29 Year Old San Francisco Woman With Brain Cancer Plans To End Her Life On Nov.

[skyblue1]

Brittany Maynard, a 29-year-old woman battling stage 4 brain cancer from San Francisco, plans to die two days after her husband’s birthday on Nov. 1 by assisted suicide. As part of her legacy, she’s launched a nationwide campaign she’s launched calling for death with dignity laws.
On Monday, Maynard released a YouTube video on her decision to move from her home state of California in order to access death with dignity laws in Oregon. The nonprofit Compassion & Choices is helping her go public with her choice through a campaign to expand assisted suicide laws around the nation

I can’t even tell you the amount of relief it provides me to know that I don’t have to die the way it’s been described to me, that my brain tumor will take me on its own,” Maynard said in the six-minute video, which also includes interviews with her mother, Debbie Ziegler, and her husband, Dan Diaz.

The newlywed, who was living in San Francisco at the time, learned she had terminal brain cancer last January after months of suffering from debilitating headaches. In April, UC San Francisco told her she had six months to live.
“My husband and I were actively trying for a family, which is heartbreaking for us,” she says in the video.

Maynard has glioblastoma multiforme, the most aggressive and lethal form of brain cancer.
With few options in California, Maynard and her family moved to Portland where she met the criteria for Oregon’s Death with Dignity Act. Since the law went into effect in 1997, 1,173 people have had prescriptions written under the act, and 752 have used them to die.

Maynard says she’s received a prescription for medication that will end her life painlessly if she chooses to ingest it.
“I plan to be surrounded by my immediate family,” Maynard says in the video. “And I’ll die upstairs in my bedroom that I share with my husband and pass peacefully with some music I like in the background.”

Currently, only four other states — Washington, Montana, Vermont and New Mexico — have laws to help terminally ill patients die.

“Between suffering and being alive to decide enough is enough, which to me provides a lot of relief and comfort that OK that option is there,” says Diaz, Maynard’s husband.

Maynard’s mom describes her daughter as a wanderlust who loves to travel. Since her diagnosis, she and her husband took a trip to Yellowstone. She’s also been to Alaska with her best friend and hopes to make it to the Grand Canyon, if her increasing pain and recurring seizures affords her the opportunity.



http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2014/10/07/young-san-francisco-woman-with-brain-cancer-plans-to-end-her-life-on-nov-1-brittany-maynard-oregon-compassion-choices-assisted-suicide-death-with-dignity-oregon/

[Icequeen]

IMO this shouldn't have even had to have been made into law in any state...it should be an unalienable right.

I really hope she gets to see the Grand Canyon.

 

['andersom']

IMO this shouldn't have even had to have been made into law in any state...it should be an unalienable right.

I really hope she gets to see the Grand Canyon.

Hope so too, and hope the dosage of meds she got is high enough for her. In other countries where euthanasia is allowed they use other medication because it is more reliable, and in those countries a doctor will be present, to help out if it is not enough.

[Zippo]

no parrent should have to outlive there daugher. no person should have to choose to take there own life in order to avoid pain.
this is saddening. and i wish her the best with what ever time she has left.

['andersom']

no parrent should have to outlive there daugher. no person should have to choose to take there own life in order to avoid pain.
this is saddening. and i wish her the best with what ever time she has left.

True, but since life is fucked up this way, it is good that this daughter can choose to go the way she can bear with, in stead of suffering horribly at the end. When that moment comes, that will be a relief to the mother too, not having to see her daughter suffer that way.

In my country euthanasia is not an issue. It is allowed, with strict guidelines, for many years. Now there are people saying that more than five years after a loved one passed away through euthanasia, they find themselves thinking: "couldn't he have clung to life a little longer, for us?"
It is weird how the mind works that way. The moment the loved one passes, there is relief of suffering having stopped. Over the years memory of the pain of the suffering seems to fade quicker than the pain over missing the loved one.

Not a reason to draw back the right of euthanasia. But, apparently something that happens.

[Zippo]

no parrent should have to outlive there daugher. no person should have to choose to take there own life in order to avoid pain.
this is saddening. and i wish her the best with what ever time she has left.

In my country euthanasia is not an issue. It is allowed, with strict guidelines, for many years. Now there are people saying that more than five years after a loved one passed away through euthanasia, they find themselves thinking: "couldn't he have clung to life a little longer, for us?"

fucking selfish assholes.

[Yuri Bezmenov]

IMO this shouldn't have even had to have been made into law in any state...it should be an unalienable right.

^^ this.     

[Pyraxis]

In my country euthanasia is not an issue. It is allowed, with strict guidelines, for many years. Now there are people saying that more than five years after a loved one passed away through euthanasia, they find themselves thinking: "couldn't he have clung to life a little longer, for us?"

fucking selfish assholes.

This. I have very little sympathy for people who want to force somebody who is suffering from a terminal illness and wants to die, to suffer longer, simply because they can't stand being around somebody in pain.

I think one of the best things you can do for somebody in severe pain is to stay with them and stay present, give them simple company. Accept it. So many people are too scared of pain to be able to deal with it, because it's too much of a reminder that life is fragile.

['andersom']

In my country euthanasia is not an issue. It is allowed, with strict guidelines, for many years. Now there are people saying that more than five years after a loved one passed away through euthanasia, they find themselves thinking: "couldn't he have clung to life a little longer, for us?"

fucking selfish assholes.

This. I have very little sympathy for people who want to force somebody who is suffering from a terminal illness and wants to die, to suffer longer, simply because they can't stand being around somebody in pain.

