It has been almost a month, and time for me to sit and get my thoughts about my dad's last few months out of my head and on paper............A quick background about my dad for those who didn't know him..............He was strong, independent, private and proud.........
The beginning of what I will call "the end" started in February, the weekend after my Grandmother's funeral.........my Dad ended up in the hospital with Congestive Heart Failure. His wishes were that his information not be given out, so that he wouldn't have a tirade of people running through his room.......full of loud talking........He was in great pain, and when I arrived, I was told that I wasn't allowed in the room.....he wasn't taking any visitors. It took some time, and I was not really nice to the nurse and he finally got pain meds and was able to take visitors....there were only a couple of people that knew where Dad was, but sure enough he ends up with a whole room full of loud "visitors", and he was furious that he had been betrayed by his own. Showing that he was allowed no rights to his wishes. He got well enough to go home........but never well enough for my mother to go back to work.
Along comes April, Dad gets sick again, and Mom takes him into the doctor.......they do some lab work, and she goes home. I call her later in the evening to see if she got the results from the labs, and she hadn't, so I called and eventually got the results.............My Dad was in complete renal failure, and needed to go to the hospital immediately. I called the Urologist, and we had a conversation, and he stated that he would see us at the hospital. He decided to a procedure that ended up blowing us all out of the water.......Dad's prostate cancer had returned, and the tumor was growing into his bladder, and towards his kidneys.........he suggested another procedure.....stents in his kidneys. This would be proactive in keeping the kidneys open, and functioning. Dad wasn't really "for" it, but I thought it would be a good idea, so he finally decided that he would go through it. (Having not journaled this, things seem a bit fuzzy already.....but this is my best recollection of the events in order). He ended up having a CT Scan, and Bone Scan to find out that he had extensive metastatic disease in his pelvis, hips, ribs, lymph nodes.......and then they found a stricture in his colon that appeared to be caused from disease as well.........WOW! Not exactly what we expected to hear........WOW again........they suggested HOSPICE. This is my DAD they are talking about!!! The Urologist had a different more proactive take on things, but Dad had been through so much in this hospital stay that he said he wouldn't have anymore surgery, and his choice was hospice. Dad made a phone call to his brother Frank in Alabama to tell him the "news"........at which time he told his brother that he wanted him to sing at his funeral............then he called his nephew "Bud" (Frank Jr.), and told him "I am dying, this cancer is all over my body, and I want you to preach my funeral". He agreed that he would be honored..............Not the call I think he was expecting, nor was it anything that I enjoyed hearing.........but it was what it was, and he felt he needed to take care of those things. It took me a couple of days before I was able to accept that dad was planning his own funeral, but finally I got on board, and we talked about it together, and there was nothing in his funeral that he was unaware of.......He chose down to the songs that he wanted sang.
It was time to make phone calls and tell family what was going on..........He ended up with exactly what he didn't want.......he had up to 25 people a day in his room "visiting". There were times that his mind wasn't always right, and that was hard to watch.
Once deciding on hospice, he ended up being released to go home. My brother from Ohio came to visit for a week, as well as my cousin from Alabama. We had some very good times with family and Dad. Dad had good days and bad days over the course of the next couple of months. We had lots of family get togethers with my family and my cousin Lewis and his family.....Dad enjoyed them and the kids. Dad got weaker and weaker, and we had to get a hospital bed for the living room.........so he spent the days in the living room, and slept in his own bed at night. Father's Day came and went, and I missed seeing Dad only because I was admitted to the hospital that day for 4 days.......I did speak with him several times throughout the day, wishing him a Happy Father's Day. Mario spent the day with dad, and that made him happy......He also received a phone call from his son Fredrick.............but that's it.....
On July 5th we went out as a family to see Dad, and he was up and moving having a really good day...........he wanted BBQ, so Lydell went to town and got some ribs, (because that was his request) and came home and grilled them for Dad. He also wanted some potato salad.......when all was cooked, he took one bite.......and it didn't taste good.........as had been the case for the last 4 months.....On July 6th I spent the night at my parents, it was a long sleepless night for my mom, as Dad kept getting out of bed, and was becoming more and more agitated and confused.
Hospice was called, and the nurse decided that it would be best for dad to go into the Hospice house.............It was a very hard decision to make, but we were no longer able to take care of dad at home.
The care he received at the hospice house was absolutely amazing.......There was very few times that we felt that dad was "with" us........most of the time he had a blank stare, and didn't respond to anything. There was one day that I was there and it was obvious that he was trying to tell me something...........I thought he wanted his nose scratched, and so when I tried to scratch his nose, he wrinkled up his face, and I could tell that he was upset...........what he wanted was his eye wiped..........mom knew immediately.
The day before dad died, I took the boys up to see him............On the way there they were making "get well cards" in the backseat. Jayden proclaimed that dad would love his card because he did his very best..........I told him you are correct. Isaiah said, "he won't even know it's there"...............(that hurt my heart, but he was correct) Isaiah continued on making his card all the while being very secretive about what was in his card. When we arrived, the boys jumped out of the car and ran in ahead of me..........when I arrived in the room, dad had two get well cards on his chest. I immediately picked up the card that Isaiah had made............The words I read, made me cry and have to walk out of the room. Inside the card read.........."For God so loved the world he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him shall have everlasting life in heaven"..............Amazing from my 9 year old son...............I thought to myself amongst my tears.........."He gets it, praise God"
On July 14th, I got off work, and went straight to the hospice house............knowing that dad could go at anytime. When I got there, he was still staring straight at the ceiling, and didn't acknowledge that I was there.......Around 7ish the nurses came in and gave him a bath, which seemed to agitate him quite a bit, and it seemed that no amount of medication calmed him down. Mom and I were going to go and get some soup in the kitchen, but the nurse was going to call the doctor to see if they could give him more medication............so we decided to stay with him...............we were talking to him, and telling him how much we loved him, he got a great big smile on his face, took a deep breath, and we watched the life go out of him.............It was most amazing, and heartbreaking all at the same time...............but my mind will never forget the smile on his face as he breathed his last breath............he knew we were there, and it was his way of telling us that he loved us too.
We made all of the phone calls to family, which was very difficult.
Hospice called the funeral home, and they came to get dad................I was able to stay in the room while they put him in the "black bag"...............well, it was blue. When I said that I wanted to watch, they explained to me everything that I would see them do, so I wouldn't be shocked. They got dad in the bag, but didn't cover his head............then all of the hospice staff lined up and we walked dad out to the van that took him to the funeral home...............It was an amazing experience, almost like a ceremony.
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