Suggested euthanasia

Sometimes they don't ask - they just let neglect do anything. My sister, who was 42 and totally blind was in Leicester Hospital with kidney failure (nothing to do with her blindness). She was failing fast, when her MiL came to visit. MiL noticed her nails were drip white, and her breathing was shallow. She's a forceful woman: she rallied the medics and forced them to resuscitate my sister, and put her on dialysis.

My sister is 62 now, has had liver and kidney transplants 13 years ago, works two jobs, is happily married and enjoying a good life.

How dare they assume her life was worth nothing!!?? She lives in France now, and is extremely well treated by the largely free French medical system.

Years ago a wealthy business owner in South Africa, diagnosed with a terminal illness, took his own life near a "vulture' s restaurant" that he had established by training the birds to come there over a period of time. Quite grisly, but an elegant solution too I thought at the time.

Scooter I am no longer allowed medication, it punched a hole through my stomach and nearly wrecked my liver. I am only able to take the odd ibuprofen if I am going to have to do a lot of walking or gardening. I'm going to try to get back on it soon so that my large garden doesn't turn into a wasteland, but it's very frustrating and won't get any better.
Durhamjen I have always said that I want to go on the compost heap when I die. My friends all say they won't have me because I am not organic enough.

How shocking. I hope the doctor was told that this sort of suggestion is not always welcome. 85 is not old these days.

Janerowena,I am in the same position as you,in my fifties and have arthritis( Rheumatoid). I am working part time and medication is doing a good job at the moment.However I watched my Mum struggle with the same condition till she died 3 years ago at age 73.I watched her struggle to walk and used to wonder how she kept such good spirits as she had regular flare ups which completely floored her.I dread my condition getting that bad to be honest.

A new child euthanasia law has been voted for in Belgium ("The 86-44 vote Thursday in the House of Representatives, with 12 abstentions, followed approval by the Senate last December").
"The law empowers children with terminal ailments who are in great pain to request to be put to death if their parents agree and a psychiatrist or psychologist find they are conscious of what their choice signifies."

Quotes from here

What makes you think you go to waste, janerowena?
We are all part of the cycle of nature. Matter cannot be destroyed; it just changes into a different form, whether buried or cremated. At least we take less time to be useful again than plastics.

I wonder how differently we would live our lives if, as in Soylent Green, we knew the exact day on which our lives would end?

If only! I think I am the only person I know who came out of having watched Soylent Green going 'Oh yes! What a brilliant idea! I want to go like that!'. And also being quite pleased that I wasn't going to go to waste.

My last surviving aunt will be 99 this year. She has no big health issues, lives alone, plays bridge 2x a week, gave up driving at the age of 95 and golf at 93, goes shopping in either a taxi or dial-a-bus and can still entertain her visitors and likes nothing better than a glass of sherry at mid day. She watches little tv but reads the DT from cover to cover each day and completes the cryptic crossword. At 88 she visited Australia and decided not to walk the Kings Canyon but took the helicopter option . Her only nod to old age is having carers morning and night to help with dressing and showering as she is a little unstable on her pins and she uses a frame to walk around the house and into the garden where she still tries to do the odd bit of weeding. None of her friends survive but she is happy with her own company. Each time I see her she tells me she has been here too long and it is time for her to go! I hope she gets her telegram next year and then sleeps away as she would like. If only we could all choose the way of our passing!

Precisely. Fit active happy over 90s are rare, and often they are very lonely and live alone. I have regular contact with a pair of over 90s. Neither of them look it, to all intents and purposes they are a happy reasonable active 80ish male and female. However he is looking more tired and weary every day and she is starting to be forgetful. They both get out once a week for shopping and twice week for social activities, but she says that if it weren't for those they would see no-one as neither of them have family nearby. They phone each other every day at a set time in the morning, although they are not friends they check on each other and know that something is wrong if there is no reply. She says that she gets so lonely she could cry. One of us calls on her every now and then if we are going her way, but she often forgets that we have been. He had an amazing tenor voice and used to sing in a choir with my son, and even though I tell him regularly that DS is away at uni he still asks me accusingly why he hasn't seen him.

So yes, they are still alive, and keeping going, but they are not happy. They are tired and weary and walk with sticks. I don't want to be like them. Although GillT57's aunt is very happy with her life, and I do think perhaps the doctor could have asked her a little more subtly, I think the question itself is a perfectly valid one.

It sounds a bit tactless to say the least if your aunt has a good quality of life.
My recent experience with ill, helpless and miserable 90 years olds was rather the other way around. They would have loved to be able to slip away gently but had to suffer on to the last gasp - literally.

It's so hard to tell. There was a day 3 years ago when MIL was deeply unconscious and on her way out and if we hadn't nagged GP and the called ambulance ourselves when we did, she'd have died in her own bed. I did think in the immediate aftermath, when she couldn't stand for weeks, that it would have been kinder to let her go. But she managed to recover, has had 3 more years - impossible to imagine what someone else would want isn't it - because it is impossible to imagine how she keeps going, month after month, in such discomfort and limited mobility. But not apparently depressed or at the end of her tether.

Gill - what you have written reflects exactly my mother - she also has osteoarthritis and COPD - she is significantly younger than your aunt but is also significantly worse health wise - it is so distressing for her and for us to (have to) watch her struggling for every single breath. My mother would be glad, so very, very glad, to just be able to slip away in her sleep and not to have to wake up to the sheer torture that every day has now become. We are all hoping that she will be one of the 'lucky' ones who just needs to sleep until the end comes.

