Beginning of the end in Diary

*When someone is diagnosed with an illness, you deliver messages of hope and well wishes. When someone dies, you comfort them and say things like, “they’re at peace now” and “they’re not in pain anymore”. There is nothing to say when you get a prognosis of 1-2 months. Every single person I have told that my Dad’s cancer is Stage IV has possibly only weeks left have said the exact same thing: “I don’t even know what to say”.
I don’t expect them to know what to say. There is nothing to say. I cant even look at him without my heart breaking into a million pieces. You’re lucky to get 10 good seconds with him while he’s lucid and then he starts slurring and anything you do manage to translate makes absolutely no sense. You get caught up in these feelings of wanting it to be over, but you don’t want to see him go but you don’t want to see him suffer. He’d never have wanted us to see him like this.
I cant even begin to imagine the pain he is experiencing. The tumour in his oesophagus is so big that his voice has this strange hoarse echo. His mouth is so sore and covered in ulcers because he cant drink more than a sip of water or cordial every hour or so. They’ve done a course of radiation on his spine but I think the cancer is in the bones as well which is causing his calcium levels to rise, which is causing the delirium and confusion but also causes basically every movement to be painful.
He hasn’t mentioned any pain in relation to the pancreatic cancer but he’s now jaundiced as a result of that tumour blocking his bile duct.
The whole situation is fucked really. There is no other way to put it.
I’m taking next week off work to stay up at Mum and Dad’s. If everything goes to plan, he should be able to leave hospital today and spend the last of his time at home. At the hospital he kept thinking he was at home or would say things about going home so hopefully actually being there will help. *

I drafted that entry a couple of weeks ago. A week later I said goodbye and he passed away the next morning. I don’t even know how to write about my emotions dealing with it all. One moment you’re fine and then in a matter of seconds you get overwhelmed with sadness and anger and grief and confusion.
Maybe a few weeks down the track I will be able to write about it, but right now its not even like its real. It’ll be the days that I go home to visit and get excited about seeing him and realising he’s not there - and will never be - that it will all really get real.
I had a feeling 2014 was going to be weird… Never thought it would be this painful…