Dear Marlene,

What a difficult situation you are in! My mother-in-law lost oxygen during hip replacement surgery and this greatly affected her memory (among other more serious things) and she could not hold it in her mind that she was not going to recover. When this was conveyed to her in various ways she was devastated and shocked and this happened nearly every day in some way or another. I sometimes felt as I was turning a knife in a wound as she could not hold onto this information and it was like seeing her distressed nearly every day. It reminded me of the Drew Barrymore movie called "50 first dates" but of course it was extremely painful for my husband and I and for the nursing staff. My mother-in-law eventually went under hospice care just over a year ago. We found them to be very helpful in consulting about when the time was right for her to enter hospice (in her case, she did not have cancer but lots of other problems due to complications for loss of oxygen during surgery so it was actually difficult to get her into hospice as it was difficult to ascertain that she was likely to have 6 months or less to live). Nevertheless, the work we did with the hospice staff was very helpful in both leading up to her actual care under them and in her care in her last months. It felt as if we were able to shift some of the burden of trying to make extremely difficult decisions to experts who cared about my mother-in-law but who also cared that my husband and I did not deplete ourselves in caring for her. Plus, her pain and discomfort was finally addressed in a compassinate manner. Please take care of yourself as you can't help your husband if you are feeling as if you are barely holding on. I sometimes find it difficult to take care of myself and feel pleasure or comfort when someone I love is so distressed.

Sophie