To Be Or....

Two unrelated stories caught my attention today, but they highlight a common theme. This story from Australia is about an 81 year old man who built a suicide robot to end his life as he "struggled to come to terms with demands by interstate relatives that he move out [of] his home and into care". And in this headline from France, a severely disfigured woman was found dead just two days after a court had rejected her request for assisted suicide.

Must our governments and our laws deny us the dignity we would afford ourselves? I don't know all the details of the elderly man in Australia and the article reporting his death was a short one, but how must he have felt to decide that his only way to peace was by ending his life?

I can only imagine. Having lived for some years in a home that he once shared with a spouse, perhaps, was he relentlessly pressured by family who only "wanted what was best"? Best for whom? Were they impatient waiting for their share of his estate? Were they tired of helping him out because he could no longer care for himself or the property? I can only speculate, but maybe he just couldn't live knowing he wouldn't die in his own home. Perhaps he didn't want to be someone else's burden -- even if they were a paid health care worker.

The heartbreaking story of the woman in France was considerably more detailed. She was severely disfigured and in constant excruciating pain -- a combination that would probably lead anyone to consider death a viable alternative. In this world of humans who make over ninety percent of our decisions based on what we see, she would have been shunned, avoided, stared at, and completely unable to lead anything resembling a normal life -- even without the pain.

Yet her pleas fell on the deaf and unyielding ears of the courts who believe they know better than we what is best for us. It's almost a sick punchline that the medical examiners and prosecutors are looking into whether her death was illegal. What? Excuse me if I must quote Jack Kevorkian who said that, "Dying is not a crime". Illegal was denying her the right to end her life on her own terms with what dignity she had left.

I don't support giving everyone a blank check to off themselves at any time for any reason, but for those of sound mind at the end of their life, whether by illness or infirmity, or those whose wishes have been made clear in writing or to an advocate, the right to die should be implicit -- not dragged endlessly through the courts or fought over by "well meaning" relatives or used as a publicity tool for self-serving politicians.

That won't be me. Hopefully I have several decades ahead of me at the very least, but I'm a realist. When it comes time for me to shuffle off this mortal coil there are a hundred scenarios that could make it the adventure of a lifetime.

But for the unsavory eventualities that I haven't thought of, can't imagine, or don't want to believe could befall me, I'll already have a plan in place. If the last hand in life dealt to me is from the bottom of the deck, I won't need the mercy of the courts or a contemporary Doctor Death to help me on my way. I'll cash in my chips at a time of my own choosing with the only banker I can trust -- and that will be me.