Today I turn 67 (thank you, the cake was delicious). I am overweight but vigorous, active and overall healthy. But anything can happen at any time, including something debilitating.
What I’m wondering about is: what are my options if life takes a horrible turn? Some things (living in a wheelchair, blindness, deafness (but not all at once)) I think I could live with. But mental debilitation, or inability to communicate (e.g. my mind is functioning but I can’t talk or write) or that sort of thing I think I would rather not survive. This is a purely personal and selfish point of view, although I can’t think of anyone who would miss having my dysfunctional hulk around.
So this is a serious question. What arrangements can I make in advance to help me shuffle off this mortal coil if things get so bad that life is a serious burden? I know about living wills and DNR orders, and I have those in place. But it seems like there are a fair number of situations that wouldn’t fall under those documents (although when I try to think of examples, they seem fairly far-fetched).
Another fear I have is ending up alone (I have a husband who is older than I am, and no children, one sister who lives far away and is also older) and in some kind of care facility, where I gradually grow more attenuated until it’s too late to put an end to it all. I hate being at the mercy of other people where there is no mutual personal relationship. I hate being treated like a child. All those horrors one hears about at such places.
So, TL;DR, I’d really like to have an open-ended discussion about how people plan for the disasters that can happen in old age, and how to get out from under the burden of an intolerable life, if necessary.
You can preplan your funeral. You can start asking friends, neighbors, or others about experiences with nursing homes, you can rearrange the furniture for walkers, and you can make sure the documents you have are up to date. My neighbor is a retired minister and did pastoral visits to nursing homes, and has some pretty strong feelings on ones he doesn’t want to go to.
Don’t be afraid of telling people what you want, so they know and that your DNR isn’t a shock. If you have nice things you don’t use anymore but we’re going to leave to someone, give it to them now. Label your family photos!
Don’t do it all at once, though, because people will wonder if you’re not telling them something.
My husband is older than I, and I have spent the last 45 years wondering how to handle things when he died or became I’ll, when I ended up getting sick in January. Now he is the one who might be doing the wondering so you never know.
Don’t lose your weight! I saw a dietician last year who said at my age (65), I needed to have some emergency weight and wanted me to put on 25 lbs. I wasn’t scrawny or underweight, but I was on the low end for my height. I left thinking that there was no way on earth I was going to do that. I should have. Now I’m scrawny and underweight but can’t put on anything as fast as I’m burning it off. So, keep that emergency weight!
Thanks for the advice. I think I have enough extra weight for a couple of emergencies, but I know what you mean. One hospital stay for pneumonia can cost 50 pounds, so I’ve heard.
One thing you are not taking into consideration is that your expectations of life will likely get lower as your circumstances diminish. Small things can still make you happy. Likely at 67 you have already experienced this, though you may not have noticed it. There may come a time when a shaft of sunlight coming through a window will bring you inexpressible joy. Don’t miss it.
If your decision is to shuffle off this mortal coil, however, the option most often available to you will be VSED, or voluntarily stopping eating and drinking. Google it for specifics.
I suppose you could hire someone to assassinate you when your health deteriorated beyond some preset limits, but I guarantee you he will kill you just before that sunlight reveals itself.
No, you’re not misunderstanding, although I wish to be extremely clear that I would only take that path under pretty extreme circumstances.
ethelbert, I do appreciate that point of view. When I see people barely existing in some nursing home where they seem to be getting no joy or pleasure, only a daily dull misery out of life, I wonder if I am seeing the whole picture. Maybe someone visits them sometimes, and treats them like a person again. Otherwise they seem to be warehoused and waiting to die. If that were all there were going to be from then on, I would rather not wait. Of course the problem is that you don’t know what the next day might bring. And thanks for the VSED idea, I will read up on it for future reference.
Funny you should post this - I was having a conversation just yesterday with colleagues and one of them said her mother was told much the same thing. Her mother had always been scrawny - as a child they had her drinking beer of all things to try to get more calories into her.
Me, I got that covered. I could have 4 bouts of pneumonia and be just fine :D.
As far as “this sucks, I am DONE with it” options: if you’re in the US, there are effectively none. If you’re past the point of being physically proactive about it (finding a gun, taking sleeping pills or whatever), but mentally OK, you can refuse care including medical procedures that would prolong your life.
Be prepared for “someone” (nursing home staff or whatever) to attempt to declare you incompetent and force treatment on you. Documenting such desires well in advance would help your case if the legal system becomes involved.
That will also help if you become mentally incapacitated. If you have no family to take that over, you may find that someone goes to court to be able to make such decisions for you. I’m pretty sure that family or court-ordered guardians are not required to follow steps that say “just quit feeding me and let me die”.