Sad & Thought Provoking – Brittany Maynard Plans to Die on 1st November

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Sometimes I plan a blog and then I see something completely stunning that I can’t help but use instead. The story of Brittany Maynard is what stopped me in my tracks today. As you read this story, do not judge, rather appreciate each and every moment you have on this earth. Hug your children a little closer tonight. Kiss your spouse a little more tenderly. Appreciate your friends a little more. Life is short and fragile. The original story appeared  here.

 (http://www.nbcnews.com/health/cancer/why-newlywed-brittany-maynard-ending-her-life-three-weeks-n221731)  I have copied and pasted most of it below:

Starts

” If everything goes as planned in her life, 29-year-old Brittany Maynard’s death will occur on Saturday Nov. 1 — in her bed, on an upper floor of her Portland, Oregon home, with cherished music filling the room.

Lately, though, nothing in Maynard’s life has flowed like she once dreamed — no children with her newlywed husband, no more time. She has brain cancer, grade 4 glioblastoma. In April, a doctor told her she had six months to live. Now, Maynard has embarked on a rare farewell bathed in politics and poignancy — all painstakingly organized and openly shared, she said, in a bid to help to change laws for dying Americans who feel they are forced to endure the full, gruesome descent of a terminal illness.

Maynard made three choices that are elevating her final days to viral immortality. She moved with her husband, Dan, from San Francisco to Oregon — one of five states where doctors can legally prescribe life-ending drugs to the dying. She obtained the two bottles of lethal pills and selected the precise moment, place, guests and soundtrack for her last breaths. And she posted the reasons for all this in a video that, as of last night, had received more than 3.5 million views.

“I can’t even tell you the amount of relief that it provides me to know that I don’t have to die the way that it’s been described to me that my brain tumor would take me on its own,” Maynard says in the video. “…I hope to pass in peace. The reason to consider life, and what’s of value is, to make sure you’re not missing out.

“Seize the day. What’s important to you? What do you care about? What matters? Pursue that. Forget the rest,” she says.

“Death with dignity,” her husband adds on the video, “allows for people who are in the predicament of facing a lot of suffering that they can decide when enough is enough.” This is the link for you to copy and paste to get to the video….

 <iframe width=”560″ height=”315″ src=”//www.youtube.com/embed/yPfe3rCcUeQ” frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen></iframe>

TARA L. ARROWOOD / COMPASSION & CHOICES – WWW.THEBRITTANYFUND.ORG

In the days that remain for her, Maynard hopes to spend as many hours outdoors as her body and energy will allow. Seizures and fatigue have set in. But with an exit plan in place, she knows she has some control over the inevitable decline the tumor will cause.

Her final moment has been mapped. And it does not sound scary.

“I plan to be surrounded by my immediate family, which is my husband, and my mother and my stepfather and my best friend, who is also a physician.

“I will die upstairs in my bedroom that I share with my husband, with my mother and my husband by my side, and pass peacefully with some music I like in the background.”