October 31st, 2014 is a day I will remember forever. My father had been dismissed from the hospital with acute kidney damage, but was still sick. Brought home by EMTS, they stood in the family room for over an hour telling me, “You can send him back to the hospital any time. We can take him to a different hospital.” The next morning he was back in another hospital diagnosed with pulmonary embolisms, asphyxiation pneumonia, fluid in his hearts and lungs, and several other diagnosis. He almost died in the hospital that afternoon. Suddenly, the doctors and nurses were surrounding me, asking, “Does he have an advance directive? What are his wishes?” Thankfully, I was able to pull out an advance directive and a power of attorney to help honor his wishes. But, what if I hadn’t had this? I would have been guessing what he wanted.
Having a conversation on future wishes is important, but difficult. When I first noticed my dad was declining, I approached him to ask him his wishes. I didn’t want to ask. Who wants to talk about dying? I wasn’t even sure how to begin the conversation. I started by researching advance directives so I could present unbiased facts to my dad. I told him how I wanted to respect his wishes, but while I could try, without the advance directive, I might forget under duress. I reminded him the hospital was required to do life savings procedures. Then, I gave him a few days to think about all the facts. He didn’t want to do this at first, but after regular reminders from me, we made an appointment with the lawyer to set a plan in place. It’s been a life saver during the past eleven days.
I invite you to connect to the Care Conversations page to learn more before you need these documents.
I think this is an important discussion, even though it’s hard. My great-grandmother actually planned everything down to the last detail in advance. My aunt helped her. She didn’t want her children to worry about anything when her time came.
It is always good to have a plan. Even though it isn’t so fun to talk about.
This is so important I remember having this conversation with my mom at 16 when she was dying. Its tough, but I think its a must have conversation.
I thought I was going to have to make a decision with my father whether he lived or died. Luckily he began waking up that day. It’s horrible to think about the decisions we may have to face.
Thank goodness I don’t currently have a need to have a conversation like this soon, but it’s always best to have regardless. So sorry for everything you had to endure.
This is a VERY important conversation to have. I just wanted to mention that not all states require this to be done through an attorney. In my state there is a form available from the state web site. It can be filled out at home and then notarized. It was very easy.
Oh wow, I’m sorry for your loss. This s definitely an unfortunate but necessary conversation.
Thank you for this! My husband and I were just talking about this very subject the other day!
This a very important conversation to have with your loved ones. I can be difficult to talk about but it is so important.
This is an important conversation to have with our aging parents. Even though we don’t want them to go we still have to be ready as best we can. Thank you for this post.
This is such an important subject because who wants to have to discuss those things during life or death situations? It’s so hard to have those kinds of conversations beforehand but so necessary. Thanks for the reminder.
It’s so important to have these crucial conversations with loved ones before tragedy strikes. They are not always easy to have but they are necessary.
It must be really hard putting all those things into place – but such a good thing when in such situations – I have to admit I have no idea what my parents would want. although I do think they have written it all down.
I have known people who have everything ‘together’ way before time, and those that were still in denial after a Dr had given a terminal illness diagnosis.
Every family member should know what a parent wants, every spouse should know what their partner wants beforehand. Granted things can change, but a power of attorney helps.
I hope your Dad improves !
My mom is terminally sick and I don’t think I even really know what she wants. I’ll have to get my big brother to look into this. Thank you for sharing.