Monday, January 5, 2015

It's not easy being a hero

The ancient Romans knew what it was to be a man.  They would have saluted this guy:
I want to start off by saying this is going to be officially ruled a murder/suicide when in all actuality it is a double suicide. My baby was trying to escape the bi-polar demons that have been swirling around in her brain since childhood and now because of my selfishness in dialing 911 she is experiencing the only thing she feared more than her illness…life support on a respirator.

...

I don’t care what is done with the ashes but I know Kathy loves Damariscotta Lake.

...

Please don’t mourn for me, my spirit will be in a much better place with my soul mate; you may even catch a glimpse of us from time to time.
Boy, this must have been a hard choice to make.  Back when Dad was in his last days from the cancer, I often thought that it would have been a mercy to give him an overdose of Morphine, but my family needed me.  Somehow, that makes me feel like a lesser man than Mark Lavoie.

Some nights the wolves are silent and the Moon howls.

Hat tip: Free North Carolina.

6 comments:

Old NFO said...

Damn... That took courage.

Jeffrey Smith said...

I dissent.
He made the choice to flee from life and the consequences of his actions.

He went for the easy choice.
You went for the hard choice. You are the one with courage, not him.

greg said...

I saw this story a few days ago, and I must say I am more on Old NFO's side...although I think Hero is a bit strong of a word. I do not think poorly of him for what he did...just not sure hero is the right word.

I'll tell you, this story is one of the main reasons that one of the resolutions I made with my wife was getting Living Wills and Real Wills written.

R.K. Brumbelow said...

Wait, so because I have a brain tumour (very treatable but outside of what I can afford as treatment is deemed experimental)

The resultant agoraphobia,
I wake up in pain every day
And in stark utter loneliness because I cannot bear the physical pain that being around others causes me.

Wanting to never wake up again

You are suggesting I would be braver and more heroic to take my own life?

I am sorry, I know you are scared and hurting Ted, but quite frankly fuck you and the pity horse you rode in on.

Suicide and medical homicide is a failing of character, not something to celebrate.

Borepatch said...

R. K. Brumbelow, I have no intention of walking that path.

Goober said...

Rare dissent here, too.

It takes more bravery and fortitude to keep on keeping on than it ever does to just put an end to things.

Where's the bravery in the blackness?

I wanted to live so badly this year with my heart/cancer scare and surgery, that I forgot everything else. I became so overwhelmed with what it meant to "go on" that I ended up getting myself fired. The pills caused me so much fatigue, and the fight caused me so much distraction, and the depression (which I posted about on my blog) caused me so much "don't give a fuck" that it showed through in my performance at work, and my boss fired me.

I'm so ashamed of that, and so depressed by the fact that I failed so miserably to uphold my end, in spite of my problems, that it almost seems like all the fighting was in vain.

But screw that. I've got a vested interest in this life, and even when it feels like that isn't enough, the fact that there are people that have a vested interest in me is reason enough to hang around. '

Only cowards take the easy way out. It is the permanent solution to a temporary problem.