Your Stories

My husband was diagnosed with lung cancer with secondaries in liver and bones in June 2011. He died 1 December 2011. We hardly had time to accept the diagnosis before our lives changed on an almost daily basis. I became his full-time carer and he began to slip away very quickly.

My father died at the beginning of the year. He was almost 96, was ready to go and we had accepted that. In the past year he’d had five falls; on Boxing Day he fell again and broke his shoulder – I could feel the crepitus.

I am 54 and fairly healthy and active. However, having seen my whole family (parents, brother) develop cancer (and in my parents' case, die) I have not totally put my head in the sand over 'death matters'. Yes, it's not easy to talk frankly about death for lot of people, but over the last few years with my involvement with a cancer charity, a palliative care ward in a hospital and conversations with a number of elderly people within the community, it has made the subject less likely to cause raised eyebrows.

I've watched friends and family die in agony in local hospitals. They have mostly been over 60. They have been calling out for pain relief or subdued by the withdrawal of fluids/care and slipping into unconsciousness - luckily. I recommend joining 'Death with Dignity' (previously the Voluntary Euthanasia Society), who are gradually getting nearer the goal for those who want to choose when as well as where they want to die. The Bill usually passes through the Commons without problems, but the religious zealots at the Lords stop it.