My mother died of cancer. We had known for over a year she had it. She could not be operated but she did get radiation therapy, etc. and all seemed reasonable stable. Then from one day to another, she became very ill. She went from being an intelligent, loving, warm and strong woman to a total wreck who didn't even knew who she was or where she was (or who I was) in just two months' time. First her personality changed. She became extremely paranoid. She started to hallucinate. She became scared of everyone and everything (including me, imagine that, your own mother being scared to death by your presence). Then she lost the ability to read and write and finally to speak. She also stopped eating and lost 30 kgs in weeks. She refused every kind of food.
In the mean time, the pain went from bad to worse to excruciating and Morphine only goes so far.
And all I could do is was hold her hand and tell her I loved her over and over. Even when she fought me. I've never felt so powerless, sad and angry in my life and it seemed to last forever. During the last days of her life, when I sat next to her bed, I remember thinking, if I pull up her nightgown right now, 'Help Me' will be engraved in her skin, just like in The Exorcist.
There was no last conversation or goodbye. There was only pain.
My father died from the complications of a Cerebral Haemorrhage.
It was horrible but compared to the suffering of my mother, it was almost peaceful.
