R.I.P. Mom 6-22-08 part III

I try to imagine what Mom’s days were like at the Hospice house..I always felt bad because I could never get up there to see her until around 5pm everyday.  Whether I was just running errands, doing things for Dad, or working, I just couldn’t seem to get up there earlier. I know sometimes people would come visit her on their lunch breaks, but I hated the thought of her being there alone… I didn’t want her to lay there just thinking about…dying..all day..alone.  Even when I was there though, she usually didn’t want the T.V. on, she just wanted quiet, she would lay with her eyes closed, not necesarily sleeping.  One night Monsters Inc. was on T.V. and I watched the end of that with her. She always liked movies like that, like, shrek, finding nemo etc.

After about a week at the Hospice house, they let her go home.  She wanted to come home so bad.  She had to come home with a pick line in her arm, its like an I.V. to administer her meds, but theres no needle involved, the tube was in her arm, and stayed there, you just had to screw on the needleless syringes with the meds.  So, Dad and I had to learn how to give her her meds.  That was kind of scary, at first I was afraid I’d do it wrong.  They had to bring in a hospital bed and some other equipment..bedside portable toilet thing, oxygen machine..my livingroom was like a hospital room.  So, she came home.  Dad and I had to take turns giving her her meds every 3 hours, around the clock.

blahhhh here come the tears..hope I can finish this whole thing within this entry..

I would get up to do the med she needed at 3am, Dad is a light sleeper..worse than me even, if he had to wake up..he wouldn’t get back to sleep. See..there were two meds we were giving her through the I.V., each one she got every 6 hours, but..they had the two meds spread apart, so that she got one of them every 3 hours. …anyway… this worked fine for a few days, Dad and I were exhausted..but Mom was ok..still throwing up about once a day on a good day..but she wasn’t any worse than she had been. (throwing up and not really eating anything..mostly threw up bile of some sort)

After a few days, she took a terrible turn.. I sometimes wonder if it was my fault.. It was the Friday afternoon of the same week she came home, and she was actually wanting food, that was miraculous..so I gave her a little fruit cup, peaches. She ate the whole thing, I was surprised. She seemed ok for the rest of the day, nauseas now and then..but no worse than normal.  Then night time rolled around.. I think it was around midnight, she got sick, threw up. I decided I was going to fall asleep on the couch upstairs since I had to get up at 3am to do her med, and the couch upstairs is very close to the stairs, her bed was right next to the stairs downstairs. I knew I’d be able to hear her if she needed anything, Dad went to bed. At about 1am, I woke up to her calling for me, yelling help.  She was sick again, throwing up. So I went down and did what I usually did, all I could do….rubbed her back, dumped her puke bucket, and gave her little pieces of cut up tums to help with the acid from the throwing up. She was still not feeling good..in pain now from all the throwing up. So I went upstairs and just got my pillow and blanket, and laid down on the recliner downstairs that was next to her bed. I tried to fall asleep, but it seemed like every time i shut my eyes, she would moan from the pain, or get sick again. This went on all night.  I gave her her scheduled med at 3am, but it didn’t seem to help.  Her side began to leak also from all the throwing up.

-side note- I don’t think i mentioned this..she had a tube/bag coming out of her side from her liver.  It was to help the billy ruben (no idea if thats spelled right) filter out of her system.  Billy ruben is the stuff that will make you jaundice if its in your system.  The tumor had blocked off the bille ducts, so nothing was filtering properly in her liver.

So..She was leaking bile out of her side from all the pressure of throwing up. That was the only thing I couldn’t deal with.  It had happened earlier in the evening too, and Dad took care of it, but I couldn’t stomach it  Seeing a tube coming out of someones insides….I almost passed out/threw up I had to walk away. I told her I’d change the dressing (gauze and bandage) if she wanted because it was all soaked with bile.  She didnt want me to..it hurt getting the tape off her. So I got paper towels and put them all around it so she wouldn’t feel wet at least.

