Patients with renal failure typically have 1-3 weeks to live should one forgo treatment. She had been on dialysis for approximately two-three years until complications arose causing pain and a significant decline in quality of life. Sometime in September, she was placed on hospice care. Grandma Packing Rat was only given a few weeks. She had several rough days, but managed to pull through.
Though we expected her appetite to diminish, she continues to eat – certainly more than she used to. Grandma Packing Rat finished 1/4 of a coconut pie! She socializes with visitors very well and quite oriented to person, place and time. Her memory appears to be intact. This leaves the hospice care providers and physicians confused. According to her blood tests, she is not dying despite renal failure.
I can’t explain it myself, but who cares.
Man, that’s tough. I’ve read a lot about people living longer than expected when they have something to live for: an anniversary, a holiday, to see someone, etc. But years? That’s some will.
The time she was on dialysis was also unexpected. She’s a tough one.
She has a hankering for buffets – that’s how good her appetite is now. And she eats a sizable portion, too.
I had a similar experience when they took my grandma off her meds before she died. It was deemed near enough that the family was coming in to see her, from all over, expecting a funeral. She went from completely out of it, to walking and comunicating. It only lasted about a week, then she reverted, and passed. We did get her back for that week, though.