audreyh1
Give me a museum and I'll fill it. (Picasso) Give me a forum ...
Well - it doesn't seem so controversial.It is a controversial thread.
Well - it doesn't seem so controversial.It is a controversial thread.
OP is in the US, I am in the US and you are in the US... the death with dignity law that I was referring to is in the US if you had followed the thread.
There is a nuance of a difference between death with dignity and euthanasia... the former is simply accelerating death since one needs a terminal illness to qualify (and must also pass a physchiatric exam). Since depression is treatable and not terminal, I would not be comfortable with that as a valid reason for euthanasia and it would not fall under death with dignity laws.
Here's a powerful article about a woman with Alzheimer's that decided to check out prior to the worst happening. Very well written.
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/17/magazine/the-last-day-of-her-life.html
In my late FIL's case, his daughter from his first marriage showed up and did all she could to stop his DNR order in the belief that "he couldn't have possibly meant it when he signed it". He was 92 and used up. Fortunately, MIL prevailed............. Otherwise, might have one family member have one view, than other have a totally opposing view. With the paperwork done, I hope they are reasonable enough to say "well, at least we honor his wishes, which was in writing."
Here's a powerful article about a woman with Alzheimer's that decided to check out prior to the worst happening. Very well written.
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/17/magazine/the-last-day-of-her-life.html
yeah ... as assisted suicide becomes more common, that's the slippery slopeAt some point, it may be the only 'treatment' that insurance will pay for. Incentives will be provided to do it.
Here's a powerful article about a woman with Alzheimer's that decided to check out prior to the worst happening. Very well written.
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/17/magazine/the-last-day-of-her-life.html
Michigan State over Michigan.
Oh - for me and the assisted dying. I don't know. I'm not of the view that if I get a tough diagnosis that I would immediately end all treatment and just wait to die. If I felt that there was some meaningful (even though unlikely) chance for survival or extended reasonably good quality of life then I would probably want to try it. The place where I could draw the line would be when the treatment itself decreased quality of life and was not effective and it became clear that it wasn't extending life in a good quality of way. I guess I think I would know when I was at that point.
A good book on end of life care is Being Mortal by Atul Gawande.
It is an incremental approach. First death with Dignity, then for anything. That is what has happened in the Netherlands.
No, I do not endorse killing another human beings because they are ill. (That's not to say I would have been all that upset if someone put a bullet in that disturbed Las Vegas sniper before he murdered all those innocent people). As far as being terminally ill, I can see declining the use of extraordinary measures, and signing a DNR, but not easily.
My experience with hospital staff seems to be the opposite of what many cite here, very willing to let my parents shuffle off this mortal coil, before they were ready.
I recall when my son was 20 he went into the hospital for surgery, and they were after him to sign a DNR. Umm, no.
It seems quite horrible to me to deprive someone of food or water. I am crazed if I'm without water for two hours. So when someone has dementia, it's ok to torture them by depriving them of food or water? That was one of the options.
And all dementia is not created equal. So what happens when that person who so boldly said they wanted to be killed off, regresses and becomes frightened? Reminds me of the people who when they are 50 are proudly proclaiming that they would rather be in a nursing home than possibly place any burden whatsoever on their children; but when they are 85 and in the nursing home they are howling to get out.
It's too much of a slippery slope.
That is quite an article. It illustrates the difficulty with making a decision to kill yourself before you become incapable of doing so. Sandy seems to have done it at precisely the right moment. But without the active cooperation of her family I doubt she would have been able to get it done. To be safe, and to avoid the decision being taken away from your old self by your less cognizant new self, I suspect most would need to do it sooner - before they would prefer. An interesting factor in the article is that there is probably no effective way around that dilemma. The Dutch experience shows that laws permitting assisted suicide for incompetent Alzheimer's patients in accordance with directives drawn up when the patient was competent don't work. In practice the vast majority of the Dutch doctors just can't bring themselves to kill someone who no longer is able to articulate that desire. To me this indicates that peoples' fears about euthanasia laws opening a slippery slope towards premature death is probably misplaced.Here's a powerful article about a woman with Alzheimer's that decided to check out prior to the worst happening. Very well written.
https://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/17/magazine/the-last-day-of-her-life.html