“Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.” Mahatma Gandi
In a conversation with a dear friend recently, she seemed surprised that Dwane is well aware he is dying It is a personal decision whether to be up front with the person with dementia that he/she is dying, and it is a moot point if the person is not lucid enough to have the conversation. It is a personal philosophy of mine to deal with things open and directly. Years ago I had a friend who was afraid she had something wrong with her, but when it was suggested she go to the doctor, she refused. She said she was afraid to find out something was wrong. Not me. Whatever the news is; I want to know what it is and I want to deal with it. My belief is that we can deal better with life's challenges if we are well prepared with information. I also wanted Dwane and me to make the very best of the time we have left. That is why we went overseas to see his daughter; that is why I took him to Sagamore, to the seashore, back to Mayo Clinic. My approach has been: we are all dying, but now we know within a tighter time frame when he is dying. So, we can choose to do the things we want to do before he dies.
While it is an individual choice whether to discuss with the person who has it that this is a terminal illness (and neither way is right or wrong), there is still merit in our knowing, as caregivers, that we have a finite amount of time with this person. Some types of dementia take years in the dying process, but Lewy Body Dementia usually has a shorter course. Whatever the type of dementia we are dealing with, there is merit in focusing on the quality of the life we have to live.
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