I hope my mother will die every day. (There - I've said it.)
Mum went from dodgy and in denial but independent to completely unable to function overnight. She had a fall which resulted in hospital for 2 months and I moved her from there straight into a care home near me. That was more than 2 years ago. Since then, her confabulations and delusions have become constant, her mood is variable, she is incontinent now and has no memory. She is never happy and has no interest in anyone or anything.
However... she is also mostly fit and healthy, despite breaking her hip a year ago, and has no meds apart from the occasional paracetamol or laxative. In other words, she ain't dying.
We've always discussed death and dying in our family and all share the same pragmatic attitude about quality over quantity. I have mum's Living Will (now called an Advance Directive) stating her wishes not to receive any further medical treatment should she lose mental capacity or become dependent on others for the rest of her life, so both those criteria have been met.
But instead of the dignified death she desperately wanted, she's ended up with dementia which none of us foresaw. Whilst it's clear cut enough to make decisions about voluntary euthanasia when a person has capacity and something like MND, with dementia it is impossibly difficult. Even if it were legal, it would involve someone else taking the 'now' decision and that's a complete minefield - entirely subjective and, of course, open to abuse.
So here we are. Instead of being able to respect my mother's wishes to 'put her out of her misery', should she ever become 'like that', (she made me promise I would shoot her!!) I am now faced with watching her horrible decline (and it IS horrible), possibly over umpteen years. And at enormous expense, of course.
Dementia has ruined the end of my mother's life and it is ruining mine (and my distant sibling's, to an extent.) If I sound cold and callous, I'm sorry - we are not a close family and she was never 'my lovely mum'. But if I'm honest, I just don't see who benefits from keeping her alive - certainly not mum. I often find myself wishing that when she fell getting off that bus (2 and a half years ago) and hit her head slightly, that she'd hit it much harder, or that she'd have a major stroke or something that would finish her off. The thought of watching this decline continue over several more years just fills me with terror, dread and blackness.
(Sorry for any offence I may have caused.)