Two things:
1. It must be hard to do a job where you disagree with everything! I am interested to know how you (particularly as an INFJ but also as a human being) keep it up.
I'm used to it. It is my life. I have disagreed with most everything our society does, and the way we live, for my whole life. I do my own stuff differently, which is what keeps me sane. If they wanna pay me to perpetuate the fucked up system,... okay.
2. If a person's near the end of a very painful illness (I acknowledge that there are some that are not painful, but there are certainly some that are), what does "functioning" look like, anyway? Isn't daily life different when a person is dying?
Everyone's so hung up on pain. I see more pain in younger people who have more musculoskeletal problems or osteoarthritis than I see in people near the end of their life. Things that are worse than pain are not being able to breathe, not being able to move because you cannot process oxygen, not being able to swallow because you will choke and/or get pneumonia, falling and breaking things and being confined to one position in bed, brain damage, just to name a few.
End of life functioning looks like the beginning of the end. A person begins withdrawing from life. It is a process, and one that is documented. A person might begin to seclude themselves from others more and more. Might go inside their head more and more. Stop talking to others. Stay in their room. Not watch media. Close their eyes. Sleep more. Usually they become debilitated enough that they have some sort of accident or injury that makes them bedridden. Then they get infections, start retaining fluid, get hemostatis, and eventually get into a coma like state. It's a withdrawing into mind and into the beyond. I think during this process they began rerunning their life's tapes; remembering their life. They don't seem to care if others are around fairly early in this process. Even though others want to be with them when they pass. By that time they have become so One with themselves and the other side, that they don't notice nor care much, though I'm sure they register it on some heartfelt-loving plane.
So, you see, to invade in this process is so obtrusive and dastardly, to me it's repugnant and ugly. And an ultimate thievery and disruption of a person's final bit of life.
Some people are going to say, though, if they ever become so brain damaged that they aren't themselves (and perhaps they will outline what that means, precisely) or can't "function" anymore (also outlined, hopefully), that they want their lives ended in a humane way (also outlined). Not everybody is going to make the same decisions for him or herself around the topic of end-of-life choices, even if everybody gets the exact same accurate information.
I'm sure they will. I've heard to starve to death is not very pretty. But I've never seen it, so I don't really know. I am not sure how starving of thirst is. But the alternative of a feeding tube starts one on an even more slippery slope.
I concur. So, I think I hear you saying that you believe that there is an ideal way to die and feel strongly that people ought to want that, but you wouldn't make the choice for them?
Agreed. Unless I was in some position I had to. Then I would make the best decision possible.