 |
|
|
|
|
Right To Die? |
|
I'm firmly on the "right to die" side of the debate, for a variety of reasons that are elaborated on in the daily updates archived below. More recent blog entries are added on top.
The ongoing struggle of that husband in Florida to get them to let his wife die is a subject ripe for discussion. I haven't talked about it yet since it just depresses me, but I can't put it off any longer, since it ties into a larger issue I want to discuss. The link above points to an article about the husband's recent appearance on Larry King Live. While being "interviewed" by Larry, he really let the parents of his comatose wife have it.
I think it's a tragedy to keep anyone alive in that sort of brainless misery, especially if they asked to be put out of their misery beforehand. Whether or not the woman wanted to be kept alive as a vegetable for decades is almost irrelevant; I feel like doctors have a duty to not allow that sort of prolonged torture. For all we know she's suffering from 14 years of nightmares that she can never awake from. Okay, probably not, since she's got like, no brain activity, which is the main reason her husband wants them to let her body die. But just hypothetically speaking; I don't for a minute assume that sleeping for 15 years would be a lot of fun, or a peaceful experience. If you're never going to wake up, or won't ever be in your right mind if you do, why would you want the doctors to keep you alive and (potentially) suffering in the first place? The case of that poor woman underlines the need for a living will. I of course don't have one and can't be arsed, but I don't have any religious nuts for immediate relatives, so since both of my parents and my girlfriend know that I wouldn't want to linger in a vegetative state I should be fine. So to speak.
As for the larger issue, I don't think anyone should be kept in the living hell of a coma for forever, if they have no hope of recovery. People do come out of comas from time to time, but if the brain is dead or so severely damaged that there's no hope of every returning to a reasonable level of function, I'd rather be dead. I can understand some people who, for whatever religious reason, think that life is precious and all of that. I don't respect it and think they are fools, but I can understand that lots of people on earth have a need to let some ancient writings determine their actions in the most critical areas of their lives. I think it's insane, but whatever, I do understand it. It just depresses me, especially when it affects other peoples' lives adversely.
I feel bad for the husband in this case. His wife died 13 years ago, and he's not had a day's peace since then, and his battle to let her rest in peace continues to this day. I think any criticism of him for having a girlfriend and a life is ridiculous; what's he supposed to do, remain celibate for the rest of his life? His wife is dead (or as good as) and has been for more than a decade. He'd like to move on, but if he gets a divorce he'll lose all legal right to try and follow through on his wife's last wishes, and would spend the rest of his life thinking about her lying in a vegetative state, brain dead, forever. So he's had to put his personal life on hold for over a decade, spend all the time and money on legal bills, all just to try and protect a woman he once loved from her stupid parents. Why can't they get a life? Move on, make something of themselves, etc. Sure, they're too old to have any more kids, but why dedicate the rest of their lives to torturing their daughter? It's time to move on, old people. This isn't Kill Bill; she's not going to come out of her coma just in time to bite the lip off of a rapist and go on to take a very bloody revenge on the people who put her in that coma.
The larger topic is the whole "right to die" issue, but I don't have any patience with that one. There are no arguments to keep alive people who are doomed to a life of misery and death, or who are in a coma they'll never come out of. If they want to die and their only option is terrible pain and eventual death, or if they're a vegetable, what's the argument? No one else has the right to die with dignity? Bullshit! Who are you, Mr. Preacher Man, to tell anyone else they can't die if they are in horrible pain, or a coma, or hopelessly brain damaged? Believe in your little fantasy land of heaven and hell if you need to, but don't try to inflict your delusions on the rest of us. If you want to be kept a vegetable for 20 years after you wreck your motorcycle and have your spinal cord severed at the third thoracic vertebrae, fine, put it in a living will and I won't object. But don't tell me I have to stay alive in a state I'd rather be dead than exist in. Well, I'm lying. I do object to the waste of money and resources that are spent on people who are permanent vegetables, but hey, if you want to be kept lingering in that "better off dead" state for years and years, and you saved up enough money to pay for your care or have insurance that will pay for it, good for you. I'd personally be worried that perhaps it's like being in a nightmare that never ends, or that you're lying there, unaware of anything, but forever hearing the agonizing whine of shredded nerve endings; suffering from a pain that you can never scratch. But hey, if you're willing to take that chance, I guess you'll have to learn that lesson the hard way. But if a person stated that they wanted to be left to die in irrecoverable cases, or their relatives know that they did, what's to debate? Your fanatical religious "right to live" ends where my misery begins. Three of the following questions have value in this debate. One doesn't. Guess which one?
