Fuck, this question made me cry
My grandmother will be on a ventilator just over a week. They are taking it off this Monday, because her wishes were very clear that she does not want these sorts of measures. She made it known that she wants to be with my grandfather in heaven.
For me, this decision for her was harder than I thought it would be. She was not sick. She was getting better and not needing help, when she fell…and the doctors thought she was exaggerating her pain. They then discovered weeks later she has a broken back, and shoulder, and then pneumonia. On top of that she contracted MRSA at the hospital, so they put her in a coma and on a ventilator…and now she won’t be coming off of it alive because she cannot breathe for herself. Which I personally think is because of all the pain killers she is on. I have never been informed of anything about her brain activity. I’ll have to ask. It’s just been hard to even ask questions without it hurting.
Anyways. I always felt it would be so easy to respect peoples wishes. I’m a proponent for euthanasia in the very sick, but I never had the subject touch me personally. It’s not as easy as I thought it’d be. I thought it’d be simple as in “They are in pain, let them go” but now I have to let go of someone I love and it fucking sucks. And it doesn’t seem fair, but I know it’s what she wants and I wouldn’t want to be having some machine breathing for me or some stranger wiping my ass when I go to the bathroom.