There is a universal rule when it comes to end of life care. When a family member enters hospice, the rulebook gets completely thrown out the window. The entire goal shifts from curing an illness to making sure the person is as comfortable and happy as humanly possible. You give them the chocolate cake, you let them watch their favorite trash television, and you let them call the shots. But one family on Reddit completely missed the memo on what hospice actually means.
The Original Poster recently shared a heartbreaking but ultimately frustrating story about their mother. The mom is only in her fifties and is tragically dying from terminal liver cancer. She is currently living her final days under in home hospice care. The situation is incredibly heavy, and the family is understandably on edge.
The mother lived a notoriously unhealthy lifestyle for decades. She was a very heavy smoker who proudly quit over ten years ago. However, she struggled with morbid obesity her entire life, poorly managed her type two diabetes, and spent a few years drinking four to six alcoholic beverages almost every single day. All of these health factors violently collided, resulting in the terminal liver cancer diagnosis.
By the time the doctors caught the cancer, it was far too late to do anything about it. Once she started feeling the severe sickness that ultimately led to her diagnosis, she stopped drinking entirely, save for a few rare occasions. Now, she is just trying to find small pockets of joy while confined to a hospice bed.
The Original Poster is a dedicated child who visits their dying mother two or three times every single week. They spend their time doing the little things that matter most. They talk, they watch television together, and the Original Poster brings her whatever small comforts she asks for. During one of these visits, the mother confessed that she really missed her favorite drink and just wanted a couple of cans to enjoy.
Instead of immediately shutting her down, the Original Poster did the responsible thing. They grabbed a list of the mother’s daily medications and painstakingly cross checked them to make sure there would be no dangerous interactions with alcohol. Once they confirmed it was safe, they waited for a really good day when the mom was not taking any heavy pain medications.
On that good day, the Original Poster showed up with a six pack of her absolute favorite five percent alcoholic beverage. The mother was thrilled. She happily drank two cans, enjoyed her evening, and then drifted off to sleep. It was a tiny, harmless moment of normalcy for a woman who is actively dying.
A few days later, the Original Poster casually updated their siblings and mentioned the drinks. The siblings completely lost their minds. They got incredibly mad and started screaming that their mother has liver cancer and her liver is already failing. They accused the Original Poster of actively harming their mother and causing her to die faster by bringing her the alcohol.
The logic the siblings are using is completely flawed. The mother is already on hospice care. The entire definition of hospice means the patient is going to pass away and medical intervention to prolong life has permanently stopped. The mother is not going to suddenly recover if she skips a beer, and she is not going to instantly drop dead because she had two light drinks on a good day.
The Original Poster pointed out that it has been weeks since that visit, and the mother still has four leftover cans sitting untouched. She is not going on a wild bender. She just wanted the taste of her favorite drink one last time. The Original Poster firmly believes they gave their mother an evening of enjoyment when she does not have many left to experience.
Unfortunately, the drama has now spread to the extended family, and the Original Poster has been catching massive flack from every direction for weeks. But the internet completely rallied behind them. Medical professionals and former hospice nurses flooded the comment section to confirm that giving a dying patient whatever they want is exactly how end of life care works.
You do not put a person on hospice on a strict diet. If a dying woman wants a cold beer, a slice of pizza, or a giant hot fudge sundae, you sprint to the store and get it for her. The siblings need to stop projecting their grief and anger onto the Original Poster. The only thing that matters right now is making their mom smile, and a cold six pack did exactly that.