Final miserable question: Why do we bother to get treatment for terminal illnesses when our final destination is death anyway?

Most terminal illnesses involve a lot of pain. Most of the treatments are to abate the pain. Would you prefer that we simply let someone who has a terminal illness and is gasping to breathe just suffocate, or a terminally ill cancer patient writhe in agony? Most people don’t want to be sent into a room to die, if there is something that can keep them alive for awhile longer. Most people have loved ones and no one wants to lose a loved one.

You’re right that we’re all gonna die sometime, we’re all ultimately terminal, but you sound like we all might as well just stop eating or drinking water ‘cause we’re all so damned miserable and we’re going to die anyway.

I haven’t read any of your “constant misery” so I’m going to take your word for it. Have you considered treatment for depression?

@Kardamom Oh don’t get me wrong, I totally agree with what you say and under NO circumstances would I let a dear person suffer and YES I would do whatever was required to ease the pain and prolong life for him/her. It is just the pointless nature of life that gets to me. I am not a heartless creature who has no feelings, on the contrary, but yes it could be the depression getting the better of me!

Because they don’t want to leave life right now. That’s why people keep fighting or want to extend their lives usually.

@ZEPHYRA That’s good to know.

It really doesn’t matter to me whether life itself is pointless. I, being an agnostic atheist, don’t think there is a reason to be here, living on this earth in this place and time, but I feel grateful that I am living here on this earth in this place and time.

I think you may suffer from depression if this is how you feel about life, in general.

Even though I’ve got some problems, mostly with not having enough money and worrying about the future, but I do my best not to dwell on the negative. I see beauty and joy and whimsy in every day things. Even with just sitting here on the couch, being able to go on Fluther and have a laugh with friends or find cool and interesting things.

If I go outside, I always have my camera with me, even if I’m just going to the grocery store. The other day I was thrilled to see a bin of Pluots because they’re just so gorgeous.

I find wonderful things to look at and try all over the world wide web. Hence my Pinterest pages, that now number 60 boards. I am interested in all kinds of things from dogs, to cooking, to silly videos, to Japanese culture, and most recently (thanks to our own @gailcalled) Doc Martin.

I am one of those people who never gets bored, although the ugly head of depression sometimes rears its head, but that doesn’t stop me from looking for the wonderful, even if it just resides in this little Pumpkin Kiss or This Face or These Faces or This Recipe.

I think you mentioned in one of your questions awhile back about how to bear day after day after day. I actually like a lot of mundane routine in my life, so having a schedule and knowing what is coming next, even if it’s just sorting the clean laundry is a good thing. I don’t need every day to be like a trip to an amusement park. But I also plan a lot of joyful activities into my life, even if it’s just watching NCIS on TV on Tuesday nights, or planning a camping trip for the family, or driving up to the snow in winter, or making a homemade mushroom pizza for dinner. I am what you would call easily amused, I’m not a demanding person and I don’t expect much, so when delicious little things happen, like seeing a funny comment on one of my Facebook posts from a friend, or getting the chance to rub a dog’s tummy, it lights up my insides.

I have a close friend and a couple of acquaintances who epitomize the “Gloomy Gus” syndrome, and it always pains me (and sometimes make me angry) when they simply dwell on everything that is negative in the world, but never make any attempt to change the situation. Sometimes simply not talking about how awful the world is ad nauseum, actually makes the world not so sucky. I know if makes it less sucky for me. These kinds of people, and you may or may not be one, I don’t know you well enough to know, actually contribute to the suckiness of the world. If you, or they simply cannot or will not see the simple beauty in a lake, or the smile of a baby, and make those things a part of their every day lives, then I have nothing but pity for them.

Why do you think you view life the way you do? You said that it may be the depression talking, which I think is about 99% likely. If you do suffer from depression are you proactive in trying to combat it? Do you see a therapist? Do you take medication? Do you exercise and eat well? Do you read up on the latest information about treatment for depression? I hope so, because it sounds like you aren’t enjoying life at all, and that actually makes me want to cry.

I just want to give you a little Gift and see if this doesn’t make you feel happy, at least for a few minutes.

Not everyone does. My father-in-law refused to have a heart valve replacement at age 88 and he simply laid around for six months until his heart stopped.

Maybe the person feels they can get 20 more years out of life. Maybe they want to take more vacations, travel to more places, see their grandchildren grow, maybe their scared to die. Maybe they just retired after working like a dog and they want to enjoy some of their retirement and the money they saved for retirement. Maybe they just got married or remarried and they want to be with their spouse. Maybe they really enjoy a great hike or a boat ride and maybe they have pets that they just adore and can’t bear to part with and will worry about who takes the pets when they go. Countless reasons.

