Dear editor,
I waited awhile to respond to Dr. Reggler and Mary McAffrey’s letters.
I didn’t want to be hasty but to make sure my words expressed what I strongly feel and for a long time have believed.
I believe in the right to a life of quality, not length.
I believe everyone has the right to have a life of unbearable pain ( in many facets) ended with dignity, and if with needed assistance, so be it.
I think euthanasia is a scary word, connoting past ‘wipe-outs.’ I always understood it to mean “with mercy.”
I believe it is an individual’s choice and am thankful to have and have had a doctor with whom I can and have had these discussions. I am afraid of pain. I am not afraid of dying. My faith brings promise of a better life to come. I believe we all have gifts and talents to use for the betterment of this world, but I have often wondered why so much is spent of getting further ahead, even to going to other planets, when there is so much inequality, homelessness and poverty in the world we already live in.
Is ‘looking to the future’ a way of ignoring today’s problems?
I certainly don’t have all the answers or a solution myself.
I’ve heard many talk of the problem of overpopulation. Surely allowing those whose reasons are personal and may not be included in rules for assisted dying shouldn’t have to live in their pain for someone else’s reasons.
Barbara Lynn Ble
Courtenay