Clarkfield Farms
11-03-2014, 09:35 AM
I haven't been around much at all for some time. And if you know me at all from other websites and forums, some of what you'll see here will reflect what you've seen there. But it saves time, and helps avoid memory lapses, to just copy it back and forth.
I do it to honor my father...
Back in early June, my father was slightly dehydrated and went to the hospital for an IV. He's 96, and this has happened a few times before; one saline solution bag and 3 hours later, and he'd be home. Normally.
With the new regulations, he couldn't be admitted for dehydration and they wouldn't even diagnose him for it, but that's a long story. So my sister drove him home and as he was walking along the driveway his foot didn't lift up all the way (a bit weakened from dehydration) and he fell forward, skinning a large part of his forehead; that return trip to the hospital got him admitted.
After months, not hours or days or weeks but MONTHS of wrong medication, under-medication, over-medication, leaving him on a simple sugar IV for TEN DAYS because they couldn't get a proper order in the system to get a doctor's authorization to change the old order?!?!?!, doctor and nurse and hospital staff error after error on a daily basis, a man who went into the hospital in June, healthy enough to still be playing 3 rounds of nine holes of golf every week, was reduced to someone who had a feeding tube through the nose, on oxygen (permanently), unable to speak or move on his own, and, eventually, at the end of August, sent away for "comfort care" to die at the local hospice... they gave him two weeks to live. In case you didn't know, "comfort care" used to be known as "sent home to die."
Beginning the very next morning, he literally blossomed there. He was aware, alert, and could be heard clearly and strongly across the room (which, if you know hospice, those are big rooms!!!). He was told that he could eat whatever he wanted as long as it was thinned or thickened to Stage 2 baby food consistency, because the drugs and mistreatment at the hands of the hospital literally left him without the ability to swallow properly, and he was aspirating a certain percentage of everything he ingested; this led to repeated bouts of pneumonia in the hospital, where they gave him mega doses of antibiotics and all, but at hospice? Yes, some aspiration, but NO pneumonia... There are a good many people with a great deal to answer for. At hospice, he could have beer and Bailey's Irish cream, wine, anything he wanted as long as those beverages were given via "sponge sticks," since they were terrible when thickened. I know, I was FORCED to finish those for him!!! Oh, the sacrifices we make for those we love... :D He literally flourished for some time, he could walk with the aid of a walker and at one or two people for stability, he loved taking car rides, he was doing terrific but not good enough to ever return home. we also knew that it wouldn't last, the damage had been done.
A lifelong tomato-holic, and it's hereditary!, every day he was at hospice I made for him what he called "Tim's Concoction." I pureed fresh tomatoes from the garden, strained them through a food mill, added mayonnaise, salt, pepper, bacon drippings, and a touch of maple syrup (thanks, Steve!). He told everyone, me included, that he honestly believed the only reason he was alive and doing well was "the concoction." When you think about it, it WAS the only fresh, raw (except the bacon, of course!), unprocessed food available to him. He loved it, and had at least a little at every meal from the time he went to hospice. Some meals, that was all he ate! :) I don't know whether to call it irony or what, but when the tomatoes ran out, that was the last batch I ever needed to make...
About 10 days ago, his slow decline began. It arrived at the cliff's edge late Thursday. He's been wanting "to go" since he could still speak in the hospital. At around 2:30 PM on Saturday, the hospice nurse listened to his heart and told us that according to her experience, he had less than 12 hours. He was still awake, and aware, but too weak to speak or move except for faint hand signals and head movements but even that had become too strenuous for him. He had been, miraculously, pain free until Friday night, and he was getting morphine and Xanax (for anxiety?) every hour; but then the kidneys were shutting down, his blood was thickening and eventually his heart wouldn't pump blood through any of the organs and he was be gone. Notwithstanding, he was the strongest and toughest, and at the same time gentlest (in a John Wayne sort of way?) man I've ever known.
I've been trying to keep distracted the past few weeks by working, visiting him, making things he liked, checking email, etc. and was in Canada a week ago but it's at the point where distraction has no more usefulness.
True to his Irish humor, he told us a couple of weeks ago that he wanted to hold on until after November 1st so that Social Security couldn't take back his October check; when my Mother died back on December 30, 2003, one day before my Dad's birthday (yep, he would've been 97 this year!), they made him pay back her December payment. Stubborn ol' boy, GOOD FOR YOU!!! ;) You won again...
He's got 10 kids, I don't know how many grandkids, and I REALLY lost count of the great-grandkids but I know my daughter & son-in-law tipped the scales with twin baby boys, and he adored them - couldn't get enough of them. :)
Dad died at 4:19PM EST yesterday. Most of us were able to be there from Saturday on.
