My life

So sad to hear about the sudden death of a neighbour’s lovely cat. He became ill very quickly and was put down shortly afterwards, the vet relieving him of his pain and discomfort. At least when it comes to our pet animals, we can be a caring country. Not so much to our fellow human beings.

We have a growing ageing population that’s growing and ageing with each passing year. Hospitals are full of elderly people with chronic illnesses and conditions with nowhere for them to go. Many of these poor people have been overwhelmed by dementia and are merely shells of what they once were. Some just lie down all day, not even knowing they are alive. It breaks my heart.

Close family members have gone that way, lost in a failing body, unable to carry out basic bodily functions, not knowing where or who they are. And we keep people alive for the sake of it.

How many of us would want to end up that way? Even the most devout of believers can surely not believe this is all God’s grand design. But if they do, what kind of God is he?

I do not want to end up the way of some of those I have loved. Incontinent and wearing a large nappy, being washed and cleaned whilst knowing nothing about it, just lying there day in, day out totally oblivious to everything and everyone.

Where there is quality in a life, then feel free to enjoy it even the most difficult of circumstances. It is subjective as to what qualifies as quality. My view is life as it is now. I accept a general slowing down – that’s been happening for almost half my life – but making the necessary allowances, life is as good as it ever has been.

It is all very well living much longer but for what? I don’t know the exact figures – they are out there – but in the years ahead there will be many more folk aged over 100 years of age. Few of them will be active, almost all of them will rely on differing levels of care. They can stop us dying quite so soon but the process of getting old continues, minus the odd disease or two.

A pet goes to the vet and if there is a serious condition, we are never advised to send the animal to pet residential care, to fill the animal with drugs to enable it to have a completely worthless life, devoid of all quality. The vet says it would be kinder to give the animal a fatal injection. I know because we are the so called intelligent species it is not exactly the same with humans but there surely must be a better way?

I shall have living power of attorney to ensure that if I am afflicted with a ghastly incurable condition that takes away my mind and/or movement, I do not want to be kept alive just for the sake of it. Have you any idea how horrible it is for the loved ones you have to share it with?

I am certain that I will not survive my own death and live forever. There will be no row upon row of virgins waiting for me in paradise or all day pub opening in heaven. When the light goes out, that is that.

This has to be a matter of individual choice talked through with loved ones. I don’t want to go to the human equivalent of a vet and have a fatal injection as soon as a diagnosis is issued, but by the same token a slow walk into a living death holds no appeal to me.

I’d like to live forever, but only if I could be 30 forever. I am beginning to value each passing day, understanding better than ever my own mortality and that’s a good place to be, trust me. Growing old doesn’t occupy my every waking moment. In fact, I hardly think about it at all. Not because I’m scared because I don’t know what to be scared of, yet. There will one day come a time when I might be scared and losing my faculties would be my biggest fear of all.

I suppose the distinction should be between what is living and what is life. Life for life’s sake, in a near vegetative state, is not a choice I would make and my hope for future years is that I will have a say. It’s my life, after all.