People should have the right to choose to accept or refuse treatment. Even for those with only a few months to live, for some of them the opportunity to get their affairs in order and try and optimize their relationships with people with whom they feel close, that time is precious for all concerned. It takes courage to face the end of your life with dignity.

Ever consider therapy?

Perhaps they do so because they have some slight hope that maybe it will get better, after all. I know I would, if treatment was available. And as @Kardamom says, even if it’s just to dull away some of the pain, if you’re going to die, might as well go as comfortably as possible, considering.

I don’t plan on any heroic interventions should I become terminally ill. I have had a good life, lots of experiences, a child, many unique moments. At almost 54 I won’t “fight” for my life. I will choose to die with dignity, perhaps even euthanasia, and am all about quality over quantity.

Getting treatment is a personal choice, and one that many younger people might go for, and that is understandable if you are young,
I say anyone over 50 just needs to let go. lol
In your case, yes, maybe your thoughts are not so much consciously driven and maybe more from a place of depression.

When people smoke or do other destructive things, and they say, as justification, “Well, you have to die of something” I think to myself that if they’re LUCKY they’ll die quickly. Chances are they will get a variety of chronic illnesses (neuropathy, dementia, COPD, stroke) all related to smoking (or whatever they’re doing). COPD, stroke, etc. are things that you die from slowly. Slow and suffering.

@jca True enough, but…stroke and dementia both, happen to many people, smoking aside.
I am one of those that believes it is true, we have to die of SOMETHING, sooner or later. I’m not advocating smoking, just playing devils advocate.
Right now I know a 40 year old with Pancreatic cancer, never smoked, drank, I had a health nut aunt that died at 63 of colon cancer and know an 80 year old smoker that is as zippy as a 25 year old. There are no absolutes.

@ZEPHYRA I just wanted to mention that I have thought about this same thing. I can understand it certainly if you have children or loved ones that depend on you.

Instinct of self preservation. All there is to it.

An awful lot of the concept of “good treatment” has to do with how popular it is to treat certain terminal illnesses with adequate pain control. If you are unfortunate enough to have an excruciatingly painful disease that isn’t fashionable to treat, you’re simply tough out of luck when it comes to pain control. I had a friend who had POTS, Lyme, Bartonella (yes, the dog and cat disease) and Hashimoto’s disease. I took care of her in her last days. She would lie in bed whimpering day after day, and when she’d beg her doctors for pain relief they’d ignore her. One doctor actually laughed at her. She used to pray that she’d get cancer so she could get some decent pain relief.

My mother had a similar problem. It’s far more common than you’d think, and worse in states where prescription pain medication is often abused.

@Coloma: Yes we can always find people who have lived a relatively healthy lifestyle and still had stroke, dementia, etc. However, smoking constricts blood vessels (leading to stroke, neuropathy, dementia) and does all kinds of other things that are too numerous to get into. If you google “Top 10 preventable causes of death” smoking is #1 or #2. Statistics will show that the people who live a healthy lifestyle and get other illnesses are way less than people who smoke (or do drugs, etc.) and get other illnesses.

@jca Not disputing that, just saying that it is true, we all have to die of something, and short of a massive heart attack or plowing your car into a tree at 70MPH, most of us will suffer in our dying process to one degree or another. I know an almost 94 yr. old who has lived a clean life and is in extreme pain from her failing knee and hip with moderate dementia to boot. There are no more surgeries or medications she can pursue and so she sits most of the day, in pain, and wishes to be dead.

My point is simply that we will all suffer if we live long enough.
Whether it’s a smoker with COPD or just an ancient person whose body has worn out.

Yes we will all suffer and die if we live long enough. I think the chances of a peaceful death are greater with a healthy lifestyle.

A few months ago I saw a documentary about Johny Carson. All about his life, and they had some footage from before he retired, and he was in his 60’s. He jumped very nimbly over something, and I found it pretty impressive. He was an avid golfer and seemed to have a pretty good body. The documentary talked about how he jumped off his yacht to swim one day and was surprised to find that he was out of breath. They then discovered that he had emphysema, from a lifetime of smoking. If you have ever seen someone with emphysema, it’s not something you would envy. Here was a guy in great physical shape, who suffered, did not want medication and died probably pretty miserably, probably feeling like he was breathing with an elephant on his chest, because of a lifetime of smoking (and probably drinking). To me, I’d rather not take a chance of that kind of thing happening.

@jca Yep, not a fun way to go I’m sure. It would be nice if we could just all die in our sleep. Sadly that is rare.