[anxious_RN]

I'm in nursing school and today in one of my classes we were talking about death, dying and bereavement.

This topic interested got me thinking, and I am curious how others feel about it.

If you were terminally ill, would you want to be put on life support to live your life as long as possible?


The way I feel about it, is life support is simply prolonging the inevitable.

Have you had loved ones on life support and had to help with the decision of taking them off? Was it difficult - i.e. did you feel like you were making the choice to end their life and felt unsure about the decision you were going to make?

[bones252100]

Each case will be different. Here are 2 experiences from my life:
My 96 year old grandmother was dying of skin cancer in the hospital. She began refusing her medications. My cousin asked, "Grandma, don't you want to live anymore?" Our grandmother replied, "No, Honey! I've been here long enough."
My 89 year old father entered the hospital with an aneurism in the chest. The doctor recommended a DNR (Do Not Resuscitate) form because he would never return home. The form was completed. My father died with both his sons holding his hands.

[Justwantfair]

My ex-husband suffered from Spinal Meningitis Encephalitis, which caused him to be in a coma at the age of 20. He has a trech and a feeding tube and every doctor recommended that I "pull the plug" because he wasn't expected to recover and if he recovered "too" much than I wouldn't have an option anymore.

It was a very difficult situation and I chose to pray for him to get better and never pulled the plug. He did recover and received occupation and physical therapy following the coma lasting two months.

Fast forward seven years. His life is semi-normal life, the quality is dramatically decreased. Knowing what I know now about the recovery rate and the quality of life of individuals living on life support I would not have made the same choice. When you are living on life support you aren't functioning in life as it was intended. Life support is about the active living clinging to the hope that the same person will recover and be brought back to them. That just isn't the case, it's often a functioning body without a mind. Recovery is often not to the same quality of life that the person had prior to life support.

"Pulling the plug" is ending a life, but it's not the life that you or that person knew prior to life support. The decision is always difficult and very personal, but I will choose different in the future. Choosing to hope they will recover is a choice that has more to do with the inability to say good-bye and the hope that they will return to a life they remembered.

[Alty]

Life support is an unnatural way to keep your body going. If you were meant to live you would, without help. That's my opinion.

Both my parents died of cancer. My father died less than two weeks after his diagnosis, my mother lived with this horrible disease for 10 months, they died 6 1/2 months apart.

My mother lived with me for the last few months of her life. I watched her become a shell of the women she was. When she died she looked like a 100 year old women, she was only 63 years old.

When she found out she was terminal she made me promise not to put her on life support, not to do anything to prolong her painful existence. I agreed, even though I knew it wouldn't be easy.

The way I see it is, you aren't keeping a person on life support for their sake but for your own. As long as they are legally alive, they are alive to you and you don't have to grieve, you can hold on to that tiny little hope that a miracle will happen and they will come back to you whole and cured.

If you love something let it go!

[Fr_Chuck]

Ok, do I want to b on life support for 2 days while a transplant heart is shipped in, well most likely,

Do I want to be a veggie on support no.

[earl237]

No one should be put on life support if they have no chance of recovery. The Terri Shiavo case was very disturbing. Religious consevatives have no right trying to force their views on society. Death is a personal decision and should be left to individuals and their families.
That case showed the importance of having a living will.

[Jake2008]

My mother was on life support, with no chance of recovery. All her organs were shutting down, and there was no hope. She was 60.

I made the decision on behalf of myself and my two sisters, who could not. It was gut-wrenching, but I did it, and she died peacefully shortly after. As we watched her die, a tear rolled down her face, and she had a peaceful look, painless.

My older sister said that the tear was a sign that she wanted to live, and implied that my decision took away her choice to stay alive. Because I was so sure that the inevitable would take place regardless of how any of us saw her, I made the choice for her, without regret.

As to dealing with family members who disagree, I have learned to live with that. Although, as a poster has mentioned, had my mother had a living will, it would have been much easier, even though, I felt that she would have wanted to be relieved of living artificially.

[Fr_Chuck]

Thread closed, this is a real old thread that was reopened