Absolutely true.
I also agree with everythig Susan said in her email about honoring the needs and principles of the one who is terminal. (It's why my dad refused a homeopathic remedy and thus did not get one.)
I learned my terminal situation lessons from cats. I've bred and lived with cats for 58 years now, and so I have seen almost as many deaths as births. Every constitutional type has its own preferences.
But in NO case is it okay to stop providing appropriate care and "let them die", no matter how convenient it may be to suggest such a thing.
Where there is pain and discomfort, it must be addressed. Hopefully anyone will agree that much. But a dying individual gradually loses functions, and it happens in accordance with their constitutional type - which as I often have said - is present from brith to death and does nto change. We could actually develop a text book on how to help best for a specific type if the individuakl can not express their desires persoally in some way.
Cats will accept assist feeding when terminal, till almost the very end. I say assist feeding - not force feeding - there is a big difference. Assist feeding is how you feed a sick baby who does not feel like eating. With kindness, conpassion, PATIENCE and time and love. Frequently, in small amounts.
Just as a sick baby is not left starving, nor should a terminal individual of any age be starved, not for one single meal. Only when THEY strongly refuse assist feeding, (as also is what cats do), is it the indication of the end being near and digestion not working.
Still, at that stage, hydration becomes more essential than ever, with proper electrolytes to prevent mineral depletion and seizures adn other discomfots - either by mouth or IV or subcutaneously, or a combination or however is best to honor how the person FEELS and to make that the best possible.
Two specifics:
My grandmother was 105 when she had a stroke followed a week later by another stroke that paralysed her.
She could blink, and could control slow and fast blinks. To my and my dad's great surprise - her brain was completely functioning in there, though she lay otherwise as if dead. We spoke in morse code for another week, (my dad used it in WW2 and I had learned some for fun) we had to teach it to my gran but she was a fast learner always and this was no exception. She was SO grateful not to be "left alone to die", but able to participate for her last week.
[I had a stroke myself in 2010 so I know how it feels to be unable to communicate normally. I could not speak or write or swallow. Thankfully I had no DNR so I got right.]
My dad: He was an active guy but the disease that took him so very suddenly and unexpectedly, sapped him of all energy. He kept trying to adapt, planning what to do the next day based on his apparent rate of deterioration but it was always worse than he expected however much he reduced expectations, till near the end he could barely lift a hand or whisper the odd word..yes we reverted to Morse... . He was bored. Could he please be rolled over, a bunched sheet was hurting etc.. I bought him a lightweight toy that shot pingpong balls, so he could take potshots at the nurses. And I sat with him and chatted. And he asked for champagne to celebrate his wedding anniversay the day before he died. (He was tea total so that was quite a request). He was immensely relieved that I could know that he found God at the very end, said he was no longer anxious, and he gave me several messages for my mother - typical of him it was where to find what paperwork, and how my brother and I could help her etc.
I think we put far too little store in FINDING ways to communicate with people losing their abilities when terminal, so as to know what they would prefer, and what matters. They are alive ALL the time till they are not, and ALL those times need to be honored the best ways we can find to do it - whether the individual is a kitten or a human. We need to try to make those days of life also meaningful. It's not necessarily easy, and the load can best be shared between many, especially working with brain dysfunction situations. But even there, knowlede of the childhood of the person will point to what matters to them. (Childhood memories last longest it seems, and they shoud be seen in that context. Cats with demetia will respond to things they responded to as kittens, when old and dying with feline dementia, for example.... more lessons from cats....they are the greatest life lesson teachers!)
Namaste,
Irene
REPLY TO: only
--
Irene de Villiers, B.Sc AASCA MCSSA D.I.Hom/D.Vet.Hom.
P.O. Box 4703 Spokane WA 99220.
www.angelfire.com/fl/furryboots/clickhere.html (Veterinary Homeopath.)
"Man who say it cannot be done should not interrupt one doing it."