86 Year Old Grandmother Starved Herself to Death, She Had No Alternative for Suicide

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SeaBreeze

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An 86 year old grandmother in the UK ended up starving herself for five weeks, because she had no other alternative to commit suicide...http://www.buzzfeed.com/mbvd/right-to-die-grandmother-starved-herself-to-death-after-uks#2ie4415 It's unfortunate that these people don't have access to legal assisted suicide, we should all have it available where we live...maybe someday.

Jean Davies, an 86-year-old grandmother in the UK, starved herself to death because she said she had “no alternative.” Davies died in her home on Oct. 1, five weeks after she stopped eating.

She did not have a terminal illness, but suffered from chronic pain and other medical issues. Her four children and two grandchildren supported her decision to die.

“She had been talking about doing this for the last two or three years, if her health deteriorated,” her daughter, Bronwen Davies, told the Daily Mail. “Although that’s not to say we ever thought it would actually happen… Her quality of life was diminishing and eventually she was diagnosed with one chronic condition too many.”

Davies reportedly stopped drinking water on Sept. 16, and was frustrated her death was not immediate but took another two weeks.
Four weeks into her fast, Davies told The Sunday Times: “It is hell. I can’t tell you how hard it is. You wouldn’t decide this unless you thought your life was going to be so bad. It is intolerable.”

The 86-year-old was a longtime right-to-die advocate, publishing a book, Choice in Dying, in 1997, and said she had no alternative, except for breaking the law or going to a clinic in Switzerland, but said “I want to die in my own bed.”
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She explained that she did not have a terminal illness but suffered from a range of medical conditions including chronic back pain and had suffered increasingly frequent fainting episodes.
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IMO, she had an agenda.
Davies publishing a book, Choice in Dying, in 1997 and spent much of her life campaigning for a change in the law to let doctors administer lethal medication to patients who wanted to die.
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and was campaigning with her own life.
On 7 November the House of Lords will debate an assisted dying bill proposed by Lord Falconer, which would allow terminally ill, mentally competent adults to receive life-ending medication from a doctor. Wootton, of Dignity in Dying, said: “Lord Falconer’s bill is an opportunity for parliament to carefully consider how best to change our outdated law, which provides neither choice at the end of life, nor adequate safeguards for the vulnerable.”

Dr Peter Saunders, campaign director of Care Not Killing, said: “It is not illegal to starve and dehydrate oneself to death but neither is it right. My fear is that this unusual case will be seized upon by the pro-euthanasia lobby to further their agenda of legalising assisted suicide and euthanasia. However we might sympathise with this woman’s condition, by deliberately choosing to go public with it she is adopting a campaigning stance, if you like, a subtle form of emotional blackmail aimed at softening opposition to a change in the law.”
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She has my respect for her courage but not a lot of sympathy for her stance.
 
One of my BILs mother did the same thing in her 8Os. I remember her very well and when she went from assisted living to a nursing home she stopped eating. My BIL wanted her to be forced fed but the staff refused to do it. I am working on what way to self-deliver when my time comes if I have the courage...
 

My mother did this aged 91. She had dementia and after a fall that broke her leg, she refused to walk again, although could have done so.
She had trouble with language due to earlier strokes but was otherwise in good health.

One day I got a call from the nursing home asking me to come over because "something was going on".

Mum was refusing to eat or drink but was neither depressed nor angry. On the contrary she was quite exultant and was singing triumphantly like an opera singer, waving her hands around. She looked me squarely in the eye and with a downward gesture with both hands said "No more" several times.

Somehow I knew what she was saying and I instructed the staff to tempt her with food and drinks but not to force feed her in any way, because she would have fought them tooth and claw. All she would accept from that day on was a few sips of water with honey and lemon to keep her mouth moist. I tried to slip in some soup but she was a wake up and once again told me "No more".

Palliative care was organised and she passed away peacefully on the seventh day. It was neither painful for her nor overly distressing for the family.

I have no idea what was in her mind. Neither she nor any of her sisters had ever talked about dying. It was not something any of them wanted to face. They certainly never talked about euthanasia. In the end she was in control, unafraid and surrounded by loved ones who came from far and near to say goodbye in that week of her last fast.

I don't want to recommend this to anyone else. I'm not a campaigner on this issue but I do want people to know that death is not always horrific. More often than not it is a sweet release from life. A friend that comes when the time is right.
 
This should be a choice and not done furtively as is the case for many. I think that it is coming universally, like gay rights and other social balancing has, but, unfortunately, probably not in my lifetime...
 
There was nothing furtive in the case of my mother. I was asked to express our wishes in writing, presumably to protect the nursing home and to provide clarity. Everyone in the family was in agreement but I was the one who signed the paper.

Her visiting doctor was consulted and a specialist palliative care team called in by my daughter, who is a nurse.
Everything was above board and all perfectly legal. And humane.

Perhaps I should add that this all took place in a nursing home. Hospital is probably one of the worst places you can choose to die in. Hospitals by their very nature are about defeating death, not about allowing it to occur naturally.
 
