July 21, 2024

Needles, Drinks & Buttons – an Existential Dilemma

In recent weeks, I have watched as the Sarco has neared its completion.

This has taken place in a workshop in Rotterdam.

I have watched as the electronics guy has trouble-shot (is that a term) his system and made some necessary last minute adjustments.

I have watched ‘the button’ being ordered online and installed.

I’ve listened to the debates about whether it should be blue or green.

I’ve also learned a lot as the young French intern (who was also working on the project) 3D-printed and installed the red lever which opens the Sarco capsule lid from inside.

Indeed, I’ve pulled on that lever and enjoyed the satisfying click that can be heard when the capsule lock is released.

All of this has made me think about what I would want when my time comes.

At 58 I hope this time is some way off.

But it’s made me think about my preferences, what do I like, and how would I feel?

Needles

At Pegasos and Lifecircle clinics in Switzerland, the method of death is an intravenous infusion.

This has always puzzled me since the former (which I was involved in establishing – I designed the website, wrote the text and worked on the back-end database and email contact systems), says its prides itself on being less medical in its approach.

Like many people I have a thing about needles. During the pandemic I routinely turned my head away each time I got that beautiful vaccine.

Same with blood. I could never have been a nurse or doctor.

Luckily the law came calling instead.

But this is the thing – if you die at Pegasos you need to lie on a bed and offer up your arm. The doctor or nurse then inserts the cannula.

After this you can lie there for a while before you open the tap that lets the infusion flow.

I think that I would find the process of a needle being inserted into my arm all but too much.

Other folk may not think much of it but I’ve always said to Ruedi Habegger that he would never have me as a client for this reason!

Why use a needle when you don’t have to I have asked? Because otherwise you will vomit he has always replied.

So if you vomit when you drink pentobarbital orally, why do Dignitas give you Nembutal in the form of a drink?

Drink

In May 2024 I accompanied my beautiful friend Angelika to Dignitas.

In early 2022 she was diagnosed with Stage IV breast cancer that had metastasised.

She was as shocked as the next person when she got the diagnosis. One minute she would be here the next minute she was gone.

She and I had both been to the Dignitas clinic before some 17 years ago when her husband John chose an accompanied suicide.

John was much older than Angelika. He had suffered from multiple myeloma.

We both saw how he had eagerly taken the small glass of Nembutal as soon as it was placed on the table in front of him.

That was all right for him, he seemed to think almost nothing of it. Angelika too reached eagerly for the plastic cup.

Maybe it is that when you are suffering so bad that you want to die, that it is easy to reach for a lethal drink, knowing it will kill.

For those of us who don’t want to die, that action is quite confronting.

From where I sat as onlooker, I found the act of her reaching for the glass to be one that exuded great courage.

There was no going back once she managed to drink the bitter-tasting liquid.

Whereas John said ‘oh that doesn’t taste too bad’, it was clear that Angelika found it disgusting and repulsive.

Luckily, she didn’t dry reach or vomit. The anti-emetic that she had taken 30 minutes earlier clearly did the trick in keeping the Nembutal down.

But it does raise the question of why your last known taste should be that of a foul-tasting liquid.

The act of forcing yourself to drink the liquid takes conviction, perseverance and courage.

These are issues that no one talks about.

It seems to be accepted that this method of death is the best we can do. But is it?

Buttons

And now I come to the topic of the button.

Specially, the button that is pressed once you are inside the 3D-printed Sarco and you want to die.

The ‘death switch’ in the Sarco is located on the right had side wall of the capsule.

According to the designer, it turns blue when it is ready to be pushed.

I have pushed this button and it felt good.

It feels good to push.

If I were at death’s door, my gut feeling is that the act of pushing this button is far less confronting than drinking a foul-tasting substance or having a medical professional insert a cannula into my vein.

There is something calming about a push, and then a click sound.

The nitrogen gas of the Sarco capsule can be neither seen, nor heard nor smelt.

The act of bringing about one’s own death comes down to this button.

It is an existential matter of ‘being and nothingness’ in deciding which way to go.

If I were brave, I might be able to offer up my arm for a needle, but it’s a pretty terrifying thought.

If I had no problems swallowing, I might want to drink my Nembutal, but only if I could quickly follow it up with a large dose of Baileys to take away the after-taste.

That leaves me with the button.

In all the design considerations that have gone into the Sarco, I never thought that ‘the button’ would be so important.

It seems a design masterstroke to make the activation of the device so easy, so welcoming and so final.

For this reason alone, I must be a Sarco supporter. But that is just me.

And I still hope that my time is a long way off.

Fiona with her dog Lulu, July 2024