No, I'm not in much of a mood to coddle the superstitious on this topic. Here's why.
My grandmother, who died in June, spent the last two years of her life in a near-vegetative state. She wasn't as bad as the poor woman in Florida, but she was deep into dementia and after declining rapidly for about a year, by mid-2001 she was pretty well gone, and as far as her daily caretaker told me, she never had a lucid moment of any kind after late 2001. She would eat, if you fed her. She would walk, if you held her arm and pulled her along. But she didn't speak, she didn't show any facial emotions, and she never did anything to indicate any cognitive processes were going on inside her head. I'm not saying she should have been killed then, since she wasn't kept alive by machines, but clearly, her life was over, with just a year or two to wait for the final end. It was the way her final end was postponed that upsets me. How was her quality of life? Over the last two years of her life she lost at least 1/3 of her body weight, most of her hair, and quite a few of the lines on her face since she never made any expressions or talked or moved her mouth in any way other than to swallow food when a spoon of something pureed was inserted into her mouth. Over the last six months of her "life" she had at least half a dozen strokes, or seizures of some kind (that we know of) and on at least three occasions her respiration stopped and she would surely have died, if her husband hadn't gotten emergency medical care to revive her. However, sad though her lingering end was, she never specifically stated that she wanted to be left to die, or that she didn't want to be resuscitated, so I can't entirely hate my grandfather for doing what he did. I can dislike him for being so nutty and defensive about things, and going into hysterical fits of screaming about how "you just want to kill her" whenever my mom or stepdad brought up the possibility that Patty wouldn't have wanted to linger on the way her body was lingering. But I can't even hate him for that, since I know a lot of it was the booze talking. Gramps was a lifelong alcoholic who mostly kept it under control when the beloved grandson was visiting, and since his wife tore into him in harpy-like fashion if he drank in her presence. I can also dislike him for being bitter and argumentative and verbally battling back at his frequently-shrill and vicious wife, and then conveniently forgetting all of that once she died, at which point he became a pathetically blubbering doting husband, sobbing all through the wake and funereal about how his "best friend" was dead, and how he was all alone. And nevermind the divorce (and subsequent remarriage) or numerous trial separations or decades or frequently frosty and unpleasant homelife. And I can dislike him for blaming me for not being there in her last, pathetic, demented days. I'm sorry if I wanted to remember my grandmother when she was alive and healthy and still lucid, and didn't want to fly across the country to see her lying in a bed, wasting away, when she was six months removed from being able to recognize any other human being and should have been allowed to escape from her lingering misery several times before. I can also dislike him for pretending like she never had a will or any wishes for her belongings to be passed along to her only child and her only grandson. And I can dislike him for talking about how he has no use for the wedding ring she wore every day of her life, and how he might just sell it to buy a new car, when he has a new truck already, as well as a relatively-new minivan and Suburban, a house that's all paid for, a generous pension and social security, and no bills whatsoever. I pity him for being so hung up on his dead wife that he can't even deal with the reality that her closet is still full of clothing that needs to go to Goodwill and the bathroom sink and medicine cabinet are full of her medicines and old makeup and other such things that no one has any use for. I'm not sure how I feel about him now dating the woman he hired as a caretaker/nurse for his dying wife. His marriage was loveless for the last two or three decades (at least it was until his wife died, at which point he developed emotions more appropriate for Romeo, staring at the cooling body of his poor sweet Juliet), and he definitely needs someone to take care of him, and the caretaker did a good job cleaning the house and helping with his dying wife, and she seems to be a nice enough person. Why should they both be old and alone? And while I can love love him for being such a great grandfather to me from about 1-20 years of age, and love him for devoting himself completely to the care of his wife once she grew really sick, and like him for ensuring that she was as comfortable in her home as possible while she was dying... I can't help but hate him a little for keeping her alive so long after her mind was gone, and her body had given up on life.
Why are humans, often in the name of religion, so cruel to other humans? We don't force our beloved pets to suffer needlessly. When they are too old and miserable to enjoy life, when they suffer constant pain, when they have a disease that can't be cured and that will kill them no matter what, we love them too much to allow them to suffer like that. It hurts, but we know they're better off dead; better off beyond the pain and misery of this life. May your society regard pets as more deserving of mercy than grandmothers. |
|
| Return to the Articles Index. |
|
All site content copyright "Flux" (Eric Bruce), 2002-2007. |
his
perennially-hot issue is a big one for many people, and will probably always
remain so. Do people have the right to die if they want to? How bad do their
lives have to be for them to have that right? Do doctors have an obligation to
keep people alive, always, no matter what?