Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire How long does death take?

18 months ago, my brother was put in hospice care with a projected 2 weeks to live. They said his kidneys had shut down, liver wasn't working and he was bleeding internally. He is still living today. Still mobil and he drives at times,but not much.He is 83.Go figure. On the other hand a good friend contracted Covid and was dead in less than a week

Hospice care, they said pops could go any time. Yeah right......almost two weeks.

It took my dad 10 miserable fuggin days. I was there for all of it, not sure I've recovered completely and it was a decade ago. Not pretty. No mercy.

Hot load of morphine.


We treat dogs and cats with more dignity than our sick and dying.

Thank you. Sad but true.

That was the case with my dad. They had him on morphine then cut the oxygen off with more morphine. Told me he'd see me tomorrow, we both knew the score

Mom went on a respirator in January, they were having difficulty keeping her BP up, reality she was dying....

Kept her alive till all us kids could get there the next day....

She had a UTI and was septic, organs starting to shut down, next step would be dialysis....

We decided 'enough'...

They took her off support, and she passed in 25 minutes....

Sometimes, though, much, much longer...............

Wife's dad lasted around a month or a little longer with a 'do not resuscitate' directive at his request.

My mom died 11 days after being admitted to hospital diagnosed with a fast spreading cancer. It had metastasized and already spread into her brain and internal organs. It was left up to me to say yea or nay whether to keep her alive a little longer via assisted breathing, nourishment and potent pain meds or let her go right then. As difficult as it was, I opted to let her go. The only right thing to do but still was the toughest decision I've ever had to make , ...so far...

'Code Blues' in hospitals are NOT cool to watch happen...

Wife's best friend just recently died at her home under Hospice care. She chose to stop all life assisting aides, meds and treatments. She lived a couple of weeks longer before passing peacefully in her home with husband, family and friends.

I was a Paramedic in central Georgia in 1982. When we transported a pt. we asked the wife to bring along all meds. I ran a call on a terminal cancer patient, and his wife handed me a one liter bottle of "Brompton's Cocktail." Looked like cough syrup. I read the label, it contained 5,000 mg of morphine sulphate.

What a massive load of morphine. For a normal person, a person not habituated to morphine, if you took 100 mg of morphine, orally, it would probably kill you. This brown bottle had 50 times that much morphine. I asked mom about the dosage, and she said "Dr. Jackson said to give George just one tablespoon at a time. He said that if I gave George 3 tablespoons at once, it might be all over."

The doctor was giving the housewife the prescription for physician assisted suicide, with sort of a "wink wink." Her husband was down to 125 pounds, and wearing a diaper. He wasn't going to live for another month, no matter what. If Mom had the brains, and the courage, she would give him the big dose, and he would fall asleep, he would feel no pain, and in a half hour or so he would peacefully pass into the spirit world.

Over the years I had handed to me about 15 bottles of the Brompton's Cocktail, most of the moms either didn't get the picture, or were too chicken to use the stuff to end their husband's suffering.

In conservative central Georgia, 40 years ago, physician assisted suicide was a routine practice.

It is pretty much an individual thing. Some people will themselves to hang on, and others simply quit. There's a surprising number of people who die in the first two weeks of January, it is thought that they hang on to not spoil the holidays for their families.

Work in Henry County? By chance?

Henry County. McDonough. Good guess, no, I was in Baldwin County, about 50 miles away.

Help him out with a pillow. Hate to see it fugg up your weekend plans.

The more threads I read like this, the more I hope I drop dead at like 75 packing out an elk or deer. Or a grizz attack.

Time you die minus time you are conceived. OMV.

When my mom passed from Alzheimer’s in a care facility while under hospice care, I remember the hospice nurse ask one another at shift change if each had “enough” morphine. Few states authorize assisted death/suicide. Few religious groups do not condone it but for the patient and all suffering they’ve endured my belief is positive.

That's how it struck me too...hahaha!

When I get to the point of wanting to kick it I’m thinking of chasing a bottle of viagara with some good whiskey and finding a hot escort and have her ride me till my heart quits. As a last resort sit on my face until I quit twitching.

I'm told by nurses that not all hospices are "bad", but I don't like what I've seen in any of the care centers or hospitals.
The protocols have been very similar.
A number of physicians have talked of how immoral the hospice protocols are.

it's 2021, far past the time we start making drs who have patients die in their care face a grand jury inquiry. wrong doing, no wrong doing make them face a GJ made up of people who ahve lost people in medical care.