Active Dying Phase

We will harvest their organs now anyway

Every hospice has a handout titled “signs and symptoms of approaching death,” it details the last two weeks. Ask for it.

OP you come to DL OF ALL PLACES to ask this question? Seek help. You're desperate for attention to make up such a stupid post. Actually, every post you make is stupid.

DL may not the best place for vital info and/or sympathy. Were all you got?

listen for the labored breathing … and the eventual rattle. Then you will know.

Jesus Christ.

Ask ChatGPT.

Some of us here are depressed enough.

Wow sone of these replies are not what I expected at all. There was just a thread last month where someone got a lot of support when their mother died in hospice care.

Sometimes they feel great right before they die. That happened to my dad and he died within a week. The morphine would probably mask this.

OP, I'm sorry you're going through this. Are you alone--no siblings, close cousins/aunts/uncles? Having gone through this with my wonderful Mother in 2018, you really need someone there you can lean on, because seeing a parent die, and the aftermath, can really do a number on you.

And yes, the labored breathing and rattle are telltale signs.

Thank you, R9 for the genuine reply. I’m totally alone. I have long distance friends who are helping me but they’ve never had a parent die and are so far removed from what that all entails.

Still, better than nothing.

There’s no death rattle but the breathing is already labored due to a diagnosis of lung cancer. That’s why I’m confused. One nurse implied he was declining, and another nurse is hopeful he will improve. That’s why I’m conflicted.

When my husband was dying of cancer, I would term his gradual slipping away as a ‘shrinking.’ It seemed to me he spent more and more time in his head and less interacting or even just responding to me and his visitors. Eventually he became entirely unconscious on a Wednesday, the doctor said he could go ‘any time now’ on the Saturday, and he died early in the evening on the following Monday without regaining consciousness. The nurses said he would still be able to hear what went on around him. I wasn’t sure about that, but when we were alone I would tell him I loved him and that it was alright for him to go whenever he felt ready. On the day he died his breathing became very ragged, although no one seemed to notice that except me. And then he took two deep breaths — each held for a suspensefully long time, and when he exhaled after the second that was it.

I have decided that the brain is kind, and as our bodies are dying and organs are closing off, we go to a happy or comfortable place, whatever that is for the individual. In his last weeks he was pre-occupied with trips we had taken together and he said he was reliving them in his mind. I like to think we were together back in Hawaii or New Zealand or Italy in his head.

That’s very sweet R11 and I just started bawling.

Thank you, that was almost 10 years ago. It still hurts but less. Grief softens with time and becomes more bearable.

When you fall in love and make a commitment, it’s what you sign on for, you know one of you will go first. We just thought we would have more time. And the unfairness of that does still make me angry. While shitheads like Trump go on and on.

For OP:

What about an elderly friend who is 89 and sleeps all day long? His spouse died and he lives alone. Goes to bed 6pm and wakes up 12pm

Sorry about ur situation OP (and the classless assholes on here). My dad died a few months back. On the Saturday he was reading his newspaper, chatting away and by the early hours of Tuesday morning he was gone. I personally think the nurses move things along.

Listen to r11 OP. My mother was calling out to her parents and sisters when she was actively dying, and her voice was almost youthful! I think she preferred her dreams to her waking world, and not being asleep was an inconvenience. She sighed a lot when breathing, and apparently this is very comforting to the dying person and is not a sign of pain. I hope your parent goes peacefully as mine did. She was in her own bed in her own house, with her loved ones close by. I hope we all die so peacefully. The billionaire's death.

To lose one parent is a tragedy. To lose both looks like carelessness.

In some matters, I find it best to take the advice of a professional with direct knowledge of the matter.

OP, my dad also died on hospice care, and he just slipped easily away while we all were home with him but not at his exact bedside. I agree the nurses increased his morphine to the point I think they helped him die - maybe for the best. Keep him clean and comfortable and that’s sadly the best advice I can offer.

Once a hospice patient is given the morphine drip the fading has begun. It's different for everybody with vital sometimes holding steady yet the patient is becoming increasingly unresponsive.

Be aware that while a hospice patient may appear to be unresponsive they are often very aware of what is going on around them. Talk to them, read to them or even sing. It will be beneficial to both of you.

Read what you wrote, OP. Don’t blame people for their replies when you don’t even say who it is.

“A parent” could be anyone’s. I was waiting for the “asking for a friend” sign off.

Sorry for your troubles, but clarity counts.

Those certainly seem like some of the symptoms of nearing the end. I have always found that once the patient stops eating the end is near.

I think the default to sleeping most of the time and/or no interest in food signal the end nearing. Hospice personnel can help determine this. They will level with you. I have had three interactions with hospice with three different relatives.

R21 has it right. Many of us first learned in the bad old days of AIDS that once the morphine gets administered "for pain" then the patient is probably in the last few days.

Take care of yourself and provide your loved one your presence as much as you can.

