Absurdity

My neighbor across the street died a year ago last October. That was his physical death. His spiritual death happened much earlier. His was the first prolonged death I had to witness. It left me incredibly aggravated and searching for a better way.

He was 82 with his health failing for the last couple of years. He was losing sensation in his feet causing him to fall. He was also losing his eyesight. He spoke numerous times of just ending the torture and letting go of this life.

He finally had one fall too many. He had to be taken to the hospital and was never able to go home again. He was put in an assisted living facility and had to starve himself for two months to get what was rightfully his - peaceful rest at "home".

I've been volunteering at Hospice pretty much since his death, and have seen his same story repeat over and over. Patients ready to cross over, families ready to let them, but a bureaucracy that refuses to let them until it's "God's time". 

I'd love to know exactly how God is involved. We have people hooked up to machines, to IVs of this, that, and the other, and in facilities who's hands are tied by the government. In our world of western medicine we don't deal with the root of a problem, but the symptoms. And we've gotten pretty damn good at it. We can give people quantity of life by keeping them artificially alive., but not quality. 

Our country is facing a huge dilemma. The baby boomer generation wants to live forever. And they want to do it in a healthy manner. And when they are no longer healthy, they just want to go. They have dictated all sorts of changes in what is accepted to maintain their health. I have a feeling they will dictate those same changes in the crazy policies that stand in the way of allowing them to end their lives with dignity for themselves and their loved ones. I hope they hurry.

People should be able to say when enough is enough. And they should be able to do it peacefully. They should be allowed to tell all of their loved ones goodbye, close their eyes, and go home. They should be spared the agony of having to endure physical pain and the emotional pain of seeing their loved ones mourn their death. And their loved ones should not have to endure the emotional pain of helplessness in ending their pain.

The recent death of my mother-in-law further strengthened my argument for allowing merciful death. I watched grown men break down numerous times in the two and a half days it took her to let to. They were crying from the loss of her, but also from the pain she was enduring by letting go. It was a process that none of us should have had to endure.

Today I read the attached article. It sickens me that these people are being portrayed in the light that they are. For this gentleman to be labeled as a murderer and then to accuse him of suicide is pre ponderous. The journalist responsible for this depiction should be ashamed. It is clear what happened. A loving husband was fulfilling his dying wife's last request. And he did not want to continue without her. Who are we to negatively judge them.

http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/03/19/17374616-man-kills-elderly-wife-in-murder-suicide-at-pennsylvania-hospice-da-says?lite

Until you are forced to endure this hell on a personal level, you won't understand my view point. Until it is someone you love dearly laying on death's door, you won't get it. But I urge each and everyone of you to contemplate it. Because very few of us these days die of natural causes quickly. And it could be you stuck in that bed one of these days with no options.