(no subject)

My grandfather is in hospital. His prostate cancer has spread, and he now has tumours in his brain. He has good days and bad days. Both times I have visited he has been lucid and remembered us, but even then he would forget names, and I have heard that he has lost visits from family, and had times when he couldn't finish a sentence.

Steroids are helping, but it is all palliative. When I first visited, a week ago, he said that he expected to go home over the weekend. He probably won't go home again. Mim says that while I was out of the room when we visited on Sunday, he said to her quietly that he didn't think he was doing too well. I think he knows that he's not going to get better from this one.

He is still himself, he is just frustrated (and angry, and probably frightened) when his memory fails him so completely, and he can't manage.

The doctors said that it could be any day now, but it won't be longer than months.

We hope that he has a heart attack earlier than later. We want him to have a dignified death, while he still has his self.