UPDATE: Today, I will be turning off life support for my father... (He passed away quietly...)

[Liberty Belle]

81. I'm so sorry for your ordeal. Try not to blame your brother and become bitter.

He obviously cared about your father to attempt CPR for 15 minutes, and is probably blaming himself for not doing it correctly.

While it's so hard to lose a parent, I lost both of mine to Alzheimer's after a prolonged, heart-wrenching ordeal that went on for years.

Take comfort in the fact that your father didn't suffer. I once interviewed a heart attack survivor who was without a heartbeat for nearly 20 minutes but miraculously survived with very little brain damage other than short term memory loss. He said he didn't remember anything from the time he was jogging in front of a fire station just before collapsing (where a nurse and firefighters all worked trying to save him) until he awoke in a hospital many hours later.

I found it comforting to know that if a loved one ever passed of a heart attack, they wouldn't have had any pain or fear.

That said, do ask to be able to speak to your father by phone. They say that hearing is the last sense to go if there is any mind left to know what you are saying.

It is hard to be far away when a parent dies.That happened to me when on vacation overseas,and my Mom passed away in a nursing home. They tried to reach me, but unfortunately I was on a plane with my phone in airplane mode when her time came.There was a hospice nurse and chaplain with her, but my brother couldn't get there in time, either. It sounded like she probably had a massive stroke and was in a coma, so hopefully had no realization that family wasn't with her, but still I wish I could have been.

May your father pass peacefully, and may you be able to say goodbyes and comforting words to him when the time comes.