He lived a good life.
It was a good death.
And that's a lot.
I do it to honor my father...
Back in early June, my father was slightly dehydrated and went to the hospital for an IV. He's 96, and this has happened a few times before; one saline solution bag and 3 hours later, and he'd be home. Normally.
With the new regulations, he couldn't be admitted for dehydration and they wouldn't even diagnose him for it, but that's a long story. So my sister drove him home and as he was walking along the driveway his foot didn't lift up all the way (a bit weakened from dehydration) and he fell forward, skinning a large part of his forehead; that return trip to the hospital got him admitted.
After months, not hours or days or weeks but MONTHS of wrong medication, under-medication, over-medication, leaving him on a simple sugar IV for TEN DAYS because they couldn't get a proper order in the system to get a doctor's authorization to change the old order?!?!?!, doctor and nurse and hospital staff error after error on a daily basis, a man who went into the hospital in June, healthy enough to still be playing 3 rounds of nine holes of golf every week, was reduced to someone who had a feeding tube through the nose, on oxygen (permanently), unable to speak or move on his own, and, eventually, at the end of August, sent away for "comfort care" to die at the local hospice... they gave him two weeks to live. In case you didn't know, "comfort care" used to be known as "sent home to die."
Beginning the very next morning, he literally blossomed there. He was aware, alert, and could be heard clearly and strongly across the room (which, if you know hospice, those are big rooms!!!). He was told that he could eat whatever he wanted as long as it was thinned or thickened to Stage 2 baby food consistency, because the drugs and mistreatment at the hands of the hospital literally left him without the ability to swallow properly, and he was aspirating a certain percentage of everything he ingested; this led to repeated bouts of pneumonia in the hospital, where they gave him mega doses of antibiotics and all, but at hospice? Yes, some aspiration, but NO pneumonia... There are a good many people with a great deal to answer for. At hospice, he could have beer and Bailey's Irish cream, wine, anything he wanted as long as those beverages were given via "sponge sticks," since they were terrible when thickened. I know, I was FORCED to finish those for him!!! Oh, the sacrifices we make for those we love... :D He literally flourished for some time, he could walk with the aid of a walker and at one or two people for stability, he loved taking car rides, he was doing terrific but not good enough to ever return home. we also knew that it wouldn't last, the damage had been done.
A lifelong tomato-holic, and it's hereditary!, every day he was at hospice I made for him what he called "Tim's Concoction." I pureed fresh tomatoes from the garden, strained them through a food mill, added mayonnaise, salt, pepper, bacon drippings, and a touch of maple syrup (thanks, Steve!). He told everyone, me included, that he honestly believed the only reason he was alive and doing well was "the concoction." When you think about it, it WAS the only fresh, raw (except the bacon, of course!), unprocessed food available to him. He loved it, and had at least a little at every meal from the time he went to hospice. Some meals, that was all he ate! :) I don't know whether to call it irony or what, but when the tomatoes ran out, that was the last batch I ever needed to make...
About 10 days ago, his slow decline began. It arrived at the cliff's edge late Thursday. He's been wanting "to go" since he could still speak in the hospital. At around 2:30 PM on Saturday, the hospice nurse listened to his heart and told us that according to her experience, he had less than 12 hours. He was still awake, and aware, but too weak to speak or move except for faint hand signals and head movements but even that had become too strenuous for him. He had been, miraculously, pain free until Friday night, and he was getting morphine and Xanax (for anxiety?) every hour; but then the kidneys were shutting down, his blood was thickening and eventually his heart wouldn't pump blood through any of the organs and he was be gone. Notwithstanding, he was the strongest and toughest, and at the same time gentlest (in a John Wayne sort of way?) man I've ever known.
I've been trying to keep distracted the past few weeks by working, visiting him, making things he liked, checking email, etc. and was in Canada a week ago but it's at the point where distraction has no more usefulness.
True to his Irish humor, he told us a couple of weeks ago that he wanted to hold on until after November 1st so that Social Security couldn't take back his October check; when my Mother died back on December 30, 2003, one day before my Dad's birthday (yep, he would've been 97 this year!), they made him pay back her December payment. Stubborn ol' boy, GOOD FOR YOU!!! ;) You won again...
He's got 10 kids, I don't know how many grandkids, and I REALLY lost count of the great-grandkids but I know my daughter & son-in-law tipped the scales with twin baby boys, and he adored them - couldn't get enough of them. :)
Dad died at 4:19PM EST yesterday. Most of us were able to be there from Saturday on.
He lived a good life.
It was a good death.
And that's a lot.