Your mother was lucky to be able to be in control. I have two older sisters with dementia who would never want to live like they are living now if they had a choice before it struck them down. They are essentially living, smiling zombies, as they are maintained on "happy" pills...
 
Nursing homes are not allowed to use chemical restraints these days.
Or physical restraint either. Certainly not for senile dementia.

The key is adequate funding for staffing.
 
These aren't chemical restraints necessarily, but to keep them "up." And as sad as it is, this a good thing...
 
Nursing homes do use retsraint DW. Any nursing home that has a security code on the door to keep people in is restraint. Nursing homes have a duty of care to keep people safe.


DW it is possible that your mothers organs were in failure and this may have triggered her refusal of food...as appetite stops when this happens. You say your mother had dementia? Do you still think she was capable of making this choice as a conscious choice?
 
Once you get to the home no matter how you check out is a blessing, not to mention the cost of keeping you lingering like some hothouse vegetable...
 
I think everyone should have the right to die, with assistance if necessary, if their quality of life is so poor due to illness. Obviously a psychological assessment should be done first.
 
so many children world wide do not get a decent chance to grow up....and we spend billions keeping the very very elderly alive , often against their wishes.
 
Yes, some nations just haven't been able to cope with dying efficiently, unless it is the killing of other povulation so...
 
JustQuinn said:
Nursing homes do use retsraint DW. Any nursing home that has a security code on the door to keep people in is restraint. Nursing homes have a duty of care to keep people safe.
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The particular wing where she was living did not have locked doors at that time. Mum couldn't escape anyway because of her lack of mobility caused by the earlier fracture. Before that, she lived in a hostel for people with dementia and the main external door was locked with a key but there were doors out into the gardens that residents could use at any time. It was safe, but not prison like.

DW it is possible that your mothers organs were in failure and this may have triggered her refusal of food...as appetite stops when this happens. You say your mother had dementia? Do you still think she was capable of making this choice as a conscious choice?
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I don't think that her organs were in failure when she began to refuse nourishment. She was in fairly robust health apart from the dementia and lack of mobility. I've often wondered why this happened and I have no answer. Mum had often expressed a belief in an after-life but was not religious in any way. She seemed to believe that relatives remained close for some time after death. She said she felt my Dad's presence until she was financially secure when his superannuation was transferred to her.

I dismissed this as wishful thinking but she is not the only person to tell me similar stories. In the back of my mind I can imagine that she had some sort of vision of someone come to escort her to another place. It would explain the rapturous mood during the singing. This was something else that she believed happens at life's end.

She didn't make a conscious, rational choice to die but she was very determined not to receive food. That left me just two choices. Allow nature to take it's inexorable course to her death, or to allow her to be fed via a peg leading directly into her stomach. Knowing my mother, I refused this option because, as I said earlier, she would have reacted violently to this option.

There had been times before this when she had been a fussy eater and I solved this problem by giving her sherry shandies to stimulate her appetite. This was something very different and talking to people involved with caring for the aged it seems that it is not all that uncommon.

In my mind, her time had come, she was willing, or at least, not unwilling to go, and I wanted her departure to be free of stress, conflict and pain. Which it was.
 
DW I was not specifically talking about your mother regarding "restraint" but responding to your comment
"Nursing homes are not allowed to use chemical restraints these days.
Or physical restraint either. Certainly not for senile dementia."

The nursing home where my 90 year old mother resides does have a security code on the entrance
 
I do not understand why she starved herself ,it would have been quicker to OD,or electrocute,or Drown.
she would not have put herself through so much pain ,she would still be making a point.
 
Yes, JustQuinn. I did understand your point.
However, in the bad old days old people were tied into their chairs or tranquilised to a zombie like state. Fortunately, in this country these practices as no longer the norm. Aged care has come a long way forward.

My mum could be a bit difficult at times (stroppy is the term we would use). I used to organise her wardrobe so that a complete colour-matched outfit was hung on every hanger. I was doing this one day when one of her carers came in. He was a bachelor gay and we started a conversation about how the old ladies should be dressed. He agreed with me that they should be nicely presented rather than looking as if they had been dressed hastily in whatever comes to hand first. I apologised if Mum sometimes gave him a hard time but he just smiled and said "I like the feisty ones".

The secret to good aged care lies in getting the right people. People who really love their work.

Mum's younger sister, now 94, lives in a home where the carers are just brilliant. They are warm and loving, and Auntie, another feisty one, is very happy. I love visiting her there, even though it is a five hour drive from Sydney. When my time comes to need nursing care, I am confident that my relatives will choose a good home for me and will watch over my welfare. I will not seek to kill myself, directly or by proxy, to avoid this ending. It holds no terror for me.
 
Ralphy1 said:
My mother had to be strapped into wheelchair when she was at death's door...
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There are such things as tub/tilt chairs that are safer and more comfortable than wheel chairs for people in that condition.

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We bought one for another auntie when she was getting weaker. I'm sure a seat belt type restraint could be utilised for safety but being tied in by the wrists would not be acceptable.
 
This seems very pollyanerish to me when I see what my sister's ending is. This is not for me...
 

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