Just to clarify, those were "for instances" not anything that was specifically done (for instance, my friends were very supportive when I moved. I don't know if I'll actually go to Japan, but my husband is super supportive of that, as well as my feminism. My parents did get mad at me for leaving the religion, though.)

Thank you all for your very kind words. I still haven't been able come up with the words to connect the experience of my mothers' death with assisted suicide. It's one of those thoughts that sometimes pops up and seems so obvious but when I try to describe it I can't come up with a rational-sounding explanation. It's hanging right there---just out of my minds' reach.

Dammit. Should have taken that creative writing course when I had the chance.

Why does someone have to talk to a shrink? I mean, I'm capable of figuring out whether or not I like chocolate or vanilla, and neither one of those choices make me crazy. Why can't I decide if I whether or not I prefer death to life?

You can (well, you can't, actually, under our current legal system, but you know what I mean), but it should be an informed decision. The 'shrink' tells you "we can't do any more for your depression than we already have done", or "your last doctor was an idiot, your depression will probably improve on such and such a drug regimen" or "these symptoms might be biological rather than psychological in origin. I recommend that you get an MRI of your thyroid before you go through with this".

This is exactly the same reason why we would have terminal cancer patients talk to a qualified oncologist before administering assisted suicide: it's obviously going to have an impact on your decision if she says "the average patient with this type of a tumor lives for about three years with aggressive chemotherapy" rather than "that's not a tumor, it's Dr. Chaudhry's thumb print."

If I end up going to Japan for a year to teach English...

Really? I'm just about to go and do exactly that in South Korea! Apparently the whole experience is amazing (and rather lucrative too :) )!

But going back to the topic, it was selfish of your parents to expect you to stay within the religion in which you were raised. That was an expectation they put onto you, and to reassert yourself there is not selfish. It is just to defy their expectations of you. The same with your friends. It would be rather selfish of them to expect you to stay where you are your entire life just so they'll have you around. Again you are simply defying expectations which have rather selfishly been imposed on you by others. The same with the feminist points. It would have been selfish of your husband to expect you to stay at home with the kids, and to live for his domestic convenience.

These are all unreasonable expectations to make of other people.

But if you killed yourself, you would be denying no-one's expectations of you other than to stay alive. The people around you love you and want you to propser (if that doesn't sound too Star Trek...). If you think we should not make this expectation of each other then we will indeed end up not caring for each other at all. We will have to dismantle (to borrow Scotlyn's phrase which I love) our web of caring by which we are joined to those we love.

I grimace every time I hear someone argue that a person should receive "counseling" or that suicide could never be a rational choice. Either you own yourself, or you don't. By most people's definition, it is not possible to be sane and want to kill yourself. Why not? Be very suspicious when someone trots out the word "selfish." There's always a controlling agenda there. Nobody owns you, not even your children or friends. It's your life. Spend it or end it how you wish!

I've always wondered that myself- if you want to kill yourself, that's enough right there to make you crazy. Why? If you don't enjoy your life, I don't see suicide as any less rational than walking out of a movie that sucks half-way through: sure, it MAY improve, but it doesn't look like it's going to. What's so great about living that it's carche blanche preferable to death?

And in this case, I'm perfectly happy to let assisted suicide be an option. I would just like a qualified psychologist or psychiatrist to make the distinction before the choice is made; just as I'd want a good doctor to certify that the patient's cancer is terminal before the decision to end his or her life is made.

Why does someone have to talk to a shrink? I mean, I'm capable of figuring out whether or not I like chocolate or vanilla, and neither one of those choices make me crazy. Why can't I decide if I whether or not I prefer death to life?

And yes, it is true that it would hurt people. But, as I mentioned before, lots of decision that one makes hurts people, even if that is not the intention. I left religion, and that really hurt my parents (my dad in fact told me that I should just pretend to still believe to make my mother happy). I went to school on the opposite side of the country and that made my friends unhappy because I left them. If I end up going to Japan for a year to teach English, that'll make my husband unhappy. All of these choices are selfish, and make people unhappy, but they are still perfectly rational, moral decisions to make. What's the difference between that and suicide?