Some people don't like to plan ahead while others don't even want to think about their own mortality. There are some decisions, however, that are best made in advance. These resources are designed to help you get your loved one thinking, talking, and making decisions about how they want their financial and medical affairs to be set up. And to let you know what's important to them so you can honor their wishes.
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| End of Life Article by Clay Evans, Part 1 of 3 parts Boulder Daily Camera columnist |
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Good article - this is the first of a series of 3 articles, mainly dealing with advanced directives and the issues that occur when they are not followed. Click here to visit the resource page. |
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| End of Life Article by Clay Evans, Part 2 of 3 parts Boulder Daily Camera columnist |
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2nd in a series of 3 articles on Death and Dying. This part covers more detail about advance directives. Click here to visit the resource page. |
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| Hard Choices For Loving People - by Hank Dunn |
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This booklet was written to provide guidance to patients and their families who must face the "hard choices" as they receive and participate in healthcare. It looks at questions like "Shall resuscitation be attempted", "Shall artificial nutrition and hydration be utilized?", "Should a nursing home resident or someone ill at home be hospitalized?", "Is it time to shift the treatment goal from cure to hospice or comfort care only?". This is all looked at with a compassionate and loving view, and yet is clear and to-the-point. |
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| Knocking on Heaven's Door by Katy Butler |
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In this visionary memoir, based on a groundbreaking New York Times Magazine story, award-winning journalist Katy Butler ponders her parents’ desires for “Good Deaths” and the forces within medicine that stood in the way.
Katy Butler was living thousands of miles from her vigorous and self-reliant parents when the call came: a crippling stroke had left her proud seventy-nine-year-old father unable to fasten a belt or complete a sentence. Tragedy at first drew the family closer: her mother devoted herself to caregiving, and Butler joined the twenty-four million Americans helping shepherd parents through their final declines.
Then doctors outfitted her father with a pacemaker, keeping his heart going but doing nothing to prevent his six-year slide into dementia, near-blindness, and misery. When he told his exhausted wife, “I’m living too long,” mother and daughter were forced to confront a series of wrenching moral questions. When does death stop being a curse and become a blessing? Where is the line between saving a life and prolonging a dying? When do you say to a doctor, “Let my loved one go?”
When doctors refused to disable the pacemaker, condemning her father to a prolonged and agonizing death, Butler set out to understand why. Her quest had barely begun when her mother took another path. Faced with her own grave illness, she rebelled against her doctors, refused open-heart surgery, and met death head-on.
With a reporter’s skill and a daughter’s love, Butler explores what happens when our terror of death collides with the technological imperatives of medicine. Her provocative thesis is that modern medicine, in its pursuit of maximum longevity, often creates more suffering than it prevents.
This revolutionary blend of memoir and investigative reporting lays bare the tangled web of technology, medicine, and commerce that dying has become. And it chronicles the rise of Slow Medicine, a new movement trying to reclaim the “Good Deaths” our ancestors prized.
Knocking on Heaven’s Door is a map through the labyrinth of a broken medical system. It will inspire the difficult conversations we need to have with loved ones as it illuminates the path to a better way of death.
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| LiveStrong (Survivorship notebook and book of survivor stories) by Armstrong Foundation |
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This "Survivorship Notebook" and booklet of "Survivorship stories", is an educational program of the Lance Armstrong Foundation and was created as a way for all cancer survivors to have access to the information they need. Survivorship begins at diagnosis, the moment your battle with cancer begins, and continues through your treatment and beyond. A survivor is anyone battling cancer: the person with cancer, a spouse or partner, a child, a friend, a parent or a caregiver. |
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| Passages in Caregiving by Gail Sheehy |
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Caring for a loved one with a chronic illness -- a parent, partner, sibling or child -- is a role no one aspires to but many of us will take on.
In her superb new book, "Passages in Caregiving," Gail Sheehy writes that someone is serving as an unpaid family caregiver in almost one-third of American households. It's a job that lasts an average of five years.
"Nobody briefs us on all the services we are expected to perform when we take on this role," she writes.
That statement is no longer true, for "Passages in Caregiving" -- written from Sheehy's personal experience supplemented by a generous dose of reporting -- does it well. Her book outlines the road that awaits caregivers and gives practical advice to help them on the journey. It's an ambitious and readable blend of memoir, reportage, consumer advice, pep talk and love story. Click here to visit the resource page. |
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| Share The Care by C Capossela & S Warnock |
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Whether you're prepared for it or not, chances are you'll take on the role of caregiver when a family member or friend is affected by a serious illness or injury, or when you find your elderly parent needs help. As you'll soon discover, the range of tasks and responsibilities involved are overwhelming. This book offers a sensible and loving solution: a unique group approach that can turn a circle of ordinary people into a powerful caregiving team. |
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| The End of Life Advisor - by S Dolan & A Vizzard |
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In this simple guide, you’ll find both practical step-by-step advice and compassionate, heartfelt guidance to dramatically improve the last days of life. Written by a mother-daughter team of hospice volunteers with experience in nursing, law, and psychology, The End-of-Life Advisor will show you the remarkable benefits of hospice care.
If you’re a healthcare or legal professional, you’ll discover the important ways you can advise your patients and clients. If you’re caring for a loved one, you’ll learn how you can help make their last days much more comfortable. If you’re planning for yourself, you’ll understand the decisions you need to make now – so you can find greater peace down the road. |
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| The Most Excellent Dying of Theodore Jack Heckelman by Nancy Poer |
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When faced with cancer, Jack made a decision to die with gratitude and consciousness. Here, holding his beloved Pooh bear as a child, he could hardly have known the rich, fulfilling life and death that was to come. A communications engineer, he lived all over the world and was deeply committed to raising awareness of the global needs for social justice and caring for the earth. He was a leader in working for the Peace Academy and Earth Charter. |
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| The Unexpected Caregiver by Kari Berit |
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As their parents grow older, growing numbers of Baby Boomers find themselves thrust into a caregiver role, often with little warning or preparation. In a sense, they must function somewhat like activity directors in senior-care facilities, helping mom and dad come to terms with both day-to-day concerns and longer-term issues. Kari Berit brings extensive professional and personal insights to this subject. This book is a "splendid treasure chest of practical ideas that will help ease the stress of caring across generations". |
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