Dad just wants to die

[Sue321]

My Dad went into a care home last October as I could no longer cope with his mood swings and threatening behaviour towards myself and my Mum who is disabled and has stage 5 kidney disease.
He has deteriorated slowly over the last few months and his memory has seen a rapid decline in the last few weeks. Around the start of this fast decline in memory he began to say that he wanted to die. This progressed to almost constant requests for me to help him/bring him something so that he can die. This is obviously distressing and I wonder if anyone else has experienced this with a close relative.
I just don't know how to handle this, I have found that agreeing with him on most things reduces his agitation but I can't agree with him on this. Is this likely to go on much longer, it is an emotional nightmare

 

[Butter]

I'm very sorry. It is hard for everyone. There was a lady in my mother's carehome who used to pray to be 'taken' all the time. I tried to keep her company a little.

My mother decided she wanted to die and stopped eating and drinking. We tried to make sure she was cared for properly.

And now my father tells me that he wants to die. I do just listen to him and try to be sympathetic. He is unhappy. He has done all the things he set out to do. My mother died a year ago. He is 89. He wants to die while he still has some independence. I do not feel I can disagree with him - I try to acknowledge his feelings.

 

[Sue321]

Thankyou. It helps a little to know that others have been through this. Dad is 89 too. He is also blind and gets very agitated if I don't answer him immediately as he thinks I am ignoring him. This is so hard

 

[Shadow01]

My mum's most common phrase is "It's time I was gone" I get this most days and several times a day.

If I take mum anywhere for her health (doctors, hospital etc) she says very loudly "I don't want you to do anything that will prolong my life ... It's time I was gone... can you just give me a pill or something to end it?"

I respond by saying ... Mum they just want to make sure you are comfortable and not in any pain...

I get funny looks to which I just shrug ... what else can i do ?

 

[snoggy1one]

My mum too is always saying she wants to die rather than stay in the care home, and it is awful for the family to hear these desperate pleas. Mum has at times made comments about wanting to commit suicide and the carers in the home watch her all the time and are very aware of this. Mum has seen a psychiatrist and has been put on anti depressants and is very up and down with mood swings.

I try and agree with most of the things mum says as much as I can because she doesn't react well when she doesn't get her own way. It saddens me that she is so dissatisfied with everything in her life and nothing is ever right. My Mum is never happy any more and is often wishing her time on this earth would end. As a loyal and loving daughter it breaks my heart to hear these comments and I can only hope that it could be yet another phase we have to get through on the journey with Alzheimers. I just hope that things improve and I try to take one day at a time as I cannot cope looking further ahead myself.

Somehow we have to grab at any of the strength we have left and do the best we can.
Tomorrow is another day.. and we can only hope a better one than today. xx

 

[Jaycee23]

My mum is now in a nursing home up to her eyeballs in depression pills which she has taken for 18 months. She was sectioned and in hospital for 7 months but they still could not manage her depression. She was widowed two years ago and constantly says she wants to die and be with her husband. It is totally devastating that after 80 years your life ends like that. When I sit and watch her in the home which the staff are fine but the place is as old and tattered as its residents I feel I would want to slit my throat if I was my mum!! The hospital was new and imaculate so I cannot say it is the surroundings that causes mums frame of mind. She was saying it when she was at home. It is heartbreaking but I just say to her that I am so sorry she is feeling so sad and wish I could do something.

 

[60's child]

My Mum said this to me recently as well. I was really shocked as it seemed to come out of nowhere. She had never said anything like this before. I think she was having one of her "more aware I have dementia days" at the time. Having dementia has always been her biggest fear. I remember her talking about it when I was a a child and saying that is the thing she would dread the most.

 

[Butter]

I think we are fortunate if we are able to tell our children that we want to die - if that time comes.

Maybe I am wrong, but I think it is totally reasonable to want to die if you feel your life's work is done, many of the people you have loved and wanted to be with are dead, you have lost your independence, you can go nowhere and decide nothing for yourself. And maybe do nothing for yourself.

It is desperately sad. It is a living death. It is one of the greatest problems facing a developed society that we can keep people alive and care for them indefinitely.

 

[Sue321]

I agree. This is a living death and it is the most awful thing imaginable. My visits with Dad are getting shorter and shorter because I struggle with the repeated requests to die. His short term memory has completely gone and he doesn't realise that he has said something as soon as he has said it. This means that visits consist of him saying - I want to die; who am I; where am I; I want to die; can you help me; I want to die; please help me; where's my wife............................

Mum is in the nursing home next door but is not well enough to visit him very often and is obviously very upset by how he is now.

I love them both very much and most days are spent in a round of visiting one and then the other.
Help, I feel like I'm drowning.

 

[loveahug]

My mum still lives at home and won't have carers. Dad died in 2008 and mum has said ever since she wants to die to be with him. She has tried alcohol, leaving off her tablets, or taking too many. Anti-depressents don't work. She is not mobile enough to get down to the river, but if she could she would I'm sure. Not everyone copes with old age in a positive way and losing your husband after being married for 65 years is just going to add to the burden.

It's all so so sad

 

[gillou]

My MIL went through this stage of constantly saying she wanted to die, I think it is just anger at a failing body and mind, and grief for all the things she was going to do and put off till it was to late. The good news is as her condition has worsened she has stopped saying I'd be better off dead 1000 times a day and seems to just live for the moment with not much insight in the future. I also on the instructions of the Doctor stopped entering into the "want to die" conversation and changed the subject or just left the room for a couple of minutes as it wasn't doing her depression any good, or mine!