Death With Dignity

 This past month has  brought me to consider the issue of Death with Dignity.

 

Twenty days ago my sister, my only sibling, died. We were very close; when at my Connecticut home (across the driveway from hers) I visited with her daily . . . the doctors say she died of Corona although she was vaccinated and boosted—I believe a broken heart was the responsible underlying cause. In those few months, she had lost her daughter, her home, her freedom and her husband.

 

She and her husband lived on the farm that she and I grew up on.  It had been in the family through 4 generations, 132 years.  They moved in with Mom following my Dad’s death in the early 1980’s.  Their children had married or moved away but often gathered ‘on the farm’, first with grandchildren and later great-grandchildren.  Sometime around 2000 their oldest daughter moved in with them as her husband had died and her only son married.  That daughter looked after them for their last 10 years when Parkinson’s disease limited my sister's normal abilities and for the last 5 years she walked with a walker but her mind was clear and she became an avid reader.  For this last year, each week I got several large-print book for her from the library. . . and she read every one.  Her favorite author was Mary Higgins Clark, followed by John Grisham then James Patterson.  The reading helped her tolerate her confinement.

 

This past June, the daughter living with them died unexpectedly.  From that point on everything seemed to go wrong . . . During that summer her husband was twice rushed to the hospital but first they could not find the problem.  The next time he was near death; he was found to have an embedded tick and was diagnosed with lyme disease.  He pulled through but his previous vigor was diminished—yet he was still independent.  They had a series of home health-care workers.  Their two remaining children began to talk of a nursing home for them (neither lived close to the farm).  They did not want to go. He was adamant, but to their two children, my sister remained passive  By Fall, they finally acquiesced to their suggestion.  

 

The intent was to have them share the same room in the couples wing but the lack of an available space placed them temporally in different rooms in the ward.  Soon she was transferred, expecting he would join her.  But he began spiking high temperatures and was several times sent to the hospital—finally diagnosed with failing kidneys.  He was often quarantined so at times my sister could not even visit him.  January 2^nd he died—alone.

 

Of course my sister was shaken, but strong.  She attended his funeral Mass and the dinner following.  There, she was alert and conversational, enjoying seeing all the family and a few friends.  I had long visits with her for several days before returning to Florida (where I stay for the winters).  She seemed OK but I could see the depression moving in.  The weather was bad, she urged me to “go back where it is warm”.  

 

In 2 weeks I got the call that she was in the hospital and expected to die.  I got an immediate flight, but on arrival I couldn’t see her, she was under Covid restrictions.  She hadn’t wanted extreme measures to prolong her life so when she reached the critical point she was removed from nourishment and fluids in preparation for her expected death.  At that point the hospital allowed one and only one, person per day to say their good-by . . . I was third; after son and daughter.  I give the hospital credit for allowing a visit, but by the time I saw her, my sister was already gone.  She was unconscious and unresponsive, with a morphine drip in her arm.  Her mouth hung open and there was an oxygen tube in her nose—why?  Was that keeping her hanging on? . . . but she had already left us, there was no response to human touch, she wasn’t ‘alive’ any more yet the end dragged on a few more days.  She was alone at the time of her death. We treat our animals better; quietly putting them to sleep when the possibility of recovery is gone.  I believe that should have been available for my sister.

 

And this is the story that brings me to the issue of Death with Dignity laws which allows one who is medically terminal the opportunity to say good-by to loved ones while still able to communicate.

What is Death with Dignity—also known as the Right-to-die?  Very simply, it is an end-of-life option to allow a physician to assist in hastening the death of a terminal patient.  In the U.S. it is the state, not the Federal Government which determines allowability.

 

The-Right-to-Die movement emerged in Oregon in the 1990’s.  It began as a citizen’s initiative in 1994.  In 1997 Oregon enacted the Death With Dignity Act.  It faced much opposition and was brought to The Supreme Court.  In 2006 The Federal Government lost the case against the Oregon law, thus allowing other states to make similar laws.

 

At present there are eleven states in which ‘medical aid’ in dying is legal.  In alphabetical order they are:  California, Colorado, District of Columbia, Hawaii, Maine, Montana, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Vermont, and Washington.

Every minute of its existence, the medical field strives to interrupt the course of disease or disorder to improve the quality of the life of its patient.  That is not considered an 'act against God's will'.  To strive to give dignity to one's dying is to honor that person's life . . . and so honors God, the author of life.

of Serious Thoughts: God Beyond Knowing

of Serious Thoughts: God Beyond Knowing:   This month I write of my works of fiction.     My two novels, although very different, are connected to my firm belief in a God beyond my ...

God Beyond Knowing

 This month I write of my works of fiction.  My two novels, although very different, are connected to my firm belief in a God beyond my knowing—this theme was presented in my first blog eight and a half years ago Aug 19, 2013—the long poem ‘Un-Named God’.  That poem encompasses all that I write about.  I often make references to Teilhard de Chardin who saved my faith and enabled me to embrace ‘Mystery God’.  Teilhard foresaw religions moving out of the static state of absolutism and into a dynamic evolutionary world view wherein religion and science are seeking, by different paths, the Truth of our existence.

 

‘The Stations’, my first novel is about an artist commissioned to create Stations of the Cross for a proposed shrine.  It has an allegorical quality in that the artist must plumb the depths of his soul and challenge the establishment to give new meaning to an old church symbol in the face of resistance from the conservative arm of the Catholic Church.  The artist shares Teilhard’s vision of the need for humanity to expand our vision to find sacred meaning in the secular world. Many of our religious symbols have become static and inert—thus idols.  Symbols need to be suggestive and speak to us of where we are in our development so they come alive with insightful perceptions.  Much of our world resists transformative change.  The search for new meaning in religion is not a denial of historical spiritual tradition; it’s each era’s attempt to reach closer to Truth (which cannot be reached, only approximated).  New knowledge is always built upon the old with the understanding that it is the way we grow.  Not denial; rather a transformation to incorporate elements of an ever-changing world.

