FROM MY OWN POINT OF VIEW. (Euthanasia)

Member Name: thingywhatsit

Product:	Euthanasia
Date:	06/08/05 (890 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: This is just my experience. I cannot speak for others.

Disadvantages: I have not touched the wider issue, only the issue as it has affected me.

I am writing on this subject because it is something that has touched my life.

I lost my father, two years ago. He was a very intelligent man, although a very solitary one by choice. He was not a people person, though his work enriched the lives of many, as he worked in the scientific field of discovering vaccines for tropical diseases.

When he had his stroke, his life more or less ground to a halt. He could not do the things that he wanted to do. He tried very hard, but the paralysis that he had as a result of his stroke meant that his right side was not able to function properly, his eyesight deteriorated, and generally, my father could not do the things that a normal person can.

This was not the only change in my father’s life. Suddenly he was surrounded by strangers, and this was something he was not comfortable with but something we could do little about. He had to have a carer wash and dress him in the mornings, and one to put him to bed at night. He had to see a physiotherapist on a regular basis, and had nurses assessing him, and seeing how he could continue living at home.

My sister started to live with my father because the family discussed how to go forward and it was agreed that she should be paid a salary to stay at home, give up her job and look after dad. She was super, but even super people need respite, and I used to go to England a month at a time to look after my father.

Little by little, I watched my father deteriorate over the years, and it was sad to see a man with such intelligence revert to what was almost childish behaviour. He suffered a little dementia and could not be moved into a respite centre because of this. The one time we tried this, he was disorientated and reacted so violently that we decided it was in his best interest to be nursed at home.

The last time I went to look after my father, I would feed him all his favourite foods, and try to encourage him to make an effort, although it was hard because his body would not let him do the things he wanted to do. He got thin and weak and seeing my father like this was not the easiest of experiences in my life.

One day I was reading to him. He liked to hear passages from the Bible, not just read parrot fashion but discussed and examined. We were talking about the story of the Rainbow and how the first rainbow appeared and what it meant, and I looked over and saw that my father was crying. I could see huge tears falling down his face, and I wanted to hug him and tell him everything would be alright, even though there was distance between him and me from childhood days. I cannot bear to see someone suffering so much and having nowhere to turn. It’s almost like watching an animal starve and doing nothing about it. It is not my nature. I am a giving person by nature, and I wanted to help my father.

We spoke, and he told me why he was crying. He was crying for all the things he had done in his life, crying for all the illness that he was suffering, crying because he was no longer in control of his body or bowel movements. It was a lack of dignity that made my father cry, and sorrow because he knew he was dying, and the quality of his life, though better than some poor souls on this earth, was not what he had thought he would have in his old age.

Normally my father went to sleep at 8 in the evening, but on this particular night, we talked late into the night and he told me about things he remembered and kept coming back to knowing that he was going to die. Eventually, he hit the nail on the head and told me what he wanted me to do. He wanted me to leave the medicines within his reach, so that he could take all of them, and no longer live.

That must have been the worst moments of my life. This moment of making a decision as to whether my father had the right to take his own life and whether I would indeed help him made my take stock of what life is, and what it offers.

I could not do it. My conscience would not let me, nor would my belief in God and in the very essence of what life is. I could not do it. I remember saying sorry to my father, and seeing the look of disappointment in his eyes, and knowing in my heart that I had let him down.

After that day, my father lived a further year and a half, during which time I saw him have pleasurable moments with his grandchildren, that he would not have had if I had granted him that wish to die. I believe that no matter how low we get, there are still things out there to enjoy, still things that we need to hold on to and that are precious in our lives.

My thoughts of my father go back to that night many times, and I will never know if what I did was right or wrong, but I do believe that in the last year and a half of his life, he came to peace with himself and with others, and that this time of waiting served to help him rather than hinder him.

Euthanasia is a persons right to die from a self-inflicted or medically induced manner. I saw a smile on my fathers face when the cat jumped up on his bed, and I knew that had I denied him the right to live, then he would never have known that one moment of joy, and whilst there is still a hope of joy, there is still life.

It is for this reason that I feel euthanasia is not the answer.

Since first expressing my views on this subject, a lot of people have come back to me with their views and I know that this is a difficult topic to deal with. We each deal with it differently dependent upon our circumstances. I can only comment upon the way I dealt with it, but who knows ? Will I feel the same if it is me that is ill ? I don't know the answer to that question. I only know from my experience of life that I cannot take another human being's life.

Thank you for reading.

Rachel X

Summary: Life is for living.