Victor Silva

Victor shared his story in August of 2024.

For a long time, I didn’t want my parents to talk about dying. I thought, “Wait, if we talk about it, it’s going to happen.” But well before they got sick, my dad would bring it up at the dinner table. He didn’t want to suffer, and he didn’t want a prolonged death. And my mom agreed. The thing is, when that time comes and you’re put on the spot, it can be so hard to make that call. I’m glad now we had those dinner table conversations, and I’m glad I honored what my parents wanted, even if it wasn’t easy. 

I grew up in a strong Catholic family. My dad was from Mexico, my mom from Ecuador. Every Sunday morning we went to church. Years later, when I came out as gay to my parents, my mom was very compassionate, caring and accepting. But with his deep Catholic faith and having come of age in a culture of machismo, my dad had a hard time embracing that part of me. It was that way for a long time. Then, at the end of his life, something changed for my dad when my husband and I became my parents’ caregivers.

Dad was a delivery driver and bus driver who never stopped working until he couldn’t anymore. My mom was more like me. She loved to sing; when I was a kid, I loved hearing her beautiful voice singing along to the radio. She was always calling me, checking in, asking, “Why haven’t you called yet?” I would get so annoyed, like, “Oh, Mom.” Now what I wouldn’t give just to hear her say, “Why don’t you call me?” 

In her 80s, Mom was diagnosed with dementia and could no longer walk. Dad took Mom to Mexico in the hopes that her medical care would be more affordable there than it was here, but after an operation to place a brain stent didn’t improve my mother’s condition, my parents returned to the states a little less than a year after they had left. 

When they returned, they lived with my sister’s family for a time before deciding to move in with me and my spouse, Luis. Suddenly, I — the black sheep of the family — was in charge of my parents’ welfare. 

Mom and Dad moved in with us in August 2017. Dad had some kidney issues and nonalcoholic cirrhosis of the liver that meant he needed care, too. So Luis left his job to become my parents’ full-time caregiver. He loved my parents like they were his own.

My father’s end of life was, strangely, healing in its own way. In March 2018, Dad ended up in the hospital for a few days, then

suffered a seizure that sent him to the ICU. One morning before he died, Luis and I were with him in the hospital room when he grabbed Luis’s hand and mouthed “Gracias” to him. To me, that said that my dad had finally learned that Luis and I could be just as strong in our love as he and his wife of 45 years. 

My mother lived two and a half more years. Those months were not easy, but even during difficult days we could put on some YouTube karaoke, and Mom and I would sing along to her favorite songs. She had forgotten so much, but she still remembered the lyrics.  

When the end finally came for my mother, I had to make some decisions that made me grateful for all the dinner table conversations I’d squirmed through. Mom had forgotten how to chew or swallow. We were in the hospital, and the staff was trying to put a feeding tube down her throat, but her sensitive gag reflexes weren’t allowing it. That’s when the doctor asked me, as the medical power of attorney for my mother, what I wanted them to do. 

I knew Mom wanted to be comfortable at the end of her life, and I had promised her that I would make sure that she was as happy as she could be until the very last second. At the same time, part of me wanted to keep her around. But I knew respecting her wishes to have a peaceful and gentle end was more important than my desire to keep her on this earth. Still, this was not an easy decision. I talked with my sister and her daughters, and we prayed, and together we decided to do what we knew Mom wanted: to let her go. 

It’s another level of love, caring for your aging parents at the end of their lives. You change diapers, help them bathe, do things you never thought about doing for your parents but that they did for you when you were a child. Then you have to learn to let them go. Luis and I both learned deep compassion for our elders, not just my parents, because of that. 

Also because of my parents, I know that Luis and I need to have those dinner table conversations ourselves. For many LGBTQ folks, we’re just living day by day, trying to live our lives to the fullest to the extent that we can. Even some older LGBT people might not plan much more than a year ahead. 

However, my best friend, who is about my age, recently asked me to be her power of attorney and execute her wishes; she lost her own mother just last year. Finding someone you trust to make those decisions and having those conversations with them about what you want is so important. There are so many resources for caregivers too. All the palliative care resources that we were offered for my parents made life so much better and easier for all of us, and that’s something many people just don’t know about. 

There was one other dinner table conversation my parents had with me that I still have to honor. Dad wanted me to take his ashes to Puebla, where he grew up. So the plan is next year Luis and I will go there, to a church near the home my dad built for his parents, so that he and my mother, who just wanted to be wherever he was, can be placed at their final resting place at last. 

Compassion & Choices’ Dementia Values and Priorities Tool can help you navigate a dementia diagnosis and include it in your end-of-life planning.