The throwing up continued..just about every hour. Dad got up at 6am to do her med, but I already did it a little early, hoping it would help her nausea.  It didn’t really.. at this point I’d been up the whole night, Dad told me to go sleep for awhile. I got about an hour and a half, then woke up to Mom calling for help. Dad went to walk the dog, but she got sick.  I stumbled down the stairs half awake to rub her back.  Sometimes she’d just flop her head against me in exhaustion or kiss my other hand that I usually rested on her shoulder while I rubbed her back.

At this point it was about 8am, Dad called Hospice to have a nurse come out and check her.  Someone came out pretty quick, but it wasn’t her regular nurse, and she wasn’t very nice…… She called in a perscription for another nausea med, and changed the dressing on her side I think. That was about it. After a little while I called my aunt Tina to ask her to pick up the perscription because I didn’t want to leave Mom alone, and Dad had to leave to open his store. I think I started crying on the phone..she must have asked if everything was ok..after no sleep and seeing how bad she was doing that day..i broke down a little. So, Aunt tina and my uncle Keo came over after a little bit, I was still upset. They brought the medication, but Mom didn’t want it.  It was a sepository form..aka..you have to put it in your butt.  They suck..but I guess they work really fast. By this point it seemed like her stomach had calmed down, so we didn’t give it to her. She was falling asleep. Then was the first moment of real incoherence.  Mom asked for my Aunt Tina, who was standing right at the foot of her bed, she forgot she was there or something. Then she asked for her Mom. So we called my grandma and had her come over. My cousin came to bring my grandma over, she brought her two daughters with her, they are about 7 and 9 I think.  I was upset on and off still..they kind of cautiously peeked at her from a distance, then left. I can’t imagine trying to understand seeing that at such a young age..and seeing me having to watch my mom die. I hope it didn’t upset them too much or make them think about..what if they were in my shoes..thats too young to think about something like that.

My aunt Tina left for awhile to do some errands, and another one of my aunts came over, aunt sherri. (Mom had a lot of sisters.) At that point, I left grandma and aunt sherri to sit with her, I needed a shower.  After my shower, my aunt said Mom kept asking for my Dad. I called him, but no answer at the store.  I figured he was with a customer, so I just went over to the store. (its around the corner from my house)  Not too long after I was there, I got a call o

n my cell from my aunt saying I needed to come home and call someone, Mom was unresponsive.  I told Dad, then I left and ran home.  When I got home, my aunt was holding Mom on the bedside toilet, she passed out, or went unconcious or something.  Mom told my aunt sherri she had to go to the bathroom, so she got her up, and on the little potty..mom just sat there, then suddenly went limp.  My aunt was standing in front of her so she caught her. They got her back in the bed.  They tried calling her name..she wouldn’t wake up.  I had called Hospice, and they were going to send someone out. (when you’re involved with Hospice, they tell you not to call 911 if something happens, to call them) Mom came to after a little bit. The nurse that came out checked her vitals and stuff, and just told us not to get her out of the bed again, the change in elevation probably caused her to black out..since she had been laying down for such a long period of time.

After this all happened, Mom was really just sleeping..more than I’d seen her do lately.  If she wasn’t sleeping, she just was very out of it.  We continued to do meds as scheduled..and family came and went.  Then again later that night, my aunt Tina was back, and Mom said she needed to go to the bathroom.  She was refusing to use a bed pan..so my uncle and Dad or aunt..im not really sure.. were going to just pick her up and put her on the potty. I was upstairs at this point..I could hear everything, but I was just upset..I didn’t want Mom to see me upset..and have her get upset..or anyone else..when one of us started crying it was like a chain reaction. They called me downstairs though, Mom passed out again, they got her back in the bed but needed to pull her up so she wasn’t so far down the mattress, and I was the only one little enough who could fit around the other side of the hospital bed. I got back there, still crying, and helped them hoist her up higher on the bed. Mom was still not responding at this point..everyone (Dad, my brother, aunt tina and uncle Keo) started talking about taking her back to the Hospice house.  It was starting to become too much, she needed to be with professionals. I stook behind the bed and just cried…I felt so overwhelmed at this point..I finally hit my breaking point.

I guess i had more to go than I thought..one more entry will finish it, definitely..