On Wednesday, my sisters, brother, and I, gathered to discuss how to proceed in my dad’s care. Do we continue treatment or begin comfort care in the hospital? As you can imagine, it wasn’t an easy decision to make.
My father had a second swallow test, which he didn’t pass, and we were told that, due to the dementia, his inability to swallow was irreversible. Mind you, the speech therapist didn’t say he had difficulty swallowing but that he was UNABLE to swallow.
What does this mean? Continued treatment would include a long-term feeding tube (with it’s own set of complications). As I said before, continued treatment would also mean that my father would remain incontinent, have difficulty being mobile (most likely involving being bedridden), and have progressive dementia.
Comfort care would involve removing him from his IV and antibiotics, and allowing him to die in the most comfortable way with pain killers.
This was not what I was expecting when I made the trip to visit my dad last Saturday.
Practically it was an easy decision for us to make. My father, like many men, is a proud man who doesn’t want to be dependent on anything or anyone. Throughout his life, he never was. He is a Texas born, self-made man who was born to Mexican parents and raised in extreme poverty. He worked hard from a young age (he never had a childhood), and managed to not only provide for his family, but his parents, siblings, siblings in-law, and their family’s as well. He bought his parents and sister a home before buying his own. He prided himself on never needing a handout or public assistance. With his conviction, and hard work, he not only survived, but thrived in his lifetime.
We all knew that my father wouldn’t want feeding tubes, being incontinent and being bedridden, and especially, needing his basic needs cared for 24/7. So yes, practically, the decision was an easy one. We would stop treatment and beginning comfort care.
Emotionally the decision was grueling. “What if…” and “Maybe…” kept fucking with our hearts and minds. “Is there something else that can be done?” “These can’ be the only options!”
As a family, we made the decision to stop treatment, but didn’t say anything to the doctors. Instinctually, I think we knew that we needed to sit with the decision for a while before making anything final.
the lotus experience 
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