4- Wednesday, January 6, 1993 -

North Shore News

No worse fate than

THE B.C. Supreme court has

turned down the request of Sue

Rodrigues, a 42-year-old Victoria

woman with Lou Gehrig's '
Disease, for legal permission to

have a physician help her. commit

suicide when she becomes totally:
. incapacitated. :

Her nervous system is winking .
out, one nerve cell at a time. Like:
HAL the computer being discon- ;
nected or Han Solo frozen like a‘ ;
statue, but, alive. Terribly alive. .,

_,. She'll end up as powerless asa |
vegetable, but with her mind still
‘operating perfectly. I can imagine:
no worse living horror. This is .
about as cruel a fate as anyone’

could be cursed with: ;

It is not curable. Instead of tak-

“ing 18 months, as diagnosed, the
’ disease could, it has been shown,
_take 10 years to reduce her to
“such a state. . .
- © But the end result is inevitable,
“\-and it is a steady neurological
disintegration all the way. :
Eventually, you choke to death.
1 don’t know if you’ve ever’
:., Seriously choked. I have. Not the’
" way to go. It’s tortures. 0"...
‘This is the reality that Ms...

Rodrigues faces. Unable to strug- *.

gle or fend it off, just be strangled
slow motion to.death: | +;

Quite reasonably, she. wants a!
hand to come down into that aye
ing zone of her body and turn off’
the-switch, painlessly, p fifes- ,
sionally, just letting her go mer- .
"-. ifully to sleep, :

!. ¢The B.C. Supreme Court, in its,
isdom, says no. But that’s what:

Vd want under.those cir- .
i ‘cumstances. I should say, that’s

what I'd want-at the very, least: a
“right such as that. I might, ine:
“fact, want to exit a lot sooner.
perhaps even in styles 8
That stiould be my busi ines, not:
‘the government’ s. .
But while suicide isn't illegal i int
Canada, assisting someone to °
‘commit suicide carries a 14-year’
, Sentence. wood 7
: Displaying a great deal of”

" courage ‘and compassion for: ;
others in’a similar situation, Ms.
Rodrigues has put herself through’
the’ excrutiatingly stressful experi-

ence of going to.the courts, in
‘order.to loosen the gtip of the’
state on yours' land my options. in.
he face of a long, lingering death.
When you are terminally ill, the
Jast place you'd, want to spend

» out.”

STRICTLY PERSONAL

"your precious days i is in a bloody
courtroom.
Bad enough in a hospital.
‘lam very biased on this issue.
’ There are too many people I
know whom I've heard say,
“Grandpa never would have
“wanted it this way.’’ Or: ‘‘I wish

fh we could have just pulled the

* plug.”
Modern science has given us the
tools to prolong life beyond any |
useful or enjoyable or often even
bearable poin:. We have found a
way to inject enough needles with
enough fluids to keep our bodies
in a kind of suspended animation,
for decades, if necessary. ,,

- There is an assuniption involved
here. It is the assumption that the

prolongation of life is the ultimate -
goal, as opposed to the easing or
- ending of suffering.

pees

..H someone is nailed to a cross
.and can’t be gotten down alive,
“what kind of friend or loved one
., arranges for intravenous feedings -.
“to keep the crucifee alive for —.
- weeks or months, and justifi ies it
by saying, “Don’t worry, we're ./
giving him morphine every three
hours''? | “=: ¥
There simply comes atime to
let each other go. I believe the’
trick, in such a predicament, is
not to avoid death, which is in-
evitable, but to avoid suffering a
‘whole hell of alot on the way

‘By the time my mother ‘died of.
lung cancer, those of us who fov- -
ed her wanted one thing only: for
it to be over.‘

. The doctor has. promised to.

a make her passing painless. It was

all he could do. At one point,
near the end, I asked the nurse if
there was any way | could increase
the chances of getting through to
mom. ;

She was so zonked on morphine
and God knows what else I wasn’t
getting any understandable
response out of her at all.

The nurse said she could hold’
back on the next shot for a while,
and that would allow my mother’s
conscious self to float up closer to
the surface where she might hear
me, if I tried hard enough. ~,

So as the morphine began-to
fade, | began to sing old war ;
songs into her ear. Tears finally
appeared, perhaps signalling she’d

i "

incurable illness.

freedoms won't be complete until
that final choice i is included.“

nails from inside?
The right to die with dignity, .
that’s what it’s called. Our

Your Professional,
Real: Estate Expert

OFFICE 984-9711,
PAGER: 645-9651»
FAX: 984-3350 °

“heard me, or at least heard the» jo. fi

era.
Then she began to twitch and’
the look of horror that, ‘came
across her face as the’ pain began
to kick in was something that will
haunt me the rest of my life. I
screamed for th: nurse, who ex-
plained, as she attended toa
bruised old vein, that it would
take 15 minutes for the morphine
to work its magic. , ’

_. For that 15 minutes, alone, 1

held my tortured, twitching
mother in my arms. She was too
far gone to even be able to squeak’
or squeal, but her muscle spasms
said it all. I knew 1 should take
the pillow and end it for her. im-
mediately: That was my duty to.
her...

Yet Y ididn'e , of course. Because’
she wzs my iother, and I could
“-not do violence to her even to end ,
her;pain. 1’

if feel to this day that I failed
her. he woe |
i. There should have been ahand
@ ? there, a professional hand, to -

‘ reach down and end it for her.

: What’ could possibly | have been
gained, by leaving her th rere to suf-
fer on’ ‘ind on, hooked up to all.

" those, tubes and catheters, pierced
by those needles, while’ she was:

APANESE

ey

PROGRAM Orres:

‘a Japanese environment ;

e Japanese language partners
(resident Japanese students) ._....,

« Small classes, qualified instructors, .
communicative approach.

- Courses begin.
January, April, ©
July and September

‘owyniay INTERNATIONAL COMEGE
Lf ‘Extension Department OOo
” 242 Dollarton Highway’ ”
North Vancouver, B.C, 7H 2Y1.
-Q km east of Second Narrows Biidge) " fe
Te: (604) 979-1844 Fax: (604 929-2074

crucifi ied by a million, microscopic ay

ore
January 44, 1993

aT! :30 pm. “Plat viewing.

At your Canada Employment Centre, we've found ©
that one thing our ‘clients peed pethaps even more P than a.

Help in chosing a career or overcomi
employment barriers.:, o

wee And that’s where we come in. Even ‘hough nae may
be hard to find, Canada Employment Centre at 124 East

Sth Street. (15th & Lonsdale) i in North Vancouver 1 is’, " sort ume ote. samc

WESTERN DELTA LANDS ©

This i is not a Public Hearing. Goulet will receive a ‘Teport froin staff on issues’
raised at the meeting and will formally consider the proposal at a later date