Euthanasia: How To Say Goodbye To Someone Who Has Made The Courageous Decision To Die

In the face of the death of someone we love, words become useless. The pain turns to tears and nothing we say can alleviate this inner emptiness. A flower garden dies within us that will never be sown again.

Our loved ones are those flower gardens that give us joy, they are the rain that waters the dry land, that gives color to our gray afternoons, the shade when the sun burns. Sometimes we forget that no garden blooms forever, winter always comes to force you to say goodbye.

Until recently, death was a strange visitor who showed up unannounced. Now everything is different. Science is able to keep you alive, even if you are just an unconscious body that still breathes and maintains your heartbeat. This gives us the opportunity to prolong the pain with no hope of relief.

On the other hand, it is currently possible to decide the date, the time and the way to die, to dive somewhere that science does not know. Euthanasia is one form of programmed death, but it does not bring comfort to our wounded heart.

Euthanasia: saying goodbye without knowing how to say goodbye

We are all doomed to death from birth, but not knowing when we will leave opens up a range of uncertainty that is both encouraging and frightening. When death takes the form of a month, a day and a certain hour, the clock moves forward in time with the anguish. A minute more is a minute less, and each shared experience becomes a way of saying goodbye.

Euthanasia is one of those limiting situations in life that confronts us with a painful paradox. On the one hand love, which believes that we must respect the will of the other and be ready to say goodbye with a heart full of gratitude. On the other hand, the same love shows us that it will be hopeless to imagine the world without this person, how difficult it will be to find him only in our tears and memories.

Nobody says goodbye to life without sadness. Nobody makes the decision to practice euthanasia without spending sleepless nights, looking for solutions that don’t appear. Dying becomes an outlet for pain.

“I will. And the birds will be singing…”

It is not easy to understand and accept the decision of someone who has decided to die. You refuse to say goodbye to this loved one and do not accept the idea that the human being can take control of their destiny, defining the moment when their life must end.

It’s hard to admit these truths, because along with that person, something inside of us will die. Saying goodbye is the beginning of an uncertain path that will lead us to everyone and nowhere.

Every time we see this person, we panic. We remember that the end is near, that in a week we won’t see her again, that these are the last smiles, the last words we will share.

And you cry inside so that no one will notice or see your tears. You want to hug and never let go of that person, but you know it’s time to let go.

Anguish increases when we become aware that the person will die, but the love we feel for them will never end. Love will survive; first it will turn into a silent lament when he misses your presence, your smile, your advice and your kindness. You will say goodbye many times, even after she is gone.

After the first moment of pain, we will return to the flower garden that was left uninhabited and we will notice with surprise that the flowers are gone, but their scent and birdsong remain to soothe your heart. Then you will understand that there are seeds with an eternal harvest and you will say like the poet: “I cleaned the mirror of my heart… now it reflects the moon”.

Author’s Note: Have a good trip, my dear friend…