When a cancer patient says they want to kill themselves
"I can't make my family suffer like this. I want to die!"
Even with good pain management, many cancer patients say this. They don't mean it. They are testing their caretakers. When my mother had lung cancer, from which she died in 1994, I talked to her oncologist. "I give bottles of pills that if taken whole would kill an elephant 20 times a day. Only 2% of patients in my entire 30-year career ever took them. That's why I give them out. The patients don't want to take them. They want them in the medicine cabinet as a psychological choice they can reject. And for those 2%, I respect their choice."
My mother wasn't in that 2%, but I remember having this huge fight with my aunt and cousin, who believed her. So I told her, say it to me, I'll shove the pills down your throat because I had them. She never said it again.
She wanted to live until her last moment. And if you terminate a life 5 minutes before, for me, it's murder. And, I put my mother in Catholic hospitals and hospices because I knew the nuns agreed with me. I loved those Irish nuns. My mother also had an Irish caretaker. I wouldn't trust anyone else but Irish Catholics to take care of her. Those were two other things that got my aunt and cousin crazy.
This is why Dr. Kevorkian was so controversial. I believe he meant well, but we will never know if those people wanted to die because of family pressure and drama, or whether they were really part of that 2%. That's why he went to jail, and for me, rightfully so.
Even with good pain management, many cancer patients say this. They don't mean it. They are testing their caretakers. When my mother had lung cancer, from which she died in 1994, I talked to her oncologist. "I give bottles of pills that if taken whole would kill an elephant 20 times a day. Only 2% of patients in my entire 30-year career ever took them. That's why I give them out. The patients don't want to take them. They want them in the medicine cabinet as a psychological choice they can reject. And for those 2%, I respect their choice."
My mother wasn't in that 2%, but I remember having this huge fight with my aunt and cousin, who believed her. So I told her, say it to me, I'll shove the pills down your throat because I had them. She never said it again.
She wanted to live until her last moment. And if you terminate a life 5 minutes before, for me, it's murder. And, I put my mother in Catholic hospitals and hospices because I knew the nuns agreed with me. I loved those Irish nuns. My mother also had an Irish caretaker. I wouldn't trust anyone else but Irish Catholics to take care of her. Those were two other things that got my aunt and cousin crazy.
This is why Dr. Kevorkian was so controversial. I believe he meant well, but we will never know if those people wanted to die because of family pressure and drama, or whether they were really part of that 2%. That's why he went to jail, and for me, rightfully so.
© 2009 Created by Marie
