My story does not touch upon only one person, but encompasses the experiences of four terminally ill people and those who loved them. My story is about ill people who endured extreme prolonged pain and suffering and those who had to stand by helplessly. So not only is this my story, but the story of my family.

I know many people reading this find what I did flies against everything they stand for, however, the vast majority who do object, I have found, have never personally helped someone die at that level of intimacy, so their objections are either religious, ethical or academic, and hold very little weight in my book. I doubt many have the stomach for what really happens when someone is dying.

A specialist (Pulmonologist) doing the rounds did a brief examination and told us that it was terminal. My brother asked her to give my mother something to alleviate her suffering – perhaps morphine? The specialist lowered her voice and said it would kill her!

I’m at the tail end of the boomer generation, the largest cohort of elderly the world will ever know. In ten years time we will cripple economies with high health costs, our children will find themselves with young families to care for and elderly parents who drain considerable time and resources from their lives. Why should we be so selfish?

My Mother is 93, and has lost the will to live… her eyesight is extremely poor, and even with glasses cannot see, so reading and watching television are out of the question. She is extremely deaf, and her hearing aids do not help at all. She had a pin put into her hip a year ago, and at that stage she still walked with the aid of a walker… she is now in a wheelchair.

A specialist (Pulmonologist) doing the rounds did a brief examination and told us that it was terminal. My brother asked her to give my mother something to alleviate her suffering – perhaps morphine? The specialist lowered her voice and said it would kill her!

My personal experience has been with my severely ill father who has had a seven-year journey of suffering. It is very easy to give opinions unless one has been affected by such a situation. The arguments against euthanasia are that God’s will should be done, and we should not interfere with the process of life and death. All I can say is that that would certainly be true if it wasn’t for the interference of modern medicine that is keeping sufferers alive. And to what end?

A week later her house doctor of 30 years came in and said with a ‘cheerful’ voice that he was going to help her over the threshold and she willingly put out her arm and he injected her. He told my sister, who was a geriatric nurse, to watch her to see that she would not come out of her coma. That is how she died and I am infinitely grateful to that doctor, who is also dead by now. So gracious, dignified and serene.

Eventually he died the most terrible death, drowning in his own fluids.

Today I feel I’ve let him down and the only other person who knows exactly how I feel, is my mom. We are left with the pain of what he had to bear, what we’ve seen is a constant reminder of the worst type of death he had. Sometimes I find it hard to cope.

That may sound like the statement of an abused woman but it is made by a woman who was privileged to be married to a man who loved her unconditionally for 50 years and was her best friend. Had she been in his position he would have helped her end her life, regardless of the consequences to himself, but he would not allow her to help him because the law would have punished her for it.

That may sound like the statement of an abused woman but it is made by a woman who was privileged to be married to a man who loved her unconditionally for 50 years and was her best friend. Had she been in his position he would have helped her end her life, regardless of the consequences to himself, but he would not allow her to help him because the law would have punished her for it.