Comments - Latest Popular Stories, Instablogs Community by Jacqui

Peter

Peter — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

Agree with the article on the opinion that terminally ill patients should be able to decide their destiny, and have the ability to choose any experimental drug they see fit. We are in charge of our bodies, not the government, and we need to make our Representatives and Senators profoundly aware of that fact through our voting process.

Oscar

Oscar — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

I agree one 110%. The government must be made aware of OUR rights over OUR bodies...

The Church should also NOT interfere.

Michael C

Michael C — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

”The Church should also NOT interfere”.

Amen to that.

Since WHEN did the church, any church, think it has the right to have the deciding moral call on deciding who lives or dies?!!

It’s a personal call. Period.

This interference is yet another (and a particularly inelegant and pernicious) example of churches trying to recuperate people’s pain and distress for their own attendance figures and annual turnover.

Revolting.

Oscar

Oscar — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

I’m not even sure how the CHURCH could possibly consider a terminally ill patient’s RIGHT TO DIE a sin..

We’re not talking about assisted suicide, nor random suicide...We are talking about ”LETTING GO”,: the right to refuse forced artificially induced agony..

I’m told to LET GO, LET GOD by the Church..If I was terminally ill, I’d say God had his plan for me and was speaking loud and clear... Don’t wait around for a miracle, time to wrap it up and come home..

Margaret

Margaret — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

This is a very serious decision, however someone of sound mind should be free decide if they wish to die early. The problem is of course, how do you prove they were not coerced or pressured into making the decision?

Oscar

Oscar — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

The proof will surely be the same as the 2007 Mexico City law which was quite similar, but limited to patients terminal patients with six months or less to live... The patient will need to state and sign his/her wishes in front of various, non-related and related witnesses to assure they have been in no way coerced or pressured into making their fatal decision.

Sanyog

Sanyog — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

I think assisted suicide should be legal everywhere. For three years before my grand father died, his quality of life was horrible. He was in and out of nursing homes. Eventually the medi-care ran out, and he had to live at home, with no nurse. My elderly grandmother struggled to take care of him. He could barely walk, and was eventually forced into a wheel chair. He would abuse laxatives, and wake up in the middle of the night shitting himself, and on the way to the bathroom, he would fall over because he was too weak to walk. I lived with my grand parents, and would often have to pick him up.

One night, after he was covered in his own feces, and had blood coming down his head after he had fallen, I had to pick him up. He just turned to me and said “I hope the Lord takes me soon”. He should have died 3 years before he did. His life, and all his loved ones would have been much better. He did not deserve to die like the way he did.

Oscar

Oscar — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

My wife watched her beloved Grandfather die slowly..Every year the Doctor’s seemed to cut another piece of him claiming ”this would make what was left of his life much better.” He Suffered horribly: physically and emotionally. Everyday he would cry and beg his family to help him die. It was horrific for Him and their family..His ”life” was NOT prolonged, as that type of pain and suffering could NOT be considered living. HIS AGONY WAS PROLONGED, nothing more. What happened to him would be bettered refered to as ”legal, medically induced torture” than life saving efforts.

Alex

Alex — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

If someone wants to end their life, they’re going to do it - whether it through a clean, monitored process or with a jug of Drano. I don’t think its the government’s place to deny that right, but I do think it should be heavily monitored and regulated to prevent... yano, murders.

Oscar

Oscar — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

The exact propsal has not been published yet, but I know it will require a presigned, witnessed document by the patient for the exact reason of preventing any type of illegal or coerced acts.

Joanna

Joanna — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

I plan to kill myself before ever needing to live in a nursing or assisted living home. Once my time is up and I no longer contribute anything to society and find myself needing the support of others I will lift their burden and step out with dignity. I won’t waste away in some old folks home or subject myself to the experience of watching my body fall apart until I eventually find myself incontinent in a bed hooked up to a ventilator where my relatives will just wind up deciding whether or not I stay alive anyway.

Oscar

Oscar — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

I agree, I don’t want to put that type of burden on my family; emotionally, mentally, or financially...

Celso Camargo

Celso Camargo — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

I agree with you! The scenario you pointed is not life, but hell on Earth!

