Just had a very bizarre conversation with Walt and Seth, as we were talking about last wills and preferences (we’re all single). I told them (they already knew, so I was not breaking news) that my will had them as being given strict instructions to pull that fucking life support if I was brain dead like a fucking weed, but my brother said “I think your blog during Schiavo would have made that clear.”
Then I thought, maybe not. So, for posterity, if I am in a vegetative state or brain dead or whatever the fuck you want to call it, harvest whatever organs I have not ravaged with my poor lifestyle habits and truly atrocious decision making, then shoot me up like Janis Joplin and PULL THAT FUCKING PLUG. I honestly don’t know how much clearer I could be, but I thought it would be nice to be on record.
Plus it might give you all something to talk about.
Also, if I die tonight, SETH AND WALT did it. Fuckers.
eemom
um, that would be last will and TESTAMENT, Cole.
There’s something in there about “being of sound mind,” also too.
Wee Bey
Great. Now this will happen and we’ll have five noisy people ranting about the “extrajudicial assasination of John Cole!!!!11!1ELEVENTYONE!1!”
PurpleGirl
If I can’t get my scanner to work, I have to pull the plug on the damn netbook… certainly not on me, I like living and there is yarn crawl this weekend.
Time to see how I can pay for a new tower machine. Time for bed, the computers are driving me brain dead.
General Stuck
Life is hard, then we die. No exceptions.
I got a pair of crickets or Katydids in my bedroom that are driving me bonkers, and I can’t find them. Being deaf in one ear doesn’t help with locating the incessant chirping, and the other a long raspy whistle like noise. And when I think I’m getting close to their hideout, the little fuckers shut up.
Corner Stone
A full one third of your popularity contestants here qualify for that definition.
Donut
http://wearethe99percent.tumblr.com
John Cole
@eemom: Christ, I edited the post and you still trolled it before the edit was in.
Yutsano
Stop covering for that damn murderous feline.
srv
I don’t think much will be left after Tunch is done feeding.
Cacti
Your last will and testament isn’t what you want to put that in, Cole. That’s a document that takes legal effect AFTER you’re dead.
You want to create a durable power of attorney for healthcare, state explicitly under what conditions you want the plug pulled, name an agent who would give the green light to pull said plug, and one or two successor agents who would do the same, in the event anything happened to your first choice.
Jewish Steel
The sudden death of a young friend has made me rethink the oft repeated desire to die quickly and with little suffering.
After seeing what this has done to my circle of friends, I think I’d would prefer the suffering if it would help my friends come to grips with the inevitable.
trollhattan
Carlin had a routine, which I can’t find on-line but whatevs, wherein if there were a machine they had to shove up his ass to keep him alive, then shove away. Whatever it takes. Since we don’t know what’s on the other side, no point in being in a hurry to find out.
I’ve made it quite clear the Carlin rule applies. I’m hoping they understand the up the ass part is NOT a requirement. OTOH congress can butt out, thanks.
Mary Jane
I’m glad to see the CA Democratic Party is adding a Death with Dignity plank to our 2012 platform. It’s not up to anyone’s personal god to decide if I die a slow, agonizing death, or as John fears, less functional than a rutabaga.
soonergrunt
During the Schiavo thing, I tried to get a codicil into my will that if I were ever brain dead, then the only way a person to whom I am not married could override my DNR/removal of support would be if he or she gave me a blow job to orgasm. The stated rationale being that anybody who’d do that for me obviously was desperately concerned for my well-being.
I couldn’t afford a private attorney, and although the National Guard JAG owed me a favor, he flat refused to put it into my will.
On another note, it looks like my union, AFGE #2564 is going to war with the OKC Veterans Affairs Medical Center.
What was that Chinese curse–“May you live in interesting times.”
RoonieRoo
My sister, my dad and I just recently had this very conversation. It’s a good one to have. Awesome post Cole. By the way, I’m +3, how many are you?
amk
some death jokes
There was an elderly man at home, upstairs, dying in bed. He smelled the aroma of his favorite chocolate chip cookies baking. He wanted one last cookie before he died. led down the stairs and crawled into the kitchen where his wife was busily baking cookies.
