My husband, John Washburn, endured months of pain from a rare form of cancer before his death in September 2022. He wanted the option of medical aid in dying, which I have been advocating for and will continue to do so for all the citizens of Pennsylvania.
Medical aid in dying legislation — specifically House Bill 1109 and Senate Bill 570 — have been sitting in Pennsylvania Judiciary committees for over a year. In some form, this legislation has been under consideration by our state Legislature for nearly 20 years. When asked, Pennsylvania voters overwhelmingly voice their support for medical aid in dying legislation — 74% of us support this legislation. It is time for our legislators to listen to us.
My husband, John, the love of my life, my soulmate and best friend, died Sept. 26, 2022, from peritoneal mesothelioma. This is a sneaky, aggressive form of cancer. We received the diagnosis in November 2021. The prognosis was terminal; John’s care team determined, at best, he had six months to live.
John was a vibrant, active 72-year-old, who most people thought was at least a decade younger. He made people comfortable in his company. He played with our grandchildren, took them on trail rides, canoe paddles and hikes, had romps and rolls in newly raked leaves and to playgrounds and taught them how to play the Washburn version of competition solitaire. We were better together; we knew this and pledged our love and lives to each other.
John’s mom, whom we both loved dearly, found the end of her life to be a progressive decline. John did not want to have the same experience. We often joked we could always find our way to the North Pole and hitch a ride on an ice floe into the aurora together if we found that the end was near and we could no longer participate in the things that gave our lives meaning. Instead of having a gentle, peaceful ice floe ride, John was on an extremely scary, steeply falling roller coaster. He desperately wanted this ride to end.
In the months following his diagnosis, John went to great lengths seeking care for his cