My mom is 85, has heart failure, atrial fibrillation and 2 leaking valves. Her life expectancy?

She is not a candidate for surgery. I want to be mentally prepared.

This is a very difficult question and I do not believe that anyone can answer that. However, in order to prepare yourself mentally, you need to consider this. The life expectancy of the human being is around 80 years, but woman lives slightly longer on average. Your mother have already reached a very high age, for which you can be thank full. Spend as much time with her as possible , do what you can and don't let her spend her last years alone. It is bad to loose a parent, but make sure there are no unsolved issues between family members. The death of a parent is terrible, so make sure that everyone is prepared to live without her. Good luck.

Thank you all for your thoughtful answers. It is very hard. Report It

Start preparing now....Enjoy the time you have with her...

Try not to think in terms of weeks or months - live day to day

Have valve replacements been discussed? Is she a candidate? I work in Open Heart ICU and it is pretty much the norm to operate on a 90 year old now. If the valves are fixed (Aortic and Mitral I presume?), it should fix the heart failure symptoms if she pulls through the surgery. For the Atrial Fib., she could have the surgeon perform the Maze procedure during the valve surgery while he's in there in attempt to erradicate it. Or, she could just live with the Atrial Fib and get mechanical valves since she is probably allready on Coumadin for it.

At 85 she is already past the normal life expectancy. I am 49 and have heart failure,atrial fibrillation and two leaky valves so this is not just because of your mothers age. My sister died of breast cancer years ago and we all thought we were prepared for it but even though we knew it was coming how can you really prepare for a loss like that? Just love your mom in the now and appreciate what time you do have with her. By doing what you can for her you will be doing for yourself.