knows I have lessons to learn and lessons to teach.  

So, another fall arrives.  The leaves turn.  The days shorten.  And I am losing another parent.  Fall will turn to winter and the days may be dark.  But spring always arrives.  The sun always comes out again.  And life goes on.  It will be different.  It will be odd to live in a parent-less world.  But I will survive.  I will continue to bloom.

For now...I visit with my dad, I work, I spend time with my children and my husband, I reach out and experience the amazing support of my friends and family, I speak, I breathe, I feel, I hurt, I cry, I live.  

One day...one moment...at a time.