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 Post subject: Guilty over my mom's passing
PostPosted: Mon Jun 16, 2008 4:09 am 
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Joined: Mon Jun 16, 2008 3:32 am
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Location: PA
Hi,

My mom passed away a week after Thanksgiving, 2006 from cancer. It wasn't diagnosed until Thanksgiving day and we were told she had maybe 4-6 months. She started getting abdominal pain in March of 2006, went to 3 specialists that I know of and they found nothing. By summer she was having a lot of trouble eating. One of the specialists her GP sent her to had her on $100 a pop Vitamin B shots once a week. These were not covered by her insurance and as she was on an income that wasn't covering her expenses as it was, we had to take that on also. When they upped it to 3 times
a week I intervened and asked why. What did her blood work show?

Well, it showed nothing. Fraud out and out. I told my mom I thought her GP was in collusion with the specialist since he sent her there and saw the blood work but did nothing to stop the money drain. But she was sure her GP was not involved so I just
called him and told him I believed this was fraud on the specialist's part and he should know about it if he decides to send any other patients there. I believe he got the message.

Anyhow, my mom went through pain off and on till just before Thanksgiving getting so weak that she couldn't stand anymore, even with the help of her walker. The pain had been bad for a week but she wouldn't let us call an ambulance. Then exactly a week before Thanksgiving she let us call and they took her to the hospital. The emergency room was a NIGHTMARE and after 6 hours of my mother in terrible, terrible pain and the nurses being more than nonchalant. It ended up with me standing in the middle of the emergency center screaming at the top of my lungs for someone to come and help my mother. Then they did and got us out of there and into a room, maybe so I wouldn't cause another scene which was fine with me.

The rest was also pretty much a nightmare. I am in a wheelchair and can't get to the hospital alone and my husband is so overloaded with work that I didn't push him to take me, so she was in there a week alone. BIG, HUGE mistake. They mistreated her and threatened her. I still shudder and cry about it when I think of it. You HAVE to
be there with your loved one or the hospital will treat them like garbage. I talked to the doctor every day but he told me bull. Since I wasn't there I had only my calls to mom several times a day and calls to the nurses station, who didn't give a DAMN. Remember at this time they had found nothing wrong and we expected her home any day. I had always had hospital staff that was very loving, caring and competent. Don't assume that is what you will get.

Anyhow, on Thanksgiving I got my husband to take us to the hospital with food and we all ate. It was a HUGE deal cause my mom hadn't really eaten in a month. We had a great visit. That morning they had finally diagnosed her with a big cancerous ball in her abdomen that touched her pancreas, liver and stomach but was blocking the esophagus, hence her trouble eating. When I said they threatened my mom, they were giving her the liquid for x-rays and she drank a bit but then couldn't drink anymore, it was
coming back up and she was choking on it and inhaling it. The nurse said she if she didn't drink more she would put a tube down her throat and pour it in. My poor mother called me in a panic, crying that they were drowning her and were going to kill her. My mother was very down to earth and quiet so I knew this was bad. I talked to the nurses station and put a call in to the doctor but at that time nothing had been found so they didn't know her esophagus was blocked. This terrorizing of her still haunts me. She told me and I believe they broke her collar bone and perhaps one of her ribs doing their "tests". It was just horrific. I am so guilty that I didn't stay with her to watch over her cause the
nurses now are overworked and underpaid and don't care.

When we were there things got better. I went every day after we got the diagnosis and was making plans for a convalescence hospital because they told me she had like 4 months or so. But after not eating for so long and then eating on Thanksgiving with us, my mom had to go to the bathroom. Friday morning she rang for a nurse and one came and helped her to the toilet. Then she had to go again and again a nurse came and helped her, but the third time they just put a bedpan under her. She had a terrible bedsore on her tailbone and she couldn't sit on the bedpan so she tried to get out and
go to the toilet by herself and she fell. She laid there calling for them for a long time before anyone found her. It was all downhill from there. All her systems started failing.

She fell on Friday morning and Tuesday morning she died. I totally blame the hospital and their uncaring staff for robbing her and us of 4 more months of her life. I never got to say good-bye cause after she fell they just doped her into oblivion so she wouldn't be any more trouble to them. All of this is why I was shell-shocked and in a stupor of
depression for a year after she passed away. But even before that there are things that just haunt me now.

A year before she passed away my husband and I came to her house to live so we would be closer to her and help her. I am in a wheelchair as I said and there was no ramp so I couldn't get upstairs to see her. She has a finished basement so that is where we made our home (and still live). When she was strong enough she would come to the top of the basement stairs and open the door and we would sit and talk with me at the bottom of the stairs in my chair. It was so frustrating just before she went to the hospital to hear her crying in pain or to have her call me and tell me she needed a hug and me not be able to get to her. I remember looking at the stairs and figuring if I could crawl up them to get to her but then what? I actually doubt I would have made it but the pain of remembering how all she wanted was me there and me not being able to get to her is almost unbearable.

She was such a good mother to my brother and me (my brother passed away from kidney failure in 1992). She sacrificed everything for us. And when she needed me I wasn't there. I think over and over what I could have done but still I come up with nothing except I should have insisted to be taken to the hospital more often. I just didn't know it was as serious as it was. My mother was almost 80 years old and it never occured to me that she might die. How could I think she would live forever?


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 Post subject: Re: Guilty over my mom's passing
PostPosted: Thu Aug 27, 2009 5:19 am 
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Joined: Mon Jul 06, 2009 3:44 am
Posts: 26
First, I feel so sorry about your mom. I know it had hard time for you but why you feel guilty. Don't be depressed, we are always for you. You should trying to cope with your grief. She is always in your heart. My prayers always with you. Please accept my condolences...........

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