Euthanasia

[dendens]

Anyone agree with it, I mean given the right to die and with dignity? I am all for it, if someone is dying the why not put them out of their misery? After all their organs if not cancer riddled or whatever could help save someone elses life and the equipment and drugs they are on could be better used?

[great white]

I agree when is someone gonna finally pull the plug on Mr Christie....

[dendens]

when you say mr christie you mean his mother , ahve you seen thje size of her moustache ! ;)

[great white]

We be talkin' above or below the belly button here?...

[dendens]

both I suppose

[TLC]

I sat for 5 days watching my father's cancer riddled body die piece by piece after a 15 month battle with lung cancer.

That might not sound much but a brief search on the net will tell you the average cancer patient lives appoximatly 3-5 months fron diagnosis to death.

I have a living will ... so does my mum, it says at a time when I am no longer in control of my faculties, I can no longer communicate with my family then I am not to be treated.

My dad was there one day telling me off, the next day he didn't know any of us unless we were trying to move him to take care of him. There's a lot of stuff that came after that I have no desire to ever put my friends or family through.

But a person's right to die with dignity is not something that anyone should be allowed to legislate because the alternative is the most degrading removal of humanity that any person can ever consider and it's not right, fair or even human to stop the right to deny the right of any human being to die quickly without pain or loss of dignity.

[bindu]

I totaly agree with you their Tracy! This last year I had to watch my mother slowly die of lung cancer as well and that is something I would never wish on anyone.

To watch someone you love more than anything in the world is heartbreaking for you and them. To see them struggle with the indignity of it all. In the end my mother was so riddled with pain and bedridden that her life was not living. This she has to suffer for over two months - its a living prison and the inmate has done nothing wrong. They should be allowed the choice to death with some dignity left in their soul.

My mother and me had often talked about this subject before she was diagnosed with the cancer as she was never a well person and we both agreed that it was something that we would both want to do if the other desired it. Although, after this period she became a practicising Buddhist and decided against this once she became present in the actual reality of the situation. However, the fact that you could visible see that she didnt want to be here anymore and that she was finding every day harder and harder, whilst the medical profession continued to treat her in order to prolong her life. Lucky my mother was at home and it was obvious that she was not going to last the night. She used every last strength she had in her body to remove her oxygen, which in itself was remarkable as she had not even been able to take the painkillers she needed or even wake up. The law says that me not putting the oxygen back on is wrong - but in my eyes I do not see that.

[TLC]

I broke the scaphoid bone in my wrist the day Dad slipped away from us. I knew he was gone when I got home from the hospital and I had to move him from the bed to the bathroom. Dad held on to my new cast and allowed me to pull him up. This proud man who wouldn't even let me carry shopping bags was hanging his whole body weight off the plaster cast on my arm and he didn't even know it was there.

He didn't know we were there except when we tried to move him and he was in so much pain he would cry 'please no, don't' usually to me as I was the one holding his body weight on my plaster cast.

He could not eat or drink, he was in a twilight zone of pain dogged sleep that would not let him go, all we could do was wait for nature to take it’s course.

If my dog is in pain and near death I can stop prolonging its agony and allow it to be put to sleep.

If my dog was in pain like this and I refused to do something about it I would face prosecution or even jail for prolonging the agony of an animal yet to do so for a human being it is a crime.

Which sanctimonious bastard say’s what I can do for my dog is not right for a human being?
Which sanctimonious bastard says that a human being is not allowed to make the choice in relation to their own life that every bloody pet owner in the UK can make for everything form a goldfish to a bloody elephant ?

Who had the right ??????
Who has the right ??????

[Jo]

did a class on this today actually and was amazed how many of the kids had had to watch their parents and grandparents die and it's something I never ever want to have to do.
I wouldn't be able to watch any of my family suffer but at the same time, I don't think I would be able to stop them living, it's one of those situations you hope you'll never be in but you wouldn't know what to do unless you were there.

[great white]

Originally posted by Jo
did a class on this today actually So you get class topics off of FF then?...

Maybe we could think of a few more for ya then....

Remembering some are Yanks from what you've said in the past are they the teachers or pupils? we will have to tread careful here in either case.....

