The sisters are convinced that Dad is dying. He was confused when Far Away Sister called this morning. While Sister thought he was in good spirits when she talked to him, she also thought it sounded like his chest is congested. Brother is ignoring Dad. The sisters don't like that. Far Away Sister called and left him a voice mail this morning. He didn't return her call. We want to make sure he is aware of what is going on. We don't want him to come back later and blame us because he was too tied up in the wedding preparations to notice and we should have told him. I wrote him an email from the sisters explaining what we saw and telling him we were taking care of everything, but that he needed to be aware of what was going on and suggesting he call Dad daily.
I don't think he's going to respond to that one, either. He may be avoiding pain right now by not facing this, but in the future I fear he will be overwhelmed by guilt and pain. Dad is bothered that his only son is ignoring him. He's made a number of comments about Brother rejecting our family. I feel bad for Dad, that he has this emotional pain in his life as he faces his death. I'm not sure I'll feel as sorry for Brother when he has to face his guilt in the future. At least I hope he'll wake up enough some day to face what he is doing right now. I hope he is capable of feeling guilt.
I have provided pastoral care to too many families after a death to not be aware of all the potential issues. It's different, though, when it's my own family.
No comments:
Post a Comment