New York’s Legislature should show love, compassion by passing Medical Aid in Dying Act

New York’s Legislature should show love, compassion by passing Medical Aid in Dying Act
By Rena Schwartzbaum
Westchester (NY) News
December 19, 2023
My mother, Lillian, 88, was a Holocaust survivor and a life-long fighter. She lived through Hitler, Stalin, diphtheria, a displaced person’s camp, the loss of her husband of 58 years and one cancer diagnosis. It was her second cancer—a very rare angiosarcoma that was the result of the radiation treatment for her first cancer—that proved too much for her. After many weeks of painful symptoms, deteriorating health, and unsuccessful treatment, she told us she was tired of fighting. She begged my brother and me to help her die. I started to research what was possible and found we could not honor her last wish in the state she had called home for more than sixty years.