Kathy Sheridan: Let Vicky Phelan die on her own terms

The savage reality of Vicky Phelan’s life was buried in the final few paragraphs of her remarkable piece: “Allow me to die with dignity, on my own terms. Let that be my legacy.”

It was not a new position for her – she called for legalisation of assisted suicide in Ireland last December, a time when she believed she had two years to live – but one given added urgency in her Sunday Independent piece by Ruth Morrissey’s tragic death and everything those women have taught us about how many shades of raw courage and battling can be sustained in death’s shadow.

Phelan has confronted her own death to the point where talking about it has come to seem almost normal, a gift in itself for all who must face up to crucifying prognoses. Twelve years ago, Nuala O’Faolain raged against death in her soul-bearing interview with Marian Finucane, six weeks after a casually relayed, terminal cancer diagnosis in a New York hospital. At the end of the interview, when she whispered, “Are you sure it won’t give people despair?”, I thought, yes, it probably would. But that was not her burden to bear.

'This is not murder or mercy killing. It is an act of self deliverance'

Death should be talked about.

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Four years before, Finucane had interviewed a 33-year-old, postgraduate student in UCC, suffering from a particularly virulent form of multiple sclerosis. Using a pseudonym, he explained why he was planning a journey to die with the Dignitas organisation in Zurich. “I do not relish the idea of going to Switzerland to die in a strange country . . . Since I made my choice, I have regained my dignity and life has been a dream. It has released me from the terror of facing a horrible and painful death. This is not murder or mercy killing. It is an act of self deliverance.”

A year later, The Irish Times reported that he had ended his life as he had planned. His name was Martin Barry. That was 16 years ago, an aeon in terms of this country’s social progress.

How can we know what we would choose in such circumstances? Nearly three years ago when my husband died in Our Lady’s Hospice, the place whose name once sent shivers down my spine revealed itself to be a haven, a fortress of calm, wisdom, compassion and love. My daughters and I were gently enveloped but never too closely and granted complete freedom and security to manage those last days together as we wished. When all else is lost, those memories matter, far more than we ever imagined.

But is that necessarily what I would choose for myself? Or for you?

Imagine you are 58-year-old Adrienne Cullen, suffering from cervical cancer with uncontrollable pain and unable to tolerate opioid-based painkillers. She too had to fight epic court battles in the Netherlands following horrifying hospital incompetence but was able to muster the strength because in the Dutch system, she knew that euthanasia was there for her, as what she called her “escape hatch”.

A piece by her husband Peter Cluskey, written last December is worth another read. "There is bureaucracy, of course, a lot of it," he wrote, "and that's a good thing: psychological assessments, medical assessments, and finally, the obligatory agreement of two doctors independently of one another that the time has come".

`My physician has stated she wouldn't kill me but that she would help if it were lawful . . .'

Now imagine back in Ireland that you are 58-year-old Marie Fleming, terminally ill with multiple sclerosis and begging the High Court to be spared a “horrible” death. No one who was there in 2012 will forget her evidence, describing the collapsed shoulder which impinged on her lung and breathing function, the pain – “so severe I’m afraid my head will burst open”, the spasms “which wreck my body, which pierce my very heart”, and the seven carers who came in to shower, toilet, dress her and put her back in the wheelchair, which took 2½ hours.

“I’ve come to court today, whilst I still can use my speech, my voice, to ask you to assist me in having a peaceful, dignified death . . . in the arms of Tom [Curran, her partner] and my children”.

Palliative care was “not acceptable” to her, she said. “I don’t want to be kept in a state whereby you’re being given ingestions of massive doses of painkillers that may alleviate the symptoms of pain but leave you in a comatose state. To be kept in a state of not being able to smell the flowers, or to see my beautiful garden or just see the changing of the seasons; that’s not acceptable to me to miss all that. I would be doing myself an injustice.”

In her paralysed state, she had decided that “the only way that is left for me to die is with the use of gas . . . I could assist myself . . . ” Or a doctor could put a cannula into her arm to pass poison into her veins, she said. “My physician has stated she wouldn’t kill me but that she would help if it were lawful . . .”

While the High Court found against her and an appeal dismissed by the Supreme Court, the Chief Justice noted that there was nothing to stop the Oireachtas from legislating to allow for assisted suicide in such cases, once it was satisfied that appropriate safeguards were put in place.

That is seven years ago.

Last September, An Amárach/Claire Byrne Live poll for TheJournal.ie found that 55 per cent of people believed that assisted suicide should be legal in Ireland while just 22 per cent were opposed. Let us have that debate.