Accepting Death

[Guest Dabeagle]

I don't know if any of you have been watching this situation, it's very sad. I have no idea how someone survives losing a child; I only know the pain of losing a parent, that comfort and security of someone you've known, literally, since the moment you were born. So while I pity the parents, I'm also floored by the level of ignorance and wastefulness on display. Their daughter went in for a procedure to help with severe sleep apnea. She began to hemorrhage and she died - she was declared brain dead by more than one competent surgeon. The parents refuse to believe that because machines are still keeping this little dead girl's heart beating.

It was Asimov who said :“There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.”

These people, with their ignorance, have managed to get their dead daughter moved to a 'facility that shares their belief' - which, no doubt, comes at a price. This poor girls dead body is being kept functional by artificial means with no hope of recovery - she's brain dead. Yet, not only do the parents not have to accept and mourn and begin the healing process, but they seem to have other people carrying forward the untruth in the name of religion. The quote that gets me the most in this article is from a kid: “Most kids are Christian here,” Blair said, “and they believe that if you continue praying, there’s always a possibility. The students understand the debate. They’re just choosing spirituality over science.”

The crime here is that there is no debate, this poor little girl is dead and no one wants to accept it. You want to build their faith in God by telling them if they pray hard enough for a brain dead girl, she'll wake up? What they should be doing is teaching these kids about life - and death and how to handle it in the healthiest way they can. After all, no one's getting out of this alive.

Read the article here.

[Chris James]

All life ends in death. What a tragic situation we have here. This poor girl's family just needs to let go, mourn the loss and move on...probably to court where the lawyers will rehash the whole malpractice thing in the media once again. The Christian thing to do is let her expire and have the community come together for the funeral. Death is inevitable and all the medical science and prayers cannot defeat it.

When I first read the title of this thread I thought perhaps this was about another young death, the boy in Pakistan who saved his classmates by confronting a suicide bomber. Aitzaz Hasan was only 15 years old, where did his courage come from? What an expression of love and compassion for his friends that this young man could challenge a deranged bomber and keep him from harming others. This boy is a real hero.

But in both cases, families will grieve. The Christian family is prolonging their ordeal by praying for a miracle. In Pakistan, the family of the bomber probably thinks he did it for the love of Allah and calls him a martyr. But even the Quran forbids the taking of a life, especially those of a fellow Muslim, and the bomber was just fooled into these actions by men who pervert their religion. The boy who stopped him to save his friends created the only miracle in all of this. He deserves the title of hero.

[The Pecman]

The story about the brain-dead girl that Dabeagle refers to is very tragic. The ignorant, grief-stricken parents are proceeding on the mistaken belief that even though there's no brain activity and no blood flow in the brain, because the little girl's heart is still beating, she's "technically" alive. At some point, you just gotta accept it, let her die, and carry on with grief and move on.

I think there are zero cases in recorded history where somebody had no brain activity and no blood flow in the brain and they magically came back to life. Once they've waited two or three days to be sure, it's over, Johnny. I'm all for having faith under reasonable circumstances, but you gotta know when to hold 'em, and know when to fold 'em.

[Jeff Ellis]

I think the problem is that Pec is quite wrong... there is a documented case, and three days was exactly as long as brain function had presumably ceased. That is where the expectation that irrational hope and faith will be sufficient comes from

[The Pecman]

I think the problem is that Pec is quite wrong... there is a documented case, and three days was exactly as long as brain function had presumably ceased. That is where the expectation that irrational hope and faith will be sufficient comes from

The girl has been brain dead for ONE MONTH:

http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/06/health/jahi-mcmath-girl-brain-dead/

[Camy]

Awful.

The telling part of the original piece is this: she is now receiving nutrition through tubes, despite medical testimony filed (PDF) in court that most of Jahi’s bodily functions have ceased.

If you read the testimony of the attending pediatrician you have to accept that she's dead, and no amount of wishful thinking is going to bring her back.

[Graeme]

As a father, I'd like to believe there's still hope that a child of mine in that situation could recover. It may not be rational, but it's very, very human. How long it would be before I gave up that hope...? I hope I never have to find out.

[The Pecman]

When the doctors start using the phrase "quality of life issues," they're basically telling you that person is not gonna come back.

I have a very close friend who had a heart attack about a year ago, and his brain was starved of oxygen for about 7 minutes. Unfortunately, this created massive brain damage to the extent that 99% of his memories are gone (short-term and long-term), he can barely walk, and he's gotten enough physical therapy that he can dress himself, go to the bathroom, take a shower, and sit down and eat. But aside from that, he needs constant round-the-clock care. He doesn't remember any of his family and friends, and his entire life (about 60 years) is gone. The hard drive has been completely wiped.

I know this guy well enough -- since 1980 -- that I'm positive that if he could have made the decision, he would much rather be dead than to be this walking shell that he is now. Literally, I could go over last week, re-introduce myself, have a few laughs, then come back a week later and he wouldn't recognize me. Very sad.

