Op-Ed: BACK OFF! I’M NOT DEAD YET

October 15, 2007

Do I have to have a living will? Last year, I had an experience that gave me the distinct impression that if I didn’t have one, my life was hardly worth, well, living.

A routine mammogram had revealed that I had early-stage breast cancer. This kind of cancer is noninvasive and thus not particularly life-threatening if promptly attended to, and the required outpatient surgery isn’t especially risky. Nonetheless, one of the shoals I had to maneuver through at the hospital (which otherwise afforded me excellent care) was a series of efforts to persuade me to sign on to the currently fashionable notion of a “good death.” (Washington Post)