Wendy Duffy heart breaking but understandable

[youalright]

What a brave lady i hope she's holding her son right now.

There are many people who suffer the loss of their only child.

There are many people who suffer the loss of multiple children.

There are many people who suffer the loss of their whole family.

As @TittyGajillions said in her post virtually everybody suffers loss in their lives. And yes every loss is tragic. But most people find a way to carry on.

Poor woman, her grief must have been unbearable.

My best friend since secondary school died of cancer in her early thirties. Sadly her brother had been killed in an accident a few years previously. It was devastating to watch the decline of two people who had been like parents to me after losing both of their children. They lived out the rest of their days staying indoors, only venturing out to go shopping once a fortnight. The house went to wrack and ruin because they simply didn’t care any more.

My mum has a progressive illness which is pretty grim at the end and she has already made us aware of her wishes before she gets to that stage.

I read this story and cried from start to finish. I cannot even imagine the turmoil she was living through.

I find the notion that she should’ve struggled for the rest of her life just to make her siblings happy absolutely abhorrent. She had already attempted to take her life, had been through inpatient psychiatric care and still felt this way. It was obviously the right decision for her.

Totally understandable decision.

I don't really think it's a question of bravery, just of doing what was right for her. You could argue the case either way, that she was brave to take the decision and follow through with ending her own misery or if she had soldiered on through it.

But loss isn't equal id be pretty pissed of if I lost a child and then someone said to me I know how you feel if felt the same when my 90 year old grandmother died or worse when my dog died

She's said her siblings understand. If they've seen her in a deep dark pit of grief she can't escape from, for years, they may also understand that it's a merciful release for her.

@ThisHazelPombear the original post was about parent/child loss though.

Which is actually why I posed the question about children, knowing full well you couldn't possibly have any, as you compared, your very real grief, with that of a woman who'd lost a child.

Grief for a loved one is tragic and devastating, in every circumstance.

It is, purely, my personal opinion, that the loss of a child, for a parent, is so overwhelmingly agonizing that comparing that, to your loss, is not, equivalent.

I am truly saddened that you are struggling @ThisHazelPombear and I sincerely hope you find peace.

P.s.
It's a shame that MNHQ have deleted your original reply, presumably because you used a swear word, I took no offence, your pain is obvious. 🌸

That doesn't mean everyone has to find a way. She tried.

Absolutely id be saying the exact same to a mother who struggled through both can be true

It’s fine if YOU don’t want to do it.
But you should not have the right to stop others doing it.

It’s not the same though is it.

She apparently struggled for years to conceive. She did, she had her miracle baby, and then 20 years later she served him a sandwich which he ultimately choked on and died. I’d not be able to continue.

This woman achieved exactly what she wanted, and she should be commended for it. We all deserve the right to end our own lives at a time of our choosing, and for whatever reason we wish - which is why assisted suicide should not be restricted only to the terminally ill. Sadly, the UK continues to deny us this, so thank goodness for places like Switzerland.

@IheartmysmartThat is awful- that poor couple. I can really see how people just give up on life in that situation.

I feel desperately sorry that whilst alive she had to endure such mental pain that living was intolerable. I don’t believe in an afterlife, she isn’t reunited with her son, she’s dead. But very sadly that was a better choice for her than living. Obviously I also feel the deepest sorrow for those left behind.

I think it's really sad and at least now she is at peace. I have to say though I'm not in favour of the state or private corporations helping people to kill themselves though, I think that takes us to a very dark place as a society.

I have had exactly those things (and worse) said to me. It doesn't make things any easier.
None of us should judge this poor woman.

Having profound grief and not wanting to live doesn’t mean she was ‘mentally ill’.
She had 4 years to think about this.
She could have flung herself infront of a train causing horrendous trauma for the driver.
It’s the same argument people had 60 years ago when discussing pregnancy termination- would you rather medically performed terminations or back street, kitchen table ones?
Ergo, would you prefer medically assisted suicide or for people to make a hash of it and keep doing it till they succeed causing unrelenting strain on their loved ones/strangers who get impacted?
Why should anybody be denied the choice of ending their own life if they simply don’t want to live anymore?

Desperately sad, there are no winners in this story. I cannot imagine her pain, and really hope she has nothing but peace now and is able to be with her little boy. I feel desperately sad for both her and her family.

But what about the elderly who don’t want to repeat what they witnessed their parents go through. I don’t want my children to have to watch me go slowly through the stages of dementia, not that I think I will be a burden to them but because I love them and want to spare them that. And I want to spare myself that, there are long spells of dementia where you are aware of you losing your self, where you become unsafe. I want the right to decide when enough is enough.

I have a 3 year old, and even though I currently do not suffer with anxiety or depression (have done in the past) I cannot imagine the thought of being able to carry on living if something were to happen to her.
I have a large family with siblings and many nieces and nephews, and wide network of very good friends.
But my child is my world and my best friend and I don't think I could live without her.

If I had more than one child, I would probably feel differently because the thought of deliberately leaving my child without a mother would be even more painful than living a life after losing a child.
I know it would pass suffering on to friends and family, but I don't think that would stop me.

I've not been able to stop thinking about this lady the last couple of days.

I agree OP, I think she is very brave. My niece lost her (then) only child 16 years ago, her partner left her a week after the child died. She tried to take her life several times but couldn't go through with it. She was a lot younger than Wendy and was lucky to go on to be able to have two more children but she has never been the same since her first child died, a big part of her died too. She is half the person she used to be.

I truly hope she is now at full peace.

I read that she had witnessed him die and tried to resuscitate him. I think that's a factor. Horrific as it is to watch your loved one slip away from illness, it's another thing entirely to be a part of it and feel like you failed. I think it was more than grief it was trauma too. Poor woman.

I'm so sorry @Freysimo I just can't imagine

I think multiple things can be true at once.

I think we can all agree it’s unspeakably tragic to lose a child. )I also think the newspaper shouldn’t have printed a photo of her child as a small boy when he died as an adult - losing a child is heartbreaking enough without the implication that they were only tiny).

I think lots of parents might even believe that you’d want to do the same thing if they were to lose their child.

You can agree with both of the above things while still having questions about the ethics of this. Four years is still a relatively short time when it comes to dealing with grief. And as I understand it, she’d had no face-to-face assessment when she was deemed mentally competent to make the decision.

I also think it’s interesting that Dignitas won’t provide assisted dying for these types of cases. If there is an actual assisted dying provider who thinks these types of cases aren’t appropriate then I think it’s entirely reasonable to question whether this is ethical, no matter how much sympathy you may have for her circumstances.

This is how I feel. I don't want to put my children through any more stress and this is something we have talked about. My living children have suffered terribly since losing their brother. Their lives and their futures were changed enormously. both had mental break downs and have been hospitalised. Both doing much better now, but it has taken ten years and has been so hard. You never get over the trauma.
We can never really know what others are going through.

Well, as I can't bring myself to believe a soul or an afterlife is plausible, she's not with her son, they're just both dead. And really, it's cowardly (like all suicide), not brave.

Brave would've been living with the grief, or even actually doing the job herself properly (which people do manage to do every day). Although I suppose I have to admit, there's no moral value in being 'brave', and nothing wrong with being a 'coward'.

I do think it's a little weird that the Swiss government will just kill suicidal people for them though. It's very dystopian. Personally, I think if the government won't kill rapists, paedophiles, and murderers, it probably shouldn't kill clinically depressed people.

In fact, even if it did have the death penalty, it probably shouldn't kill people because they're sad and want to die.