Oscar

Oscar — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

I know of family’s that have been devastateded for years as both terminally ill loved one and themselves linger in LIMBO, no moving forward, no going back..It is simply TRAGIC.

On top of it, after finally losing their loved one is such way, many times they are financially destroyed, losing their home to pay medical bills and more.

It seems inhumane to take ones right to die, regardless of what the Church, or anyone else has to say.

Celso Camargo

Celso Camargo — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

Oscar, this was an excellent article!

I have to say that, though Catholic Church makes a great job in some aspects, sometimes is too medieval, trying to bring back values from 400 years ago.

Oscar

Oscar — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

Celso , you know even though I am no longer a ”practicing” Catholic and tend to practically RUN from the Church, I still hold strongly to my Faith.

I look at Mexico and wonder what would happen if EVERYONE lost faith in the Church like I did...I tend to think, Mexico would only be more violent, more desperate, and more chaotic...

But involving ones RIGHT TO DIE, I DON’T even understand the issue, why the protest? This is NOT suicide, it is simply letting nature and GOD take over: no more drugs, pin pricks, artificial living; no more suffering; somply LETTING GO AND LETTING GOD: Where is the problem, what is there to protest? Isn’t this EXACTLY what the Church has always taught us to do: Submiss to God’s will?

Michael C

Michael C — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

Oscar at his best. Which means as usual.

Your wife must have suffered terribly at that time.

Of course people should have the right to decide to curtail, or stop, vital treatment(s) if they feel they cannot carry on.

You know, Oscar, France is very far behind on this subject.

People are often taken to court by the State for helping people to die, or shutting their eyes to it. AND, suicide is still a crime here!!!

I once did some research on this, and it showed that, in the (strangely named) ”developed countries”, catholic countries are particularly loathe to modernise their thinking on this question.

I wonder why........

Oscar

Oscar — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

My wife’s Grandfather was a living GOD to her. . In college, she was only 10 minutes away, and would go home on lunch to tend to his diabetes ulcered legs, care for him, and listen to stories from a blessed and joyful past. I believe the hardest part of her moving to Mexico was leavin Grandpa and her fear of losing him-

My wife had just delivered our middle child, 2 months previous. Her Grandfather had been getting progressivily sicker over the past year. One day her Mother-in-law called and told my wife she needed to get home as they (Her mother and uncle) had decided and were going to be allowed by the state to have grandpa’s feeding tube disconnected.Grandpa would be kept ”comfortable” and it would most likely take 9-14 days for him to pass.

My wife and newborn were on the first international plane available, when she got to the airport, he had just passed., her family was waiting for her to take her to the hospital.

My wife was in shock at what she found in the hospital. Her parents didn’t tell her about the amputation, they were trying to protect ”their baby girl” from more pain. My wife held her Grandfather’s body and has been haunted ever since...He was a very large man in life: In size, heart and spirit.

He was left gaunt, his blind eyes blind still open, glazed and gazing upward. He was black and blue from dialysis and injections, he was literally cut in half..Legless.

15 years later, my wife still mourns him, cries, and cannot forget what the incredible man was reduced to ...BY LAW.. Trying to imagine the amount of suffering involved to become a butchered, prodded mass like he was left, only makes it worse.

It amazes me France is so far behind..suicide illegal? How is it punished if one has already taken their life? Or is the punishment if the suicide attempt fails?

It seems like not long ago I watched a documentary of a young woman fighting for her right to die, pleading..She had some form of disease which caused horrific pain (I think with the abdoman), I think she was from Europe, but I don’t remeber where.. It was horrifically sad, seeing her suffering.

It just doesn’t make sense to me, unless it is for finacial gain by the hospitals...Either way, it is wrong..It causes not only the patient, but their entire family to suffer in agony, limbo, and despair.

Michael C

Michael C — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

You make a very interesting point here concerning your wife’s being aware, or not, of what was happening.

Maybe this is a no-answer question. I don’t know. Trying to protect depends on who it is. If the person is mentally strong, maybe, but if not....

That’s a personal call.

But, at the end of the day, it surely could have been possible, when she got to the hospital, to ”hide” the fact that he had no legs. Filling the bed with stuff for example, something like that. I don’t know. I know that sounds horrible, but maybe they should have hid the operation from her all the way....I really don’t know.