I think there's a point where you have to accept that these people are gone. It's worse in the case of brain damage so severe that the person is never going to wake up and never going to breathe on their own. When you get to the point where the machine is keeping them alive and they're just an empty body staring into space, that ain't what I call life.

[colinian]

I have a DNR (Do Not Resuscitate) document on file at Kaiser Hospital in case something like what happened to this girl happens to me. It's what's best for me and my family and my friends. The DNR document is required (with Yes and No choices, of course) at all hospitals where I live.

Colin

[Jeff Ellis]

The girl has been brain dead for ONE MONTH:

http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/06/health/jahi-mcmath-girl-brain-dead/

and irony has been dead for even longer than that.

[The Pecman]

I have a DNR (Do Not Resuscitate) document on file at Kaiser Hospital in case something like what happened to this girl happens to me. It's what's best for me and my family and my friends.

A very wise move.

[DesDownunder]

My living will states that I do not wish to be kept alive without a reasonable expectation of quality of life being restored. Furthermore there should be no extraordinary measures to keep my body alive with no chance to restore full cognisant abilities.

I understand this places my executors under quite severe pressure, but I have explained that if I can communicate, even if only like Professor Hawkings with his computer and from his mobile chair, I'll take that as a positive.

However as I approach 70 I am more inclined to tell them to not bother connecting me to a life extending machine, especially if there is a chance that I might lose what little sense I have left and become converted by one of those proselytising priests of burden to a religion in which I have no faith...and that's all of them.

I'm in the unusual situation of having been kept alive by machines some fifty years ago when the marvellous surgeons at the Royal Adelaide Hospital repaired the congenital hole in my heart.

I'm pretty certain I died on the operating table and they managed to bring me back. So I speak from some experience and I know that being able to experience life and share those experiences is what life is really all about. If I can't do that, can't love or know that I am loved, then turn the machines off.

[colinian]

There's the Terry Schiavo case in 1990, and the 13-year-old Teresa Hamilton case in 1994, so it's happened before. It's sad and expensive and it's obvious that there's no good outcome.

Colin

[The Pecman]

I'm pretty certain I died on the operating table and they managed to bring me back. So I speak from some experience and I know that being able to experience life and share those experiences is what life is really all about. If I can't do that, can't love or know that I am loved, then turn the machines off.

That's different, Des. Besides, you're much too ornery and outspoken to be brain damaged.

But seriously: if there's zero brain activity and no blood flow in the brain for a week or two, it's over. If you're on an operating table and a heart-lung machine can keep you going during a procedure, that doesn't count.

Glad you made it, BTW!

It's interesting: I've almost died twice in my life (one not too long ago), and the experience does change you. I came away from both experiences as now being completely unafraid of death. If it happens, it happens. I don't necessarily want to die, but I have no hesitation of spitting in death's face on my way out.

Pain and suffering, I don't like. Not a fan of either. But death itself, I'm not afraid of one bit.

[DesDownunder]

That's different, Des. Besides, you're much too ornery and outspoken to be brain damaged.

But seriously: if there's zero brain activity and no blood flow in the brain for a week or two, it's over. If you're on an operating table and a heart-lung machine can keep you going during a procedure, that doesn't count.

Glad you made it, BTW!

It's interesting: I've almost died twice in my life (one not too long ago), and the experience does change you. I came away from both experiences as now being completely unafraid of death. If it happens, it happens. I don't necessarily want to die, but I have no hesitation of spitting in death's face on my way out.

Pain and suffering, I don't like. Not a fan of either. But death itself, I'm not afraid of one bit.

Ornery? That's the nicest thing you've ever said to me Pec.

Yeah, I'm glad I made it too. I told my doctor the other day, that it seems like my fifty year old heart surgery was something of a success. I think his nurse had to get him a sedative to stop his laughter.

Near death experiences definitely do change you. After I recovered from my surgery I remember thinking that I could do anything. I really did feel free...and then life happened. I guess I'd call it a near life experience.

It doesn't always have to be your own near death experience either. I think if we are presented with stories that deal with death we are affected by those tales.

Pain and suffering are not my favourites either, and like you, my eventual death has no hold over my living except to make sure every day is lived to the full, mindful to avoid doing harm.

Rather than blowing him up I'd prefer to give a man a blow job. I call that a near love experience.

[The Pecman]

Pain and suffering are not my favourites either, and like you, my eventual death has no hold over my living except to make sure every day is lived to the full, mindful to avoid doing harm.

You are very wise.

[DesDownunder]

You are very wise.

Only when I'm agreeing with friends.

[Jeff Ellis]

Des is right.

I've twice sat with people while they died... and afterwards thanked the nursing staff for the experience... the opportunity to see that death itself was nothing to fear... the manner of it, now that's another thing... keep checking those tyres!

It's profound to realise that death is such a transient thing that it takes a stethoscope to be certain that it has even taken place.

[DesDownunder]

Profound, indeed.