Analyzing a Major Loss

The Death of My Father

     My father died on October 4, 2000; my 40th birthday.  Most people, when I tell them this, they feel sorry for me and say how terrible that must be.  They think that his dying on my birthday should ruin my birthday from then on.  I don't see it that way.  First, I take the time to remember my father on that day and then, I celebrate my birthday.  They are the same, but different.

     It was the beginning of October when I got the call from my brother Ed.  He said "Dad had a stroke, you need to come to the hospital.  It doesn't look very promising."  I was in shock.  I had just seen him the night before.  He was in the hospital to get his gallbladder out (a relatively minor surgery).  He looked good.  He was in good spirits.  I had baked him his favorite pie; apple.  We sat and talked and ate our pie.  Little did I know that they would send him home in the morning and he would have a stroke that afternoon.


     Almost six months to the day, my father had told he had Leukemia.  I didn't believe him.  I was in denial.  I never thought about either one of my parents dying up until that point.  It was only when I called my father's oncologist and he told me that it was, in fact, true, that my father did have Leukemia and he only had about six months to live.  It was then that I finally started to come around to the reality that my father was going to die.  I don't think I ever fully accept it though.


     I rushed to the hospital.  He was in a coma.  The neurologist said that he had a massive stroke at the brain stem.  This was a result of his white blood count plummeting after his surgery.  There was little chance of recovery.  Also, because he was terminally ill with Leukemia, they would not be continuing the blood transfusions and medications to treat the Leukemia. 


     My father stayed on Life Support for a week.  At that time, we were approached by the staff at the hospital and explained our options.  We were asked to make a decision for him.  Since he did not have a Health Care Proxy, we had to get together, as a family, and make the decision for him.  Based on the information we had received from the hospital, and what we thought our father would have wanted, we came to the conclusion that we should remove him from the machines. 


     We had a priest come in and give my father his "Last Rights."  One of my brothers pointed out that they saw a tear run down my father's face.  As I was holding my father's hand, I felt him squeeze it just a little.  I believe that he was saying goodbye to me.  He was still breathing on his own after being taken off the machines.  His breathing was shallow. The doctors said that if he survived until the next day, they would put a feeding tube in at that time.   At 2:00 a.m. that evening, I received the worst call I had ever received up until that moment. 

          My father had passed away peacefully without the machine attached to him.  I was glad that I was not there to see him take his last breath.  I don't think that I was emotionally mature enough to handle that at the time.  I was the closest person in my family to my father.  I was the only girl out of eight children.  


     Deep down, I know that even though my father did not put it down in writing what his final wishes were, under these circumstances, I know that he would not have wanted to die hooked up to a bunch of machines.  So taking him off of the machines was the right choice.  It was probably the hardest choice I have had to make in my life to date.