Guide to sitting around with dying father

[Anonymous]

I’m the kid who went out of town and didn’t come back when older relatives were dying, because I don’t drive and am not handy, and it always seemed as if there was a huge crowd of people in the hospital rooms.

Now my father is dying in a nice assisted living facility, with lovely hospice services, and I’m the only relative who’s in town and around much. My dad can sometimes wake up and communicate a little by, say, moving a leg. I try to give him choices via him moving whatever he can move. (“Kick now if you want water on your lips. Kick now if you want TV news. Kick now for morphine….”) I’m putting water on my dad’s lips every few minutes.

But mostly I’m sitting around working or playing with my phone.

Anyhow, has anyone here ever actually been in a near coma? If so, what would you have wanted the nearby relative to be doing or not doing?

Does anyone else have tips for what I should or shouldn’t be doing?

Also, do you have ideas about timing? I can probably work remote from the assisted living facility room for along time, but it seems weird to camp out in an assisted living facility room. My dad wouldn’t have expected my to give up my life for this sort of thing, but I’d feel bad if I heard he woke up for a bit and had no one to talk to. So, how do other people reconcile the desire to be there with the reality that it’s weird to be camped out in your parent’s ALF room?

One challenge is that people want to be sensitive and non-judgmental, so it’s hard for me to get ideas about what the unspoken guidelines really are.

[Anonymous]

Can he read and process letters from friends? I reach out to my parents’ friends every once in a while and ask them to email me letters. I then copy and paste them into a word document and put them in bold and 18 font so he can read them. You can sit there and put a letter in front him and read it aloud to him while he looks at it.

[Anonymous]

Sorry you are going through this OP.
No advice yet, but well wishes

[Anonymous]

I have been there. You don't need to be there every second. Some don't feel safe to pass away until they have privacy. While there you can share funny stories of good memories even if he can't talk. You can play his favorite music, but make sure it doesn't annoy him-he can give signals. You can just sit calmly there with him and be on your phone or even nap. Take breaks though. Take care of yourself. Go for walks. Get yourself some nice meals. My friend's family felt her father MUST NOT die alone. They exhaust ed themselves making sure someone was with him at all times. After weeks of this, hospice urged them to give him some alone time. He passed away peacefully alone. That is not tragic. As long as they know you visited and you love them, it really is OK.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Can he read and process letters from friends? I reach out to my parents’ friends every once in a while and ask them to email me letters. I then copy and paste them into a word document and put them in bold and 18 font so he can read them. You can sit there and put a letter in front him and read it aloud to him while he looks at it.

This is a great suggestion. I think my dad is not conscious enough for that, but, if he rallies, I actually have some letters from the 1960s I could read to him.

-OP

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sorry you are going through this OP.
No advice yet, but well wishes

Thank you.

-OP

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have been there. You don't need to be there every second. Some don't feel safe to pass away until they have privacy. While there you can share funny stories of good memories even if he can't talk. You can play his favorite music, but make sure it doesn't annoy him-he can give signals. You can just sit calmly there with him and be on your phone or even nap. Take breaks though. Take care of yourself. Go for walks. Get yourself some nice meals. My friend's family felt her father MUST NOT die alone. They exhaust ed themselves making sure someone was with him at all times. After weeks of this, hospice urged them to give him some alone time. He passed away peacefully alone. That is not tragic. As long as they know you visited and you love them, it really is OK.

Thanks.

The privacy idea is really interesting. That seems to come up a lot.

One weird thing is that the hospice themselves have needs, and maybe they sometimes actually need the idea of the loved ones being nearby at the time of death more than the patient or the relatives do. But it also seems weird to rush to be my dad’s bedside, look at my calendar, and say, “Well, it’s been a week. That’s my time. Bye, Dad. See ya!”

[Anonymous]

If he is/was religious, I would say some familiar prayers for him or play some hymns.

[Anonymous]

Let him rest. You are doing everything you can. Stay as much as you can and just hope for a quick painless passing.

[Anonymous]

Your Dad would want you to keep your livelihood going.

Don't hesitate to do your work from his assisted living.

Give yourself plenty of breaks.

[Anonymous]

You should definitely go to Reddit. Just google things like you’re asking and include Reddit in the search results, you’ll find much more resources there

[Anonymous]

^ *meant include reddit in your search terms

[Anonymous]

My mom and I were together for my Dad. We played old videos hoping he might hear them. We brought boxes of pictures and talked about the memories. Dad remember the year we all went to FL...

[Anonymous]

I made a playlist with all my dad's favorite songs.

[Anonymous]

Hi OP just wanted to say you are a wonderful person for spending so much time with your Dad. I recently lost my Dad and was lucky enough I could rearrange my life to be around for the 6 weeks he was not doing well. And I will never regret it. One of my relatives who was with me a lot works at a nursing home and said so many patients pass with no one ever visiting them. So I think any time you give is precious. I keep thinking I wish I could look him in the eyes and tell him one more time how much I love him and appreciate all he did for me. But I know I did that a lot, I just think it's part of my mourning. There are some great suggestions here and I'm so sorry you are going through this.