crowdog66 ◾ ◾ Hours left, perhaps days

Today my mother was almost uniformly unresponsive. The doctors tell us her kidneys are failing. They think she has hours, perhaps days at the outside.

This is a terrible blow. We expected to have at least a few weeks longer with her. The time for conscious communication is past; all we can do now is hold her hand and tell her that we love her, hoping that she can hear us (which is very uncertain). Today I told her exactly that, and also that George and my friends will take good care of me after she's gone, and that I will be all right -- giving her permission to go, so she doesn't feel like she has to hang on.

George is staying with her tonight so that I can get a good night's sleep and spend all day and night with her tomorrow. She seems to be sleeping deeply and naturally but we aren't able to wake her up. The palliative care nurses have promised us that she IS not and WILL not be in pain, and right now that's all that really matters, at least as far as I'm concerned.

It's so hard. So very, very hard. I keep thinking there's more I could have done -- that I could have spent more time with her, that I could have urged her to eat more, that I could have done SOMETHING to help her or put this off somehow. What's even harder is that one of the last things she said yesterday is: "I'm not dead yet." I think she really expected she might recover from this recent downturn. If that's the case, then I pray she never realizes that she is dying; that some of her last thoughts were hopeful ones.

In some ways this is the best possible death we could have hoped for. She was quite well and largely independent up until a week ago; only in pain for the last week; and only unconscious for the last 24 hours. I pray she passes easily, if it's her time to go.

I'm so afraid of the process. What will be expected of me? What can I do?

So many questions, and not enough answers.