I'm known as Dick_Dastardly in Team Andrax and Gromit in Team Cybernauts as well as the old grid. I don't spend a lot of time in the forums nowdays, but visit from time to time.

My dad is in a hospice and is dying from complications stemming from cancer surgery that he went through in 2006.

The doctors gave him just a few hours to live last Thursday when he slipped into a semi-coma. They can't do anything for him medically, so he was transferred from the hospital to the hospice the next morning.

It's hard on all of us, since he looked like he was on the mend until last Thursday. He was walking, joking around and getting stronger. He's spoken a few times in the last week, but no complete sentences. Just a word here or there. We know he can hear and understand us, but can't respond like he'd like to.

Someone in the family is by his side 24 hours a day and we all visit him every day after work. There's no life support, no IVs, no monitors. Just a morphine drip that gives a dose ever hour. He's a strong man, but is slipping away more and more every hour.

Most of the time, this doesn't seem real. I'm finding it hard to accept. Logically, I can see what's happening. That doesn't make it any more real though. I miss him already. I wish he didn't hurt.