I think one of the best things you can do for somebody in severe pain is to stay with them and stay present, give them simple company. Accept it. So many people are too scared of pain to be able to deal with it, because it's too much of a reminder that life is fragile.

These were not people saying that their loved one should not have had euthanasia. They are suprised themselves to find that they get these thoughts, years after they lost their loved ones. They still are thinking that there and then it was the right option. They still agree with their loved ones. But to their amazement, they find these underbelly thoughts popping up. They are not selfish, they are amazed.

Apparently this is something that may happen in a mourning process after euthanasia.

[Pyraxis]

Ah I see. I guess every emotion is valid in the healing process and all that.

I do have concerns about euthanasia, mainly in the things Mel Baggs has written about it, the danger of disabled people being socially pressured into it under the excuse of them being a burden.

Freedom still comes first.

[Zippo]

Ah I see. I guess every emotion is valid in the healing process and all that.

I do have concerns about euthanasia, mainly in the things Mel Baggs has written about it, the danger of disabled people being socially pressured into it under the excuse of them being a burden.

Freedom still comes first.

disability =/= terminal illness.

anyone who pushes disabled people to euthenise themself should be shot, repeatedly, in the stomoch.

['andersom']

Ah I see. I guess every emotion is valid in the healing process and all that.

I do have concerns about euthanasia, mainly in the things Mel Baggs has written about it, the danger of disabled people being socially pressured into it under the excuse of them being a burden.

Freedom still comes first.

That is why it is strictly regulated in my country. There have to be two doctors, from different practices, checking with the patient that this is really what the patient wants. They have to make sure there are no other options, and they have to make sure the patient is making this choice in free will, without any pressure from the family.

All cases of euthanasia have to be reported too, and since it is no longer a crime, they are reported indeed. The reported cases can be checked afterwards. Most of the times protocol has been followed well. Sometimes there are some glitches, but I cannot recall a mistake of not noticing the patient being pressed by relatives.

[Pyraxis]

disability =/= terminal illness.

anyone who pushes disabled people to euthenise themself should be shot, repeatedly, in the stomoch.

But terminal diseases are disabling. Sometimes there is a grey area as various treatments slowly lose efficacy.

@Hyke, it's not always relatives that are the problem. It's too easy as an able-bodied person to say something like "If I ever lost my xxxx, I wouldn't be able to stand it, I would rather die, that's no quality of life." Where xxxx is something like being unable to walk, unable to speak, or unable to feed yourself. But it's false empathy because somebody who was born that way, or even somebody who wasn't but values the quality of life differently, would disagree. So as treatment becomes more costly and troublesome, doctors might say "It might be time to think about organizing your affairs," and that's where the social pressure worms in.

I don't have much faith in the ability of a government system, after the fact, to accurately detect social pressure.

['andersom']

disability =/= terminal illness.

anyone who pushes disabled people to euthenise themself should be shot, repeatedly, in the stomoch.

But terminal diseases are disabling. Sometimes there is a grey area as various treatments slowly lose efficacy.

@Hyke, it's not always relatives that are the problem. It's too easy as an able-bodied person to say something like "If I ever lost my xxxx, I wouldn't be able to stand it, I would rather die, that's no quality of life." Where xxxx is something like being unable to walk, unable to speak, or unable to feed yourself. But it's false empathy because somebody who was born that way, or even somebody who wasn't but values the quality of life differently, would disagree. So as treatment becomes more costly and troublesome, doctors might say "It might be time to think about organizing your affairs," and that's where the social pressure worms in.

I don't have much faith in the ability of a government system, after the fact, to accurately detect social pressure.

True, what is unbearable suffering is not something you can predict for the future, it can only be acknowledged when it is there, and it is highly personal.
Makes it very hard, if not impossible, for people with dementia, to express their will to live, or not to live.
There is also the pressure the other way around. Doctors not wanting to help out a patient who meets all criteria of saying that it has been enough.

There will never be a watertight solution to treating the requests to die.

[Zippo]

disability =/= terminal illness.

anyone who pushes disabled people to euthenise themself should be shot, repeatedly, in the stomoch.

But terminal diseases are disabling. Sometimes there is a grey area as various treatments slowly lose efficacy.

@Hyke, it's not always relatives that are the problem. It's too easy as an able-bodied person to say something like "If I ever lost my xxxx, I wouldn't be able to stand it, I would rather die, that's no quality of life." Where xxxx is something like being unable to walk, unable to speak, or unable to feed yourself. But it's false empathy because somebody who was born that way, or even somebody who wasn't but values the quality of life differently, would disagree. So as treatment becomes more costly and troublesome, doctors might say "It might be time to think about organizing your affairs," and that's where the social pressure worms in.

I don't have much faith in the ability of a government system, after the fact, to accurately detect social pressure.

that is all in all a fair point.
when i was in foster care i was with someone bound to a wheel chair, i was never told what terminal illness he had, only that he out lived his life expectancy by ten years, and that it was de-generative.

that kid wanted to live, and he wanted to live bad. but it just wouldnt happen though.
even so, if someone suggested he euthenise himself he would have had the balls to say no. he was not in pain, even though it was terminal. he was well took care of before and after life.

the difference between a disability and terminal illness is one can be worked around, the other you just die, in pain.
just because a disability is terminal does not mean you have the legal right for assisted suicide in this scenereo.

that being said, i feel what one does with ones body is ones own choice.
coming from someone who has thought about killing them self once a day at least since the age of eight that probably means fuck all. but still.