A HALIFAX WOMAN WITH TERMINAL CANCER PLANS TO DIE THURSDAY, BUT SHE IS NOT GOING WILLINGLY. SHE SAYS THE ASSISTED DYING LAW IS FORCING HER TO CHOOSE DEATH SOONER THAN SHE WANTS.
Woman says law forces an assisted death too early
HALIFAX• Audrey Parker has decided to end her life on Thursday.
She has approached it as a public statement about Canada’s relatively new assisted dying law.
The 57-year-old Halifax woman says she is thankful the law will allow her to end the excruciating pain caused by cancerous tumours in her bones, but she says the legislation has left her in a terrible bind.
In recent weeks, the former ballroom dance instructor has spoken out — on social media, in newspapers, on TV — about how the twoyear-old law is forcing her to choose to die sooner than she wants.
“There’s no reason I should have to die on Nov. 1 … I want to live as many days as I can.”
The problem, Parker says, is that people seeking medical assistance in dying must meet criteria that she says appear to make no sense.
Applicants must be in an advanced state of decline and experiencing unbearable physical or mental suffering caused by a grievous, irreversible medical condition, which means their natural death “has become reasonably foreseeable.”
Parker, diagnosed with Stage 4 breast cancer in early 2016, meets all of those conditions.
“All the tumours in my skeleton are killing me,” she says. “My brain is constantly telling me: ‘Cut those legs off. Cut those arms off … Get away from that pain.’ It’s so heinous.”
She has been assessed and approved for a medically assisted death.
But there’s a catch. Under the law, she must be mentally competent immediately before she gives consent for her assisted death.
If her painkillers or cancer render her unconscious or mentally incompetent before that crucial moment, the procedure must not be carried out. A medically assisted death under those circumstances would be illegal.
“It’s unfortunate that I have to pick a date … but I’m not going to wait around and lose that window,” says Parker. “I don’t want to let my mother see me suffering. I don’t want my friends to see me suffering.”
She mentions having to take large doses of the painkiller dilaudid to manage her pain. Still, she speaks with passion and clear-eyed authority about her cause, refusing to give in to maudlin sentiments.
“I’m changing this law,” she says with a smile. “I’m so close to changing it.”
The existing law doesn’t permit the use of what are known as advance requests — written instructions for a medically assisted death that must be implemented whether or not the person is able to consent.
The law was written to ensure that vulnerable people who are unable to speak for themselves are not put in a position where someone else decides if they live or die.
Some critics have suggested it could be difficult to determine a person’s level of suffering if they can no longer describe their pain. And there may be cases where a person with dementia or other mental illness becomes mentally incompetent but isn’t suffering.
Parker said the change she is seeking should only apply to her category: mentally sound, adult applicants who have already made their life-ending wishes known at the conclusion of a rigorous assessment process. Ottawa should give people like her the option of drafting an advance request that would remain in force for 12 months, she said.
IT’S UNFORTUNATE THAT I HAVE TO PICK A DATE … BUT I’M NOT GOING TO WAIT AROUND AND LOSE THAT WINDOW.
Jocelyn Downie, a law professor at Dalhousie University, said legislating advance requests has already been recommended by a provincial-territorial expert advisory group and a joint committee of the Senate and House of Commons.
As well, the issue will be dealt with in December, when experts with the Council of Canadian Academies submit three reports to Parliament, one of which will deal specifically with advance requests.
“She is the most compelling of cases because she already has been informed that she meets the criteria. Many of the arguments that go against advance requests don’t actually apply in her circumstance ... To me, there is no justification for not allowing her to make an advance request.”
Parker planned to start Thursday with a hearty breakfast: lobster eggs benedict.
And when it comes time for a medically assisted lethal injection, Parker says she will be surrounded by her best friends, her mother, a roommate and her niece.