to ask how many of you would consider ending your lives at Dignitas or a similar clinic when you are elderly?

[signedsealeddelivered]

I've seen old age and I don't like the look of it. My family, genetically, all die of the same thing and it is not a pleasant death. It is a slow, suffering, confusing one where the mind and the body are both affected. I realise not everybody's experience is like this, but just wondered if these thoughts enter other people's heads too?

I don't see old age as pleasant (I mean 80--85+) Your partner is likely to die before you if you're a woman and you're straight, your friends die, your children have their own lives and you have very little to give them apart from financially (which you could also do via an inheritance.) You're hardly physically up for childcare of Grandchildren or extensive travel. If you have a dog or a pet, it's difficult to walk it or care for it. There are often a few chronic health problems if not a few serious health problems too. Illnesses hit you harder, falls hit you harder. You often stop driving and lose your freedom. There's also confusion, memory loss, muddling things up. Then there's the physical, emotional or financial burden you would potentially put on your family if you had to go into a home or receive care.

This is not a state I'd want to live in while the essentials of my body continued to tick over, and I'd rather take matters into my own hands and decide when I pass away.

I'm just wondering if this is a common thought amongst others too?

I wish the UK would change the law. I think there must be a very small window between which you have reached the time when you are ready to go, and you are still capable of travelling abroad.
I do wish humans were given the same dignity in death as we give to animals though - it seems we are living in a mixed up world.

costa

I would. I'm hoping it will be legal when I'm likely to potentially need that option.

I would 1000% consider it if I had something like cancer for example. Haven't read any other posts but we wouldn't let animals suffer in pain like that so why should humans?

Like BackforGood I find it terrible that people have to travel to these clinics while they're still able to do so, meaning they lose time at the end of their lives. I would prefer better laws here.

Not just elderly people - my DM has had severe, worsening chronic pain with for 20+ years and has talked about it

DH lost a close family member young to a neurological condition.

It's wrong that anti euthenasia types argue that good palliative care can help: even assuming services were available and fantastic everywhere (which they're not), for many terrible conditions that's a huge lie.

Like a couple of pps, my religious beliefs go against euthanasia. I hope to go easily, when time is up, but hopefully can be useful until then.

Yep. I don't want to wear out.

for everyone who have shared their stories.

I think I would too tbh.

My Granny was an auxiliary nurse in a care home and always said to my mum to 'shoot her' if she ever got to the point that some of her patients did.

She got Parkinson's in her 60s and degenerated rapidly - ended up in a care home herself and ended up unable to do anything for herself. She was in that state for about a year.
She got very ill quite suddenly and (thankfully ) died of pneumonia very quickly in the end.
What upset my mum more than anything was that she felt she'd let her mum down.

Absolutely I would, I joke about saving up pills but all my family know that I am serious about not prolonging my life if I felt I had no quality of life. I realise that what is an acceptable quality of life for me might not be the same for other people and I respect everyone's opinion especially their religious or moral objections to ending a life. I thought I was going to be put in the position of having to help one of my parents to die a few years ago ( it didn't come to that in the end) but they felt exactly the way I feel and I was mentally preparing myself to help them.

The difficulty would be knowing when to go. If in pain or confused and unhappy, I could see the rationale, but by the time that sets in you might find it difficult to do something about it without putting pressure on other people to do something they might not want to do. Otoh lots of people have great fun in their 80s and 90s and make useful contributions to society, so one wouldn't want to miss out on that.

My parents are the age you mention (mid-way between 80 and 85) and]they are currently inter-railing in Europe. When they get home they will host various combinations of children and grandchildren in their house over the summer holidays. Their tutor wrote one of his best books in his late 80s. Another old lady I knew used to volunteer on archaeological excavations into her 80s, actually doing manual work.

As for me, I have the kind of profession where you can carry on working past retirement so would hope to be able to do that. I have never been able to drive in the first place so my independence won't be affected there. And chronic pain often sets in around the age of 10 in my family, so affected family members kind of get used to that.

My MIL when young and healthy always said if she became disabled she would want to die. She has been paralysed from the waist downwards for the last 8 years, and it is actually only in the last month or so that her quality of life has gone to the extent that she actually does want to die - and nature is seeing to that. Before that she still did enjoy life, even in a wheelchair.

As for cancer, it is not necessarily incurable- I have several relatives who have recovered after cancer treatment.

Of course there are many cases of no quality of life where you absolutely understand why people want to die: I just hate the idea that

a) being a wheelchair user is so awful that you would naturally want to die (my dd was a wheelchair user at age 10)

b) cancer must mean you should want to die

c) being above 80 must be so awful that you should want to die

I'm 71 and have had a disability for many years. It massively curtails what I can and cannot do and although it sometimes gets me down, so far I haven't thought about going to Dignitas while i can still get small pleasures from my life.

However, at the first signs of dementia I would be off to Switzerland. I just hope I would recognise the signs before it got too bad. I have a terrible fear of finding myself in a care home in a vegetative state and if I couldn't make the journey to Switzerland, would try to find another way to end my life. Not sure how and would ideally prefer to trot off to Dignitas.

I would like to have it as an option

Yes I would do it and have already told family members id do it.

Both my parents said all the "shoot me if I get dementia" "I never want to live if I am a burden/ can't go to the toilet/ don't know anyone" etc.

They both died horrible lingering deaths feeling utterly lost, confused, and miserable, doing things which would have horrified their younger selves.

The problem is that people instinctively cling to life as their brains degenerate, and obviously no one is going to make a decision to kill a beloved, demented parent who is unable to make that decision for themselves.

Definite yes for me

Absolutely I would.

I read a real powerful article about the suicide of Sandy Bem an American academic. She was an academic with dementia who chose to kill herself and there were two things I found so poignant: she had to be alone when she died so as to avoid her family being implicated in assisting and the difficulties in getting the "right" drugs to ensure she died quickly and painlessly.

It's appalling we can't have a system in place which allows people to die well.

After spending the last few years caring for a relative with dementia and spending this weekend by his hospital bed in hospital watching him very slowly die, I would want the choice.

But his dementia took over very quickly. I don't when would have been the right time for him to decide this would have been.

I think the UK laws on the subject are draconian. I would

^I just hate the idea that
a) being a wheelchair user is so awful that you would naturally want to die (my dd was a wheelchair user at age 10). b) cancer must mean you should want to die. c) being above 80 must be so awful that you should want to^

No one has suggested any of these things.

Yes.
I have spent the last 20 years caring for elderly relatives.
I can't think of anything positive about having dementia, being incontinent, paying a fortune for what is really very poor care.

The stress and toll on families is horrendous.

I wouldn't want to put my DC through it.

I am very, very clear, and I have told my dh this, that I do not want to go on indefinitely with no or very limited quality of life, and I do not want my children caring for me - I want them to be off living their lives. The latter may be achievable by a good care facility. The former - I am hoping that we will have sensible, robust laws in place by the time/if I ever get to that stage.

I am (waveringly) religious but one of my big sticking points is the notion that I or anyone else needs to suffer appallingly and unwillingly just so God can retain ultimate control over the point of my death. Obviously I do not, under any circumstances, get to make that decision for anyone else. But I want to be able to make it for myself.

I definately would.

Yes it's something I think about and yes I would. I hope the law changes here in the next few years.

Corythatwas I understand what you mean by "being in a wheelchair is so awful you would naturally want to die" but the reality can be very different.
I have a disabled parent who has been fully wheelchair dependant for over 20 years, now in their 80s their body is exhausted and they have a very poor quality of life and have had enough. They want the freedom and dignity of choice.