Relative moved to hospice and has stopped eating

[allwalkedout]

I’m just after peoples experiences. A close relative of mine was moved into a hospice last week. They have not eaten in over a week and have pumps fitted to administer pain relief. I’m now having to broach this subject with my young children and working out how to handle them saying goodbye and the timescale I have to work to. Realistically, from peoples experiences, how long is it likely my relative will survive? Days? A week? Weeks?

I don’t think I will take the children to see relative as they look completely different and probably quite ‘scary’ to them. They are old enough to write or speak in a video so was planning on asking them what they wanted to do. If they did insist on seeing relative I may consider taking them to visit but I’m quite apprehensive about this. Any advice on how to go forward is appreciated.

Speak to the lovely staff. They are experts in this- from all aspects, impact on families and children. They will have suggestions that are helpful for all of you- they are there for the family as well as the patient.

Definitely speak to the hospice staff. However in general if someone's condition is changing day by day, it's likely their prognosis will be days, changing week by week their prognosis is likely to be weeks.
Take care of yourself and your family too, and again, talk to the hospice staff, they are there to offer you support as well.

Thank you both. I’ll talk to them when I go in today.

Days? A week? Weeks?

Any of those tbh!

It's mind-boggling how long the human body can survive without fluids when it's in an end of life situation.

I’ve never forgiven my dad for insisting I ‘say goodbye’ to my lovely grandmother in the hospital attached to tubes, her hair all white. She was lying unconscious or asleep and died soon after. I didn’t speak to her. That’s my last memory of her. She was a lively, fun character full of warmth and love- but when I think of her she was a frail, inert old lady in a hospital.
If she is alert, do a video call for a chat to say goodbye to leave relative and children with good memories. Prepare the children by making sure they know what to say/ tell them about.
All the best for what lies ahead.

Thank you for sharing. This is what I don’t want to happen and similar to an experience of mine as a child. I think, I’m going to take the executive decision that they don’t go in and we find a way to say goodbye that works for them.

Is your relative able to say if they want to see people? My mum died in a hospice, and didn’t want to see anyone other than me and her sisters. She was exhausted and had had enough. I had cousins appearing with their children, and had to ask the hospice nurses to ask them to leave.

You don’t say how old the dc are, it is very different if they are 5 or 15. As pp say the staff should be your first port of call. They may not volunteer this information in case people don’t want to discuss it but if you ask will be able to help.

The hospice told us that if you can see a difference in weeks, it's likely to be weeks. If you can see a difference in days, it's likely to be days. And so on. This turned out to be true..

I'm sorry I can't help with how this might affect your DC but maybe this will help establish some parameters.

Wishing you well.

Thank you for the replies and advice. My relative died the next day so we didn’t get a chance to work out goodbyes. We thought we had a while longer but I suppose for them, it meant the suffering ended sooner.