A long time friend of 50 years developed senile dementia when he was in his mid 70s. The progression was frightening. He started becoming violent toward his wife for no reason at all and saying the most horrendous things about her and her family, people he loved dearly when he was sane. We had to call the police on 3 different occasions when he started hitting his wife. They never took him to jail (they knew what the problem was). They took him to the nearest hospital. On the 3rd trip the hospital kept him for 4 weeks pumping every narcotic they could find into him trying to curb his violent streak. it never did. Finally they decided they could do nothing more for him and told his wife he needed to go to hospice. He stayed in the hospice center for 6 weeks. He was talking and eating the first 4 weeks, calling me in the middle of the night at least once a week telling me they were trying to kill him because he'd heard people laughing outside his door. He was hearing the nurses at the nurses station that was only a few feet away from his door, in their normal routines. By week 5 he had started sleeping most of the time unless they woke him up for whatever food they could get him to eat. He also stopped talking to anyone, other than a grunt now and then to voice his displeasure at something. By the last week he stopped eating and talking altogether, and slept round the clock. Finally on Thursday of that week he finally just stopped breathing at 2am that morning.

Thank you all for the genuine comments. The reason I was confused and conflicted is because the night shift didn’t think he was entering his final stage, especially with his vitals.

However, the day shift agreed he has more pronounced apnea and it’s time to stop giving him food.

I was just trying to figure things out to prepare myself. Still, I’m perplexed about why his blood pressure is still so normal.

No feeding means it's about a week. That's how it was with my mother.

I'm sorry you're going through this, OP. I went through something similar with my aunt last year. Can the hospice staff give you any help? They will know better than anyone.

Mine as well r28

OP we knew my father was getting to the end of the runway when his urine output started dwindling and finally his kidneys started shutting down. God bless you and I will say a prayer. Please let us know how you're doing. Not everyone here is an asshole.

Hugs OP.

The morphine your parent is being given will ensure that he/she won't be taking up that bed for very long. I don't mean to be cruel, but this is what hospice facilities do. A loved one of mine was given an overdose of morphine (by accident, I assume) almost immediately after entering the hospice facility and never regained consciousness, although he was alert and very much himself the night before. He was supposed to have been staying there for a few days to monitor and adjust his medication. He died a few days after the overdose. We all expected him to have much more time. It was a case of involuntary euthanasia.

A morphine drip is usually administered to keep a patient calm, because they get anxiety attacks.

Did the hospice admit to the overdose, r33?

No, R35, but it was obvious that's what happened. We brought him in on a Friday night and he was unconscious by Saturday morning. The hospice didn't admit to anything, but they called me a LOT in the days after his death to offer me "grief counseling," until I ordered them to stop calling me, telling them, "We both know what happened to him. Stop talking to me as though I'm stupid and stop trying to "handle" me with your mumbo-jumbo." They never called again.

It is a comma. A pause.

My dad has started the terminal restlessness stage. Oh boy this one is really hard to watch. It’s hard to keep him sedated on the morphine and ativan before he has another fit where he rips off his gown and shakes/grabs at things. It’s just so hard to watch.

Roxanol.

OP, my thoughts are with you. It does sound like active dying or pre-active dying stage. Thank God for morphine, my stoic mother was in pain and obviously uncomfortable, but the opiates buffered her entry to the netherworld.

In 1986, when my mother was dying of multiple myeloma, the nurse unlocked the IV pump that had fluids and morphine (or similar). She showed us how to adjust the amount using a dial on the front. Mom was in a lot of pain that last week. She kept stressing that anything over 40 would depress her respiration to a dangerous level, asking us if we understood what she was telling us. We didn't adjust it past 40 -- she died soon after the nurse unlocked the pump.

It is a form of euthanasia. You have to be a certain kind of person to take that responsibility.

Some years ago I traveled 1000 miles to help an older friend who was hospitalized find an assisted living place to go. Got there and he was refusing to eat and refusing treatment for his pneumonia. He had previously tried several times to do himself in (pills, plastic bags, blowing up his car, Hemlock Society etc). The hospital would not take his word (though he was perfectly competent) that he was refusing all treatment. I had his medical power of attorney and I verbally told the hospital it was ok. He in in hospice care in three hours, slipped into unconsciousness. I didn't think that I needed to stay sitting up bedside all night. When I got up the next morning he was gone. I'm sure the night nurse pumped up the morphine, which is certainly what he wanted. No regrets here. I was glad I could help him.

Is your loved one aware we are going dictatorship? Maybe they'd rather not be around for that.I know I don't. Does anyone know a good euthanizer? One who takes insurance.

My dad is still with us but I’ve never seen someone suffer so much from shaking from terminal agitation. It’s really the hardest thing to watch.

I’ve seen relatives die before and they just went to sleep and stopped breathing. I just hope it’s over soon as I don’t know how much more I can take seeing his body suffer, even if he isn’t consciously aware of it.

I'm so sorry, OP. When my sister was in hospice, she just started drifting off and then it was over. Very peaceful.

Hang in there. Hopefully it will be over soon. And give yourself credit for being there with him. Not everyone has the courage or compassion to do what you're doing.

If you see mucous in a horrendous color coming from the corner of the mouth, they are close.