Holiday wishes to you all, but....
It's been a little more than a month since my grandfather's death, and I'm still in the blahs. It wasn't something that was a big surprise - he was 92 years old, after all - it was just the circumstances which led up to it. It's hard to think that just 3 months ago, I was still going out to buy groceries with him. He was extremely healthy for his age, only having to deal with cataracts and a pacemaker and taking just 5 pills (and one of them being a multivitamin), eating mainly a diet of fish & vegetables, plus exercising more often than my brothers and I do! Many people, just by looking at him, wouldn't believe he was the age he was. In light of this, I just couldn't fathom the reason he would have a stroke within that week.
He came home after stabilizing, but it was hard seeing someone that had once been so active become bed-ridden (his right side became unresponsive) and so dependent on people to tend to every bit of his care-taking. Then, he went back again when we became concerned about the noises he made while coughing. He had pneumonia, so would have to be treated for that. It was during this second hospital stay where we got the sense that he wasn't going to get better... I overheard my mom saying to other relatives, "His body is giving up."
I had always thought he would pass while asleep, but instead he spent his last weeks bed-ridden in a hospital. (Though, I wonder now how I would have reacted if I did discover his still body one morning.) If there is any silver lining, it's that my mom didn't have to make the decision of sending him to hospice. She had discussed it with me that Thursday, saying my brothers and I should visit him before she told the hospital to send him there on the weekend, because once in hospice, he'd just be given morphine to reduce the pain and the effects would cause him to not recognize us any longer. So, we all visited him in his hospital room and stayed for an hour or two. The grip from his good hand was still so strong, and he managed to hold it up and wave to us as we said 'bye' and exited his room.
...then came a phone call at 3AM that night.
I guiltily wonder if he had been waiting for us to visit him just one more time before passing. My brothers didn't visit at all during his second hospital stay, and it had been a week since I last visited.
A few weeks beforehand, I had a dream while I was napping - I woke up from that nap, but I could not move my body at all, even though I could hear the door open off to the side and people moving. All I could do was move my head and grasp at air with my hand, but still the people were out of my line of vision. I can still remember how vividly I felt the panic and frustration as I was unable to get up from that bed. Perhaps, this was an inkling of what my grandfather was experiencing? I know he doesn't have to deal with physical restrictions now, but the house feels just a little more empty and dim...and it's still so so easy for the tears to fall when reflecting on it all.
He came home after stabilizing, but it was hard seeing someone that had once been so active become bed-ridden (his right side became unresponsive) and so dependent on people to tend to every bit of his care-taking. Then, he went back again when we became concerned about the noises he made while coughing. He had pneumonia, so would have to be treated for that. It was during this second hospital stay where we got the sense that he wasn't going to get better... I overheard my mom saying to other relatives, "His body is giving up."
I had always thought he would pass while asleep, but instead he spent his last weeks bed-ridden in a hospital. (Though, I wonder now how I would have reacted if I did discover his still body one morning.) If there is any silver lining, it's that my mom didn't have to make the decision of sending him to hospice. She had discussed it with me that Thursday, saying my brothers and I should visit him before she told the hospital to send him there on the weekend, because once in hospice, he'd just be given morphine to reduce the pain and the effects would cause him to not recognize us any longer. So, we all visited him in his hospital room and stayed for an hour or two. The grip from his good hand was still so strong, and he managed to hold it up and wave to us as we said 'bye' and exited his room.
...then came a phone call at 3AM that night.
I guiltily wonder if he had been waiting for us to visit him just one more time before passing. My brothers didn't visit at all during his second hospital stay, and it had been a week since I last visited.
A few weeks beforehand, I had a dream while I was napping - I woke up from that nap, but I could not move my body at all, even though I could hear the door open off to the side and people moving. All I could do was move my head and grasp at air with my hand, but still the people were out of my line of vision. I can still remember how vividly I felt the panic and frustration as I was unable to get up from that bed. Perhaps, this was an inkling of what my grandfather was experiencing? I know he doesn't have to deal with physical restrictions now, but the house feels just a little more empty and dim...and it's still so so easy for the tears to fall when reflecting on it all.