With his last remaining strength he crawled to the table and was just barely able to lift his withered arm to the cookie sheet. As he grasped a warm, moist chocolate chip cookie, his favorite kind, his wife suddenly whacked his hand with a spatula.
Gasping for breath, he asked her, “Why did you do that?”
“Those are for the funeral.”
*****************************
In some foreign country a priest, a lawyer and an engineer are about to be guillotined.
The priest puts his head on the block, they pull the rope and nothing happens — he declares that he’s been saved by divine intervention– so he’s let go .
The lawyer is put on the block, and again the rope doesn’t release the blade, he claims he can’t be executed twice for the same crime and he is set free too.
They grab the engineer and shove his head into the guillotine, he looks up at the release mechanism and says, “Wait a minute, I see your problem….”
**************************
A funeral service was being held in a small town funeral parlor for a woman who has just passed away. At the end of the service the pallbearers are carrying the casket out, when they accidentally bumped into a wall and shook the casket. Hearing a faint moan, they open the casket and found out that the woman was actually alive!
For ten more years, the women enjoyed good health and then suddenly died. A ceremony is again held at the same funeral parlor. At the end of the ceremony the pallbearers are again carrying out the casket.
As they make their way toward the door, the husband cries out, “Watch out for the wall!”
*******************
Heh, so shoot me.
Carnacki
@Yutsano: I was thinking the exact same thing. He always covers for that cat. The weird tail must give Tunch hypnotic powers
Dustin
@trollhattan: If you’re brain dead what good does keeping your body functional do? Sure it may bankrupt your family and put them through hell, but maybe you dislike them and consider that a plus. Once your brain’s gone you’re dead, finished, never to come back or move on. You’re simply gone, and making doctors play marionette with your corpse doesn’t really change that.
Shade Tail
@Corner Stone:
You really need to stop make peans to pie. It makes you look like a freak.
Ken
@Cacti: Also check the laws for your state, to see if there are any local restrictions and rules. If you move to another state, you may have to create new documents.
Make sure that your local hospital knows about the documents, as well as people who might know when you are entering the hospital – your boss, your landlord, your church. In some states the law changes once you’ve been put on the machines, so you want to make sure someone tells the doctors your wishes.
Corner Stone
@Shade Tail: Why? I like pie. Chocolate pie is my absolute fav. But, if in a pinch I will take a strawberry pie from the House of Pies.
Corner Stone
I love it when I get the triumphant pie people. It proves the adage of “hit dogs make the most noise” to be absolutely true.
Corner Stone
Or maybe that’s just for racists? I can never keep track anymore in this New Era of Civility.
Which is hard.
Corner Stone
Or pieists?
Who knows anymore round here.
fasteddie9318
Pie totally rocks. Had a piece of sweet potato pie last night. Store bought, but still pretty goddamn good.
thalarctos
@Jewish Steel:
I’m very sorry to hear about your friend, JS. I hope that your good memories start to replace the pain.
I honestly don’t know if it’s possible to come to grips with it over time. I thought I had done so with my mother’s death over the three years she spent dying, yet when it happened, it hit me so hard that I was truly blindsided by it.
I genuinely don’t know. But I think you’re a kind and generous person to consider taking that burden on if you could.
MattR
That pretty much sums up my feelings. If my brain is gone I don’t need my body. If they can use my organs to help others, go for it. If they can use my corpse to help teach students, go for it.
But more importantly John, who did you decide will become responsible for feeding Tunch?
@thalarctos: I know where you are coming from, but OTOH when the time came for my dad to go I was almost rooting for it to happen because I saw the toll that continuing to care for the shell of his body was taking on my mother.
Mary Jane
@Jewish Steel: I’m sorry for your loss.
Shade Tail
@Corner Stone:
Yeah, well, when you get trolled, you do scream pretty loudly. Most entertaining, thanks for taking the bait.
Corner Stone
@Shade Tail: So do you have me pied or are you just a fucking liar?
You’re trolling people about being pied? Isn’t that like a reduction of pathetic?
