Dear Brittany: Why We Don’t Have To Be So Afraid of Dying and Suffering that We Choose Suicide

Photo Credit: CNNYou may have read the poignant and powerful, CNN front-page story of cancer patient Brittany Maynard, 29, who has scheduled her death for Nov. 1? Come November 1, Maynard plans to take a pill given to her by her doctors as she wants to choose her own death and avoid hospice and the suffering her brain-tumor cancer may entail — Her story-gone-viral speaks of her plan to swallow the pill and choose death on her own terms in her own bedroom with her husband beside her and her favorite music playing in the background. Her story is raw — and she has all our love and prayers…. Before she dies by assisted suicide, Brittany states that she wants to use the rest of her time on earth to lobby for every American to have access to assisted suicide services.

After I read Brittany’s story yesterday… my friend Kara Tippetts dropped an email into my inbox — Kara was diagnosed with breast cancer at age 36. She has 4 young children. She continues to battle that cancer two years later as it has crossed the blood/brain barrier and has metastasized into her entire body. I’ve been reading Kara’s journey since the beginning, profoundly moved by this woman’s courage to embrace all of her life as it comes to her… Kara’s exceptional book released this week, The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in the Midst of Life’s Hard — and Kara humbly speaks important words into this current news story and national debate about assisted suicide with a tender weight & compassionate gravity that only someone, a mother, a wife, a daughter, bravely facing terminal cancer can — we earnestly love and pray for both women as they each share own their stories:

Dear Brittany Maynard,

This morning my best friend and I read your story.

My heart ached for you, and I’m simply grieved by your terminal brain tumor, for the less than 6 months the doctor’s gave you, you just past your 29th birthday.

With a heavy heart, I left my home and headed for my oncologist. I too am dying, Brittany.