Far

So, after spending most of Friday in a minimally conscious state, Mom livened up a bit on Friday evening. We went to bed around midnight (me and my fabulous sister-of-non-biological-kinship), to be awakened by hollering at 2 a.m. on Saturday. Mom was twisted up in bed, frantic because two friends of hers were in prison.

After calming her down a bit and explaining that the friends are not in prison, that it had been a bad dream, we went through three attempts to use the commode. I had not lived until I'd been peed on by my hallucinating mother. I have appropriated a nice caftan from her wardrobe to serve temporary pajama duty.

We got back to sleep at 5 a.m., and got back up to deal with someone being in prison around 9:45. Mom was very animated through the day, not sleeping at all, but fussing with the bedclothes and the blinds and the trapeze bar and anything else she could find. And she started counting. She recites numbers, sometimes in order, sometimes not. Sometimes quietly, sometimes emphatically. Sometimes in the middle of other words, sometimes all by themselves.

My wonderful sister-of-biological-kinship arrived with her partner on Saturday night. She stayed with Mom so the other sisters could sleep. She herself got very little sleep, because Mom stayed up most of the night, just dozing a little bit. Sunday Mom was slightly calmer. Slightly.

The hospice literature says that it is common for someone to experience a temporary surge of energy in their last few days. I regret to say that Mom may be experiencing a surge of energy for her last few days! I stayed with Mom from 4:30-6:30 this morning. She was still active in the rest of the morning, but my sister took over so I could pretend to sleep. Both of us heard her talking about someone or some dark thing at the end of her bed, and telling it that she wasn't going to go.

She has also talked about being in prison herself, about not being able to get out of the bed, about seeing her mother, mother-in-law, and brother, and about having to leave -- usually to go to the airport.

Some of Mom's hallucinations are distressing to her, clearly. And she is probably having normal feelings of trepidation about death. And she is experiencing those hard-to-define things that are not scientifically verifiable, but that seem to be pretty real in the vicinity of death. So how much do we validate her and help her with her feelings, and how much do we give her Haldol?

When the Hospice nurse came to day we consulted with her. She suggested a trial run of giving Mom Haldol every 6 hours, similar to what she was taking when she could swallow pills. We can see if she seems to be having a better or a worse experience in 24 hours. On Friday the end looked so near that we didn't talk much about what to do about meds except for the pain relief. Now that the end looks farther, we need a slightly more long-range plan. I will say that since her 3 p.m. Haldol and pain meds, Mom has seemed significantly more relaxed. She may even be drowsing a little.

My sister and I have decided that we are working on about 1 brain cell apiece. She says that eating a grapefruit boosted her brain cell count to 2. I may have to try this. We are doing one thing at a time, as seen in the following example, my tax return preparation process: 1. Get the stamp. 2. Affix stamp to envelope. 3. Seal envelope. 4. Put letter in mailbox. 5. Raise flag. So that's the sort of level we are on. We're feeling pretty ready for the big event here.