France?

Oh, France has three types of laws.

a) Laws they enact and implement for a change.....

b) Laws they enact and then don’t implement (means/money etc)....

c) Laws they enact and implement, but don’t enforce.

That’s the case for suicide candidates. They don’t ever actually get punished (and so much the better, obviously)

The woman you were talking about, who died of a rare and extremely painful face cancer that mutilated her horribly, began a national press campaign to be able to get put to sleep.

I do NOT however, agree with that (and I respect anyone who thinks otherwise, of course). The job of the state, and medical personnel under the Hippocratic Oath, is NOT to do the deliberate killing of people who cannot do it for themselves.

I personally found her campaign rather vulgar and sensationalist in appearance (fors and againsts, with her reading the press ang giving more interviews), but, of course, I DO understand her desperation, and she was surely not thinking right.

What happened?

She finally plucked up the courage to see a vet friend (or was it a doctor?) who gave her a bottle of the horse traquilizers that she took. She died minutes later what appears to have been an agonizing death.....

Oscar

Oscar — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

My wife not knowing, wasn’t relevant to the story, but finding him the way he was left by medicine ”improving his way of life” was tramatic for all..

I would imagine many countries have the law against suicide, written, but not enforced...Doubtful one would actually consider a law before taking their life, but it can’t hurt to have it on the books..Maybe it serves for people for are not ill, but depressed, as if they do not achieve death in their suicide attempt, there would be legal recourse to ”force” them into pyschiatric counseling, which would safe them from ”wasting” their life in strife.

I remember the documentary I watched was about a young woman who’s intestines, stomache, bowels would essentially shut down.. I don’t remeber the disease, but it was terminal and would lead to excruciating pain, followed by starvation and death.. She did not start any type of campaign, but was involved in a legnthy legal battle for her right to die...which was continuously denied, and she would continuosly appeal.. I imagine the same law against suicide was in act, because in the end, monitors were appointed to make sure she didn’t try to kill herself and that nobody would try to aid her in a assisted suicide.. She died a horrific death..her family desperate, watching her waste away and in agony..I think a large part of her family died with her.

While I do understand and wholeheartedly accept and agree to a physicians Hypocratic Oath, it applies, in my mind, to those who have a life to continue... If one is terminally ill, it’s essentially the end of the road...Whether one chooses to linger at the end, should be a CHOICE, the last choice one would have, it MUST BE RESPECTED......

Michael C

Michael C — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

Yeah, I guess you’re right about the suicide law thing.

After all, no-one needs to be legally ENCOURAGED!!

Yeah. That works.

About the terminally ill, I think I didn’t express myself very well in my comment. Sorry.

It’s just that I seem to have the opinion, (and, as I said before, I am quite willing to have it challenged), that if you ARE PHYSICALLY ABLE to take the drugs you need to end your life yourself, then you should do it yourself, and not expect others to make up for your lack of courage.

Why?

Because if you’re not ready to do it yourself, then maybe it’s because you really deep down want to live, and others should not choose for you.

Maybe I’m completely wrong.

Who knows.

(Some of us will be able to answer that question, unfortunately, with more pertinence in what I hope shall be a long time from now).

But I think the new law in your country is a good law.

Because, if you don’t want to be treated any more, then you should be able to have your wishes respected.

No-one’s killing you, it’s your call.

And that’s how it should be, in my (very) humble opinion......

Maybe that’s all just a semantic difference......

I’m quite aware of that.

Oscar

Oscar — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

I think I was the one to not convey my response well...

I’ve got alot on my mind lately and it seems my thought processes and english are getting worse and worse...

I AGREE WITH YOU 110%..The state or nation should NOT and can NOT be placed under fire for protecting LIFE.

I do NOT agree nor even fully understand assisted suicide. Death is the right of one, nobody should be allowed to make the decision, and unfortunatly, although it may be difficult to watch a loved one suffer: SHOULD NOT BE ABLE TO LEGALLY ASSIST their death.

If one is too ill to do it themselves, I would think they would be too ill to voice their desires on dying or not.

It doesn’t take alot of stregnth (this may sound cold) to swallow pills or poison... The RIGHT TO DIE, I think must be cognitivly expressed and requested by the patient.