“How much longer until I can just die?” my father asks.

Ironically, he doesn’t know he’s actually dying—slogging through death’s stages, step, by excruciating step.  No one tells him that his life is ending.  He is suffering from late stage dementia and will not remember even if we did tell him—our words will evaporate, lost in the fog that clouds his mind. 

It seems more cruel to give him the facts over and over so instead we watch in silence as his body begins to shut down, one organ at a time.

Death takes its time with him.  It makes him wait, lurking in the distance, mocking.

My father can no longer walk.  He has lost most of his vision.  Bed sores have begun to erupt on his legs.  His breath is labored.  He eats nothing but two to three teaspoons of applesauce daily. 

He will likely die of dehydration and that takes time.

The hospice doctors tell me he will be dead within weeks—possibly months, but they are reluctant to give me any real predictions.  It’s impossible for me to make them understand that I’d rather know the truth than wonder. 

I’m sure they know what is likely to happen but they will not share that with me.  They stick to their script.

“Can’t we just go for a walk?” My father asks.  “I’m tired of just lying around all the time.”

He is staring at the ceiling.  I am next to him, on the floor.  It’s 4 am. He still does not understand that he can’t walk anymore and he never sleeps. He does not understand that he will never leave this room.

Outside the seagulls are singing.  The sky is a cruel blue, but he is now locked within a world he can no longer experience. 

He tries to get up, but fails.

I want to end my father’s life. 

I know with 100% certainly he’d want me to.  I try to look for loopholes in the laws.  There is nothing.  We can only wait, hoping that death will grace us sooner rather than later.

After many hours of research I discover a solution that just might be viable:  Palliative Sedation, a fancy name for basically sending someone who is near death anyway into a drug induced coma until they die.  This is as controversial as it sounds but often practiced by hospice doctors when suffering warrants it and all other options for pain relief—both physical and psychological—have been exhausted. 

In reality it is a form of assisted suicide—but it’s legal.

I beg my father’s doctors to do this for him but they refuse.  Their subjective view of his level of suffering does not warrant such a gift.

Here’s what I think about assisted suicide:  It’s a gift.  It’s a vehicle to die on your own terms.  It is a way to end unbearable and needless suffering.

It is a personal choice.

Why should someone else’s religious or political opinions affect our very fate?

Will I be forced to endure needless suffering because someone else’s God deems that ending my own life is immoral?  Will I rack up ridiculous medical bills because it’s illegal for me to die on my own terms?

I hope not. 

When  my day comes and it is me that straddles the vast chasm between life and death I can only hope I'll be able to opt out on my own terms.

I hope Jack's still around when I come knocking.

*my father died six months ago--without the dignity he deserved.  This is a present tense reflection on that time*