Like discussing stuff they don't wanna hear could damage either of them for ****in' life....

[ourkid]

Thankfully the only person in my lifetime who has died a slow death is my grandad when i was 8, but i was too young to understand... However working where i do (a Hospice & Childrens Hospice), i see the faces on all the family who walk up and down the ward corridor. They are faces of individuals upset by what their seeing happening to their friends and relatives, and moreso, upset because they arent the person they knew anymore, and that person doesnt know them anymore. Places like Hospices are about the closest thing to Euthanasia that the Govt will allow, they'll treat the indivual with the best pain killing drugs available (ie, Morphine), give Social and Spiritual care to the family and patient and generally try to make them feel like they are dying at home and not in some shiny metallic hospital ward.

However, agreed with Tracy, its a ****ing savage decision that a person doesnt have the right to choose when to let go. Just because some ****in little black book that a bunch of talented individuals wrote a long time ago, people now think its a so-called 'sin' to take your own life and thus Euthanasia is outlawed.
Especially those with diseases such as Cancer, and degenerative diseases like Parkinsons and Alzheimers where they are basically living inside a shell they cant control and no longer want to go on.

[dendens]

I am in remission from testicular cancer at the moment (http://www.euroforums.co.uk/cgi_bin/ikonboard.cgi?;act=ST;f=1;t=1210;hl=canc er) thats a post from the time. I certainly feel if I was in pain I would rather die and help someone else.

[StretfordEnd]

This is obviously an emotive subject, but there have to be Laws to protect people who are vulnerable.

Tracy, your dad was surrounded by his loving family, and I have lost both my parents so I know how it feels, my dad died when I was 18, but what about the poor granny who is in a £ million house she's lived in since the 50's, and her unscrupulous family can't wait to get their hands on it ? There has to be legislation to prevent them "assisting" her in what could be a premature but financially beneficial death ?

[Shauny]

sorry to hear some of these stories
here is mine :

about 8-9 years ago, my only brother got diagnosed with cancer, dont know the exact name, but it was his stomach and bowl area, he has about half a stomach now. but he was told he had 3 months to live at the time . he was ill at the time, and got worse by the day.
4 months later, he was down to like 4-5 stone, and on deaths door. it was then at the stage where it was just a matter of time, the Dr's told us that. my dad convinced the Dr,s (After days of shouting matches) to give him one last course of kimotheropy..and it worked.
i dont believe in god as such, but it was a miracle. so happy storys to happen.

as for letting people die, well, you would have to be 110% convinced there was no way back. if that was the case, then yes, im for it.
if someone is going to die, 110% sure, then yes, you should be allowed to stop there suffering.

my gran died from lung cancer, and it took 14 months of agony to kill her.

RESPECTS to those here who have lost loves ones.

[Shauny]

Originally posted by StretfordEnd
but what about the poor granny who is in a £ million house she's lived in since the 50's, and her unscrupulous family can't wait to get their hands on it ? There has to be legislation to prevent them "assisting" her in what could be a premature but financially beneficial death ?

good shout m8.

[dendens]

I think you have to draw the line at relatives doing it. Only let docotors carry it out with an independent body who looks into each case. That way it would prevent relatives who want a member of their family dead for their own financial gain or similar situations

[TLC]

Who's saying loved one's should ?

Dad never for one minute accepted that he might die. As far as he was concerned until he was damn good and ready he whould not lay down he was not laying down his sword until he damn well had too.

That was his choice and it was what he wanted. We took care of him at home beaucse he needed it despite what he thought he could do, we didn't hospitalise him because he would not have wanted strangers looking after him out of respect for him.

Personally .... if I am in that situation I want to make the choice for myself if that's going to happen to me, if I'm going to degenerate to the stage where I don't know my family, I don't know my friends and can't take a dump without 2 people to help sort me out because I can't then I want the choice to make it stop.

Nobody has the right to tell me I have to live indefinatley to live with that kind of indignity !

That's my choice no one else's.

I have the greatest respect for Shauny's brother, he is a strong, strong fighter with family who stood up ant fought with him ! I wish him every best wish I can possibly convey because he is a winner in every resepect of the word.