She had 'that' conversation with a young doctor whilst hospitalised with a chest infection - I think it is pretty standard and does sound pretty brutal when you hear it but it is necessary - for my mother what it did do was to make her face up to the fact that she was on a bit of a one-way trip and that she should see the people that she wanted to and do the things that she could do before she became too ill.

That was handled so very badly. However, I do hope that euthanasia will be legal when I am older, and I would also have signed the form. That is because although only in my 50s I am already fed up with arthritis and various other ailments and do not wish to live for years with far worse ailments, every person is different, but I would hope that if I were asked, it would be done in a more sensitive way. I think I shall make my own form now, and leave it with DBH. I don't want any of my family to have to care for me. My memories of caring for my father after his strokes are not good ones.

Thanks, Nightowl. Actually I had to sign for him to have his brain tumour removed in 2011, as he was in the situation again that he would not be able to remember the next day, so his signature would not have been valid. The month before he had been assessed by a neuropsychologist who gave a written report more or less saying that there was no problem with his memory. A lot can change in a month, but actually that report was not accurate.

Thank you all for your interesting and very useful comments. One thing though: I do know the difference between euthanasia and DNR, and I do appreciate the violence of resuscitation, especially on somebody elderly and with osteoarthritis. I think what upset me was his assumption that she would want to 'slip off', as if anybody sane wouldn't want to live as she does. The arrogance of youth eh? On a happier note, I love this forum and all the articulate, well considered comments!

durhamjen what a very distressing situation for you. I don't think the doctors acted legally unless you had POA, in which case at least you would be prepared to have to make the decision. As Brenda says, your signature was not needed for the doctors to do what they judged to be in your husband's best interests and could have left you feeling responsible if things had gone wrong. It is situations like this that put relatives in a very difficult position at times of stress and I think it's high time doctors had better training on legal matters.

durhamjen + flowers (no square brackets on my French keyboard)- I am so sorry you had to go through this.

Brenda, when my husband fell off a ladder and broke his back, I had to sign the forms for his operation, as he was unconscious, drugged up with morphine, and would not remember having given consent the next day.
I was told it was a 50/50 chance of him being in a wheelchair, so asked what would happen if I did not sign. 100%. There are times when next of kin have to sign forms.
When he was diagnosed with ataxia, he started researching into living wills, as they were called then, and POA, and got them all in place before it was necessary to use them.
There is no point in having an advance directive in a drawer ready to sign, Anno.

This is very difficult and I can totally understand why you feel upset. As said though, it has nothing to do with euthanasia at all though.

As Thatbags says, resuscitation is quite a violent process and not always desirable for very old and frail people with a variety of ailments.
My biggest problem with commenting on this post, is that none of us were there during your dear Aunt's stay in hospital. Could it be, perhaps, that she was really fed up with the whole situation and mentioned to staff several times that she had had enough, as so many elderly people (like my mother) often state- also in pain with osteoarthritis which is debilitating.

None of us were there either when that 'discussion' took place, and the way the facts are presented does seem all wrong in my experience- so I think it would be a good idea for you to ask the Doctor and medical team involved to tell you what happened from their own point of view- and share you shock. If only to be reassured.

I have made an advance directive, and am a member of Swiss Exit (voluntary euthanasia which is legal here)- but I agree this should never be under duress or for quotas. I will do research about this, as the concept of quotas for DNR just seems so wrong. Personally, if in late 80s I suffer greatly from osteoarthritis and limited movement, with other ailments on top- I'd certainly would tell my family and medical team that I do NOT want to be resuscitated in case of a heart attack, and be grateful to be able to slip away without having to suffer years.. But totally agree it should be a personal choice and not imposed. As said though, and with respect, none of us were there at the time to know exactly how this came about.

I wish your dear Aunt many years of enjoyment, despite her pain- and hope you can discuss this with the team involved so you an better understand the circumstances, and then- if you feel it is appropriate- make a proper complaint.

Dd holds my poa including health drcisions

Also if someone is unconscious, either through illness or accident the clinician is able to make the decision about treatment. I think it's putting relatives in a very difficult position to ask them permission to operate for example on an unconscious person especially when the outcome is problematic.
Clinicians, for the most part, have a poor understanding of consent and their responsibilities for patients who are unable to consent. Don't get me started!
When doing my Masters in Biological health Law consent fascinated me. It was also at the time of Bournewood case so based my dissertation on it.

I have in a drawer the documents for an advance directive ready to sign and keep meaning to do so. This would enable a doctor to make the decision to withdraw treatment in the event that I was unable to make a decision myself. I have not been asked to do this, but if I sign it will be of my own volition.

Good point Brenda, I am shocked (but not surprised) that doctors are asking relatives to sign a DNR form. I suspect this is an attempt to avoid litigation later on. I was asked my views about whether my mother should be resuscitated after a heart attack and was too upset to question this at the time. My mother had full mental capacity and as far as I am aware she was never asked the question.

It is of course possible to grant POA for health decisions in which case a relative could give or deny consent on behalf of the patient if the patient lacks capacity at the time of the illness. Lacking capacity can of course include being unconscious, so it may be useful even if a patient had full capacity up to that point. However, if a person has taken the trouble to give someone else POA it is likely they will have made an advance directive at the same time.