 

My new novel, ‘The Conflagration’ carries the theme of transformation.  The old world is nearly destroyed by a nuclear WWIII at the end of the 21^st Century.  The shock, that near world destruction actually came to be, is enough to awaked the survivors to realize war is never the answer and they see the need to recognize the planet as One World.  Their descendants cooperatively abandon war and embrace universal values to assure continuation of the species; shaping their choices by relying upon the demands of sustainability and guided by global ethics.  The protagonist is in effect a ‘time traveler’ from the 21st century and we watch as she resists, then gradually adapts to the new world and is haunted by the question “Was the Conflagration inevitable?”  For her Masters thesis she looks back at the signs of danger that were there for all to see yet were ignored.

(Although a work of fiction, all references to issues of the 21^st century or earlier, are researched and accurate.)

 

 

of Serious Thoughts: December 2021

of Serious Thoughts: December 2021: With this December blog I wish to introduce my new work of fiction,   The Conflagration,   just published by Amazon .     The synopsis on th...

December 2021

With this December blog I wish to introduce my new work of fiction, The Conflagration, just published by Amazon.  The synopsis on the back cover reads:

 

Toward the end of the 21^st century, a mature young woman dies and is cryonically preserved.  She is found 300+ years later in the Antarctic when the earth has entered a new era.  The planet and environment have largely recovered from the climate crisis and WWIII—the global nuclear war at the end of the 21^st century that nearly destroyed the planet and became known as the Conflagration.

The remnants of humanity who survived, emerged with a new consciousness and vowed, collectively, to never again engage in war.  Over the following centuries descendants of the survivors recaptured the knowledge, skills, and technology needed to create a new world with eyes toward unity, sustainability and collective consciousness to become a humanity never before realized.

             Sydney Constance Thrasher awakens to this new world. 

 

As I sat thinking about how difficult it is to conceive of a world without war, my thoughts went to the ancient past . . . What merchant, plodding the miles of the silk road with his ladened camels, could have foreseen modern transportation, with trucks and airplanes transporting goods across nations and the world in hours and days?  What scribe painfully copying word for word his Holy books could have foreseen computers spewing forth pages and whole texts in seconds?  

 

So too it is hard for us, surrounded with wars and violence to foresee a One World of peaceful cooperation, having abandoned war—but it is worth trying to envision.  Like a phoenix rising from the ashes of a devastated world . . . humanity finally having learned that war is never the answer!

 

In the story, Sydney Constance Thrasher first awakened in utter disbelief which turns to anger and morphs into depression; we watch her slowly adapt to the reality in which she finds herself.  Eventually she is offered an advanced education; for her Masters thesis she is haunted by the questions, ‘Was the Conflagration inevitable?’ 

 

In the story, while world conditions and issues of the 25^th century are fabricated, all references to material from the 21^stcentury and prior are researched and accurate.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

of Serious Thoughts: Need for a God--Real or Invented

of Serious Thoughts: Need for a God--Real or Invented:   Years ago I heard a wise man say, “I believe there is a God, but if there isn’t, we’d have to invent one.’     I didn’t immediately ‘get i...

Need for a God--Real or Invented

 Years ago I heard a wise man say, “I believe there is a God, but if there isn’t, we’d have to invent one.’  I didn’t immediately ‘get it’.  I thought he was just being flip—but the thought stayed with me.

 

Recently I have returned to that thought.  It seems that in the 21^st Century, as a society, we’ve lost touch with God; God has become irrelevant.  When, by law prayer was eliminated from classrooms and public assemblies, the idea of God gradually faded. That isn’t to say that all thoughts of God have disappeared, but its place in society’s consciousness had been relegated to the back seat, whereas it was once front and center.

 

In the time when references to God were common-place, many people would say grace at meals and prayers at bedtime—that is now a rarity.  Before radio and TV, it was fairly common, especially in rural areas, for families to gather round a table as a family member read from the Bible.  In 1912, at the realization that the Titanic was sinking, the ship’s string ensemble spontaneously began playing ‘Near My God to Thee’—that would never cross the minds of people today.  

 

We can’t know God because God is so beyond our human understanding.  It is worse than unfortunate that so many different ways of attempting to grasp what a God must be and what One would want of us, led to different images, definitions and demands which led to conflict and division.  None of the images can capture God.

 

Whether God is, or is not real, our understanding in the contemporary world is that God represents the source of all that is good and desirable . . . all hope, truth, love . . .  the vessel of all goodness.  Ergo the opening statement, ‘if there isn’t (a God) we’d have to invent one.  We need a reminder, an incentive to continue striving for the good.  Only if good surpasses evil will the planet continue.

 

As thoughts of God have faded from our awareness we have seen an escalation of dangerous and destructive behaviors.  On the large scale: explosions of violence and vandalism during peaceful protests; political polarization where each side flatly rejects anything proposed by the other; widescale polluting of the planet; increasing presence and threat from nuclear weapons; terrorism in the form of suicide bombers and individuals with assault weapons opening fire on innocent strangers and vehicles driven into crowds.  On a smaller scale: a willingness to close eyes to facts and fabricate alternative ‘truths’; airline passengers attacking flight attendants over being told to mask up for public safety; brawls at sports events—both professional and little league; school board meetings interrupted by parents shouting and demanding changes in the  curriculum . . . a general demise of civility.

 

The general public seems to accept this as ‘the way things are’ and not realize it is in our hands to change.  We need God; either embraced as real, or ‘invented’ by a return to intentionally seeking ‘the good’.