UTMC

monday my grandfather, the only dad i've ever really had, moved into an assisted living place.

the women who work there tell me he needs to bring his favorote things, but he didn't choose very much. the house is full of lots of things but it was all hers. and his place is so bare.

i'm trying to be helpful. i run errands for him when i can and when he lets me. but i feel like he is planning to go soon. (and it doesn't help that i think one of his pistols is missing. he may have sold it, but he never said anything about selling it before.)

he talked a little more today about the living will stuff. he told he his two best friends had to pull the plug on their wives. i said that must have been so hard. then he just came out and told me i'd have to do that for him. and he asked me if i could. i told him that if he wrote it down i'd see to it that whatever he wanted done would be done. but one thing is crystal clear: it's all going to be up to me.

hell, when he asked me to get him the boxes for this move, he told me to keep them so i could bring all his stuff back to the house next year...


i always foolishly hoped that they would go together. or that the shock of the one being gone would cause the other one to just instantly go. no pain, no suffering. but it hasn't been like that at all.

I took a friend to Hospice some years ago. He was only there 2 weeks before he died. The illness leading up to that point was a fairly long, painful, process.
Another friend and I helped him through that, and we were responsible for making sure his wishes were obeyed.
You may surprise yourself when it comes to the really difficult stuff.

piccini9 wrote: You may surprise yourself when it comes to the really difficult stuff.

Agreed. It may seem like a tremendous burden (and it is), but you will have comfort in knowing that you will be the one to make his wishes happen, and not someone he may or may not trust. It's a bit of an honor to be asked to do this by the people who raised you. I had my father ask this of me, and when the time came (just over 5 years ago), I did what he asked-I pulled the plug. My dad didn't suffer. I wouldn't have let that happen.

I hope you can find peaceful time to spend with your granddad, right now. It will be tough at first, but when his time comes, you won't regret a single moment you spent talking with him. He needs you to be strong for him. Hopefully, he will be able to talk with some folks of his own age in the assisted care place. It might help him to heal from his loss, being near others who are going through the same thing. It sounds schlocky to say this, it should help him to regain his sense of bearing. It did for my dad.

You have my thoughts and best wishes for strength right now. It is a hard time. I understand your feelings.

my grandmother passed away horribly: in pain and on medications that gave her horrible hallucinations. both my grandfather and i believe they treated her very badly and sent her to hospice way too soon.

maybe that concensus is why he trusts me instead of my sister, who is a nurse.

and i know that when she finds out that i have sole medical power of attorney she will be pissed. some parts of this whole situation are just shitty but i know it can't be helped.


here are old photos of them. http://s23.photobucket.com/albums/b359/ ... le/family/

he served on the Saratoga during WWII and on the Valley Forge during korea.

Hang in there, okay?

One thing that I hadn't anticipated when my Grandfather passed was the change in the family order. He was a tough old bird (also a ww2 vet like your own, west pointer and rifle company commander) and had a subtle effect on the entire family that nobody noticed till he was gone. Fortunately he passed in his sleep at the age of 94, over a period of a week he kept sleeping more and more with increasingly vivid dreams... Grandmother had passed decades earlier of cancer and that went badly.

Peace & strength

thank you all for your kind words. geek, i'll be ok. mostly because i've never seen a choice other than making myself be ok.

it's just been difficult. and i've been overwhelmed between jacked-up school crap and new, temporary part-time job and being here for all my own kids.

It's very tough seeing those you love suffer. Do your best to be there for him and keep yourself together in the process.

Enjoy the time you have together.

Sorry to hear about your granddad. Like ej said, enjoy what time you do have together.