LIVING ON YOUR TERMS

The pandemic had exposed all of us to our own mortality. The severe mental stress that many people are experiencing is leading to those under financial and mental strain taking their own lives. Taking control of one's life and death will be looked at with what the law permits.

- Shaan Katari Libby

THE last two years-with numbers of the dead being the very first thing we hear on the news, has meant that we have all had to accept our own mortality. “Carpe diem” or “seize the day" literally means we should live each day as if it was our last, and this from a lawyer's perspective, also means one should have everything in place in case it really is our last day. I was brought up on Murphy's Law and this pandemic has reinforced this. I wrote my first will as a teenager, and have of late been writing wills for people of various ages. I find younger adults are now getting their affairs in order-not because they have been diagnosed with a terminal disease-but just because they are recognizing that at the end of the day we are all terminal.

End-of-life wishes tend to include the desire to ensure loved ones are taken care of, and that they don't have to make tough decisions on their own, that things are set out for them making a difficult time just that little bit easier. People also seem to want to have a degree of control over their own deaths having an “advanced plan” or “death plan” also known as a "living will” in case of incapacitation. These often include advice from the family physician as to what the likely weaknesses might be for each patient and family is made aware in advance what the patients' wishes are. As Dr. Anjana (Dr. Mohan's Diabetes Centre) says: “More and more families are learning to understand patients' wishes now. Of course depends a lot on family dynamics”. Wishes include thoughts on palliative care, wishes to donate one's body for its organs, donating one's body for science (possible via an agreement with any local medical college who will gladly accept a cadaver of any age), and so on.