Violet
So who gets Lily?
JWL
IF you were brain dead?
Elie
Yeah, we hear you.
Most of us want that proly.
Problem occurs when you are in a prolonged vegetative state and there is nothing to turn off. You are just laying there in a coma and there are no machines. Trust me, it happens. A lot. My Dad had to go the long hard way due to Parkinson disease — no tubes so no water or nourishment until….
Yeah. Those damned details. Would that there is a dramatic black and white choice. Those are easy. Its the gray that life sometimes throws on us. People who while dying and knowing they are dying, still have that fight or are basically healthy enough that the heart and kidneys just keep on going and going…
Or sometimes its left to the quick decision that a relative is pressed into as a result of an emergency — they are too in shock to remember what you wanted or unprepared just yet to carry it out, cause shit, he/she was just talking to you an hour ago…
I get your point, John. Pray that we all have it go down easy for us. In any case, however it goes, we will end up in peace.
Jewish Steel
@thalarctos:
I’ve heard that too. Particularly with parents or spouses that there is no way to prepare oneself. I believe it.
MattR
@Jewish Steel: I am so sorry. I think losing a friend so young is quite traumatic, whether it is sudden or if there is some warning. But there is definitely an argument to be made both ways. In my case, one of the primary goals of my life is to make sure I outlive my mother so I would definitely not want to go suddenly while she is still alive. But if she has passed on and I am in my 60’s (or later), I think I would rather go suddenly and painlessly.
Omnes Omnibus
@eemom: Very low standard for sound mind in decedents’ estates though. Very low.
WaterGirl
@thalarctos: @Jewish Steel:
That’s how it was for me with my mom. You can be as prepared as you can be, but I think we really just can’t get it until they are actually gone. Really, how are you supposed to be able to fathom a world in which the people who have been there for every second of our life could possibly be gone from it forever?
My parents had lived 3 hours away, I talked to them maybe once a week, but when they were gone it was so strange. My day to day world was almost completely the same, but it felt very odd, like the world was still there but foundation was missing.
There’s only so much our brains can comprehend until we are faced with the reality of what seems completely impossible – that the one we loved is gone forever.
asiangrrlMN
@Jewish Steel: Sorry to hear that, JS. Hugs to you.
@Yutsano: Why do you always blame the cat?!
@Cole, you are too funny, man. I have a pact with a friend that should I die before she does, she should clean my house of all embarrassing things.
trollhattan
@Dustin:
Eh, I’m a selfish prick who’s willing to admit I don’t know what brain-dead means. I suspect it’s not usually cut and dried such as somebody who’s launched through their windshield and like I said, I’m in no hurry to get to the other side.
In sum, I prefer to spare my loved ones the task of deciding “what would he have wanted?” by telling them “mitts off.” If the docs convince them otherwise, so be it.
We all end up there.
Elie
@Jewish Steel:
It is difficult either way so do not be hard on yourself. My condolences to you. It is very hard to lose someone dear, no matter how much prep you are given…
Carnacki
@soonergrunt: Ha! @asiangrrlMN: Because Tunch is always guilty of something
jaleh
Just telling your friends does not work, you have to have a living will…I have one with my boyfriend. Since we are not married we had to go through the whole legal thing to get this done. He will definitely pull the plug on me. We have discussed this many times.
asiangrrlMN
@Carnacki: Bullshit. Tunchie is the sweetest, most angelic creature on the face of this planet.
COLE! Tunchie pics!
Elie
@trollhattan:
“brain dead” has a technical definition in medicine which is no brain waves on an EEG for 24 hour period for 2 readings.
Again, the problem comes when there is nothing to turn off. The brain can motor along with purely brain stem functions for a while if nothing too traumatic is happening to the rest of the body, like bleeding or major electrolyte imbalance. The kidneys eventually fail and electrolytes go crazy stopping the heart after there has been a period of dehydration and absense of other nutrients essential to life. That takes a while — approxm 1 – 2 weeks depending on the age and condition of the person that put them into that neurological status.
MattR
@asiangrrlMN: Yet he is a cat. Therefore devious and likely guilty of something.
Elie
@WaterGirl:
I remember the sense of profound mystery along with the big empty hole in my heart when Daddy passed… His “aura” was still there but he was gone…
Too many deep deep things to share but its just the most profound experience one can have…
asiangrrlMN
@MattR: NO. Cats are guilty of nothing. The sleeping baby in my lap is guileless!
P.S. Thx for the hookup. I got to see the last innings of both the BoSox loss and the Rays win on the last day of regular-season baseball!
Paul
@Corner Stone: I like pie.
Wag
I would encourage anyone interested to either talk to their doctor about the Five Wishes document or go to http://www.fivewishes.org and get the Five Wishes living will. It’s user friendly and is transferable/recognized by at least 45 states, maybe even 48 states. I think the exceptions are Missouri and north Dakota.
Yutsano
@MattR: Forget it man. She has it bad for that feline. And she’s allergic to boot.
asiangrrlMN
@Yutsano: He still hasn’t responded to my marriage proposal. Sniff sniff.
@Omnes Omnibus: Bwahhhhahhhha! You funny. I heard you were asking about me last night. How you be?
Omnes Omnibus
@Yutsano: Perhaps she should wear shoe or sandal then.
Elie
@Wag:
Be prepared to fight for it though if there is nothing dramatic to do.
The nursing home initially would not carry out Daddy’s wishes and wanted to put down a feeding tube for water and food. We had to insist No. THAT was very very gnarly.
Since I had the medical background, I spared my mother having to do that.
I will never forgive them for making me insist that they not put that tube down my Dad’s throat. That was in his expressed written wishes — no tubes, etc… but they made me make them do it.
Just know that happens sometimes.
Short Bus Bully
I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest that our intrepid blog host has been drinking tonight. I know, weird.
Also too, is this thread topic indicative of said “party” conversations at the Cole household? Craaazy…
fubar
Could not have said it better. I love you man!
MattR
@asiangrrlMN: I am pretty sure that “he” was Tunch and not me, so I have to ask how you would know if he accepted? (If that “he” was me, then I think I might have missed something)
PS. No problem. Glad you were able to watch that delicious ending.
EDIT: Are you trying to give Rick Santorum nightmares by even suggestion a female-feline union?
asiangrrlMN
@MattR: Wait. You don’t remember? I’m crushed. No, “he” was Tunchie, and good point. Hmmmmm….
I only got to see the last inning of each game, but oh, that’s all I really needed to see!
Omnes Omnibus
@MattR:
To be fair, his issue is man-on-dog. Do we know if he objects to other pairings?
Wag
@Ellie
Yeah, some people in power try and force their values on a family. As a Primary Care Physician I think it’s important to have you PCP in your court If the physician supports your family’s decision to withhold tube feeds and hydration then there’s little a nursing home can do.
Lojasmo
@Cacti:
But it doesn’t work like that if you choose a weak-ass proxy. My (estranged mother named her religio-fanatic sister to serve as her proxy. Her sister wanted EVERYTHING done while my mom was on her death bed.
The day before my mom died, her doctor called me asking what the fuck was going on.
I told him that I understood the situation, and that further efforts were futile. The next day they turned off the oxygen, and my mom died.
Choose wisely. Don’t pick a dumbass.
YellowJournalism
Yeah, make sure there’s evrything necessary in place with multiple witnesses. My grandmother had a living will inplace and my greedy fucking relatives were still successful in scaring the hospital of her very caring and competant doctor into paying out a settlement for allowing her to die with dignity as she had specifically requested.
And again I thank John for the Schiavo posts because it brought to light a subject that tore my extended family apart and showed me what insecure asswipes some people could be.
Punchy
You’re STILL fuckin single?
eemom
@John Cole:
trolled? Trolled? I was trying to HELP you, you ingrate.
What’s a girl gotta do to please you, anyhow? Is it even POSSIBLE?
Too Many Jimpersons (formerly Jimperson Zibb, Duncan Dönitz, Otto Graf von Pfmidtnöchtler-Pízsmőgy, Mumphrey, et al.)
Death is always hard for whoever is left behind. My father was 91 when he died almost 4 years ago. (on a side note, it’s kind of weird; I’m 43, and I kind of grew up (if I did grow up at all) in the 80’s and 90’s. Johnson was president when I was born. Woodrow Wilson was president the year my father was born, and the U.S. hadn’t yet gone into World War II. His father, who I knew, since he lived to be 96, was born when Ulysses S. Grant was president, and my grandmother, who I also knew, since she lived to be 95, was born while Rutherford B. Hayes was president. They both lived well into Nixon. My father lasted from Wilson to Bush the Younger. It still saddens me that he didn’t make it to see Obama take over, though he would have been seething over the fucking teabaggers and what they’re now doing to the country…)
Wow, that was a long aside. Anyway, what I was writing to say was that when he died it was sudden and nobody–least of all my father–saw it coming. Even at 91, it was a shock. We were all–him, too–kind of assuming he’d make it to 95 at least, and then make a good run at 100.
So when he went, it was sudden, and, I guess, not too bad for him. We were all stunned. The same thing happened with my mother’s mother 10 or 15 years ago when she died out of the blue at 92, which made her the youngest to doe of my 4 grandparents. We just reeled when we learned, and it took a long time to get over. In some ways my mother still hasn’t gotten over it. Her father’s death a few years before that hadn’t been so hard on her, since he hadn’t been in the best health for a while. But my father and grandmother were in pretty good shape. Somehow, I think that makes it harder, or at least it does for me; I feel kind of cheated somehow, out of good years they might have had (maybe not as badly cheated as they were, but still…).
Anyway, in cheerier news, I’m counting down the days until I head back to Tela, Honduras for 2 weeks. It’s only 3 days now. My wife–along with pretty much everyone else I know–has forbidden me to bring back any more stray dogs who live on the beach. It’s going to be hard to break the news to them…
MattR
@Punchy: @eemom: These comments work perfectly together.
Omnes Omnibus
@eemom:
No. You aren’t Lily.
Fulcanelli
O/T, but maybe THIS might cheer up the emoprogs whining about the futility of the Occupy Wall Street protests.
asiangrrlMN
@MattR: That would be a side benefit (giving RS nightmares).
@Omnes Omnibus: Certainly not against frothy mixture.
Bago
@Punchy: He was the life of the party…
Omnes Omnibus
@asiangrrlMN: Ew.
Thymezone
You can’t die. This blog would not last a week without you.
No offense to your crew, but that’s the way it is.
Joshua Norton
Dude, if you died tonight, I’d probably check for internal vodka burns.
eemom
@Too Many Jimpersons (formerly Jimperson Zibb, Duncan Dönitz, Otto Graf von Pfmidtnöchtler-Pízsmőgy, Mumphrey, et al.):
can all you people here STOP being younger than me? kthxbai.
Omnes Omnibus
@Thymezone: So you are saying we should leave him plugged in for the sake of the blog? I am not disputing this, just asking.
MattR
@Omnes Omnibus: When the posting continues it will confirm our suspicions that Tunch is really the brains behind the operation.
Omnes Omnibus
@MattR: Or that Cole is one of DougJ’s sockpuppets…
Yutsano
@eemom: No.
Neener.
/almost 39
MattR
@Omnes Omnibus: And if both John and DougJ go silent we’ll know the reverse was true.
@Yutsano: Didn’t realize you were such an old man.
/approaching 37
Omnes Omnibus
@eemom: Even I can’t do that and I can do almost anything.
asiangrrlMN
@Omnes Omnibus: Yes.
@eemom: Sorry to pile on.
/40
Omnes Omnibus
You’re all a bunch of kids who should get off my lawn except, of course, eemom.
asiangrrlMN
@Omnes Omnibus: How old are you, OO?
@Felinious Wench: That’s great, FW, that you did that and that they saw you were making sense. Glad your grandmother got to go as she wanted.
Felinious Wench
@Lojasmo:
Yep, had that with my grandmother, She had Altheimer’s, was about ready to go. My mother wanted to let her go peacefully, no tubes, no machines. Right-wing Christian uncle and his offspring said we had to keep her alive for as long as possible, period.
I sat down with my uncle and his kids and said “I don’t get it. For people so confident about their faith and where you’re ending up, you all seem to be really afraid of death and determined to avoid it. Why is that?” I got some sanctity of life stuff, then I said “How is artificially keeping her alive respecting life? It’s depriving her of a dignified death. You’re playing God now. It’s her time.”
They backed down, and my grandmother died peacefully a couple of days later. With her lipstick on, just like she wanted it. :) She was a great lady.
Sarah Proud and Tall
I too am fond of pie.
/93
asiangrrlMN
@Sarah Proud and Tall: I adore you, Ms. Sarah!
Omnes Omnibus
@asiangrrlMN: Older than you. Younger than eemom. (Closer to eemom.) How old did you think I was?
Yutsano
@Omnes Omnibus: I know the answer to this. But I’m gonna let wifey dig her own hole here. :)
@Sarah Proud and Tall: Marionberry or GTFO.
Oh and hi dear.
Comrade Mary
/50, like the beer
Omnes Omnibus
@Yutsano: Have I ever told you the secret of guessing a woman’s age if ever forced into it? 23.
Sarah Proud and Tall
@Yutsano:
Quite a charming man in person, dear. He once gave me a very large line in the White House toilets.
Oh, wait, that’s not what you meant.
asiangrrlMN
@Omnes Omnibus: I thought you were in your mid-to-late thirties!
Omnes Omnibus
@asiangrrlMN: Thank you, dear.
ETA: My youthful appearance or my obvious immaturity? Think carefully before answering.
asiangrrlMN
@Omnes Omnibus: Definitely the former as you are thoughtful and wise. And you have lots of commas. But, damn.
Yutsano
@Omnes Omnibus:
The possibilities abound…
Ahh snog off. This is BJ after all.
@Sarah Proud and Tall: It was on the lunch menu last week, remember? I was there, I said hi. Daft old bat. Can remember shagging Kennedy but nothing in the recent age.
Omnes Omnibus
@asiangrrlMN: Good, verging on great, answer.
Omnes Omnibus
@Yutsano:
Mock away. Shit will happen to you too. I’ll be dead then, but still.
Yutsano
@Omnes Omnibus: Shit enough has happened so far. Some of it ain’t been half-bad either.
asiangrrlMN
@Yutsano: Oooooh, someone’s feeling feeeeisty!
@Omnes Omnibus: You are one of my faves here on da Juice for substantive, reasoned comments. And dry wit. And commas!
@Omnes Omnibus: Yes. My rusty pitchforks are legend now!
Omnes Omnibus
@asiangrrlMN: One simply loves your pitchforks.
Jewish Steel
Thanks awfully to those above expressing sympathy. She was an old girlfriend with whom I had lost touch. 38 years old (young being a relative term here) she had just completed her final exam for her actuarial license and was getting ready to rake in some real money for the first time in her life. This after doing some intense family social work that burnt her out.
She had been in a coma for two weeks after having a heart attack + seizures so her passing was frankly a relief. It’s a fucking tragedy.
Omnes Omnibus
@Yutsano: I love being alive. N’est-ce pas?
Omnes Omnibus
@Jewish Steel: Shit. I hadn’t paid close enough attention earlier in the thread. My condolences.
dr. luba
Baby Joseph anyone? Terry Schiavo’s brother and the priests were involved in this one.
Yutsano
@Omnes Omnibus: Oui. Without revealing too much, I did almost try the alternative. Pneumonia + bad job = big huge mess.
Mnemosyne
@dr. luba:
Though I’m not thrilled with the assholes who attached themselves to the case, it sounds like it genuinely was the wishes of the family to get the tracheotomy and take their terminally ill child home to die. Not really the same thing as Schiavo since we’re talking about a toddler.
Omnes Omnibus
@Yutsano: Voluntary exit? No…. Bad. Best not to do that. Anyway, you know that. And what do I know; I am on a Meatloaf jag.
ETA: I am enough of a Francophile to buy into the Existentialists.
Yutsano
@Omnes Omnibus: Involuntary. Just took extremely poor care of myself coupled with a horrible work situation. They said when I was finally hospitalized my immune system was almost completely non-existent.
For the life of me I thought you were stuffing your face with Americana.
Omnes Omnibus
@Yutsano: I will post links if necessary.
Yutsano
@Omnes Omnibus: No, that’s okay. I self-corrected.
@Mnemosyne: Total OT giggle: an old college friend works for House of Mouse. He’s up this way though so the odds of you crossing paths are very minimal.
asiangrrlMN
@Jewish Steel: Oh, JS. That’s just sad and awful. Hugs again.
@Yutsano: Glad you didn’t!
@Omnes Omnibus: I love Meatloaf, and I’m not ashamed to say it.
Uriel
@Shade Tail: Nice.
Uriel
@Corner Stone: Quit whining, whiney. It was funny, Which is more than can be said about 90% of your stuff. As for what or who might be a “reduction of pathetic”- well, there’s this little aphorism about pots and kettles…
harlana
Yeh, don’t worry John, we’ll make sure you’re dead if we have to. :)
honus
@Cacti: Also called and Advance Medical Directive or Living Will. Any half competent lawyer in Morgantown can do it for you in about 10 minutes. This is what will control your medical treatment in the event you become unable to make decisions youself (i.e. in a coma) All your raving here or elsewhere is meaningless.
Samara Morgan
yah kno, Cole, Schiavo was one thing you and i and charles all agreed on.
I was gobsmacked that all my conservative mentors didnt get that THE LADY WAS A CARROT.
@honus i want a living will that euthanizes me in case of detectable Alzheimers.
Is there such a thing?
honus
@soonergrunt: My will contains a provision that if I am to laid to rest and my wife is not beside me, my stone is to read “Lets play army. I’ll lay here and you blow the hell out of me” If and when my wife chooses to be buried next to me the stone can be changed to read “Beloved Husbad and Father.” Of course I’m a lawyer and drew it myself.
Samara Morgan
@asiangrrlMN: are you going to be his spanky nurse too?
Gravenstone
Not to be all down on your desires, John, but they won’t “shoot you up like Janis Joplin” before pulling the plug. We had to wait five days after my sister’s brain stem herniated before the hospital would allow us to remove life support. During that time, her body slowly metabolized the sedatives they’d given her (medically induced coma is a standard treatment for brain swelling). It wasn’t until a tox report came back clean and one final EEG to confirm lack of function that they gave the go ahead. Fortunately, her advanced directive was drawn up in the hospital prior to her surgery, so everyone involved was on the same page and supportive of her final wishes.
philowitz
End of life decision making can get pretty complicated, because few of us end up “brain dead” (which is legally dead—no brain activity whatsoever, in which case there are no decisions to make other than organ donation), permanently unconscious (persistent or permanent vegetative state, which is what most of us think of as ‘brain dead’) or minimally conscious state (which is not unconsciousness and so does not fall under the laws for permanent unconsciousness). But if you do fall into one of these states, there is a good chance that your only life support (‘the plug’) is artificial nutrition and hydration(that’s the tube that the whole Schiavo thing was about. Schiavo was in fact permanently unconscious but not brain dead). State laws vary as to conditions under which artificial nutrition and hydration can be withdrawn. Here’s a good site with those state laws:
However, most of us have different, more complex end of life scenarios. An excellent read on some of the messiness regarding treatment decisions is in last year’s New Yorker piece by Atul Gawande.
Talking to those closest to you about decision making doesn’t clean up the messiness at the end of life, but it does help those figuring out what decisions to make to feel as if their decisions really do reflect the decisions you would have made, so everyone should have these conversations
with those they love and who love them.
philowitz
The link to the end of life decision making site got lost in my prior comment. Here it is again:
end of life options
philowitz
Whoops, still didn’t work. One more time:
http://www2.dickinson.edu/endoflife/
Devon
This made me really sad and I don’t like thinking about it at all.