Apathy, I am so very sorry for your loss. I understand how you feel about having to tell your mother she was dying. Before my dad died, he asked me if he was dying, and I told him his heart wasn't doing good and he needed an operation, but to have it he would have to go back onto the ventilator. He didn't want that so he started saying good-bye and praying for God's mercy. I immediately regretted having told him and I wish so much he could have died without knowing he was dying -- it would have been more merciful. I loved him so much, yet I caused him to suffer by telling him the truth. I should have just said no one knows these things. Later I told him where there is life there is hope and that I couldn't wait to get him home again, so I could take care of him. He nodded, but I think he was just humoring me.

I also have flashbacks of his suffering, especially when I found him in the ICU with the cannula out and he was begging for air, water and God's mercy. His oxygen saturation was low and no one was helping him. When he saw me, he thanked me over and over. It broke my heart to see my normally stoic father in respiratory distress. I got the nurse to put him back on a mask and to increase his oxygen -- why did I have to tell them what to do? I thought they were monitoring him in the ICU with a camera. After that I didn't dare leave him alone. I watched him die for 36 hours straight in Comfort Care at the hospital. Thankfully, the morphine and removing the feeding tube helped his breathing and he was peaceful during his last moments of consciousness. Once he was sedated his breathing became labored and it was difficult to watch and to hear his breathing through the night. Alone in the dark, I kept praying and counting his respirations over and over. I finally drifted off to sleep in the chair and that's when his spirit left this world. It's as if he had waited for me to fall asleep. I thought watching him die would be the hardest thing I'd ever have to do, but living without him is even harder. We lived in the same house for 55 years. He was my best friend and my hero. For the first time I am completely alone, no husband, no children, no friends or relatives close by. The friends and relatives that used to live nearby have all died or moved away. My dad was 86, and he had a lot of health problems, but I thought he had more time left, so his death still came as a shock to me. He died four months ago, two days after Christmas.

I can only imagine how difficult it is for you to lose your mother. I pray that we both will find the strength to carry on without our loved ones, and that the terrible flashbacks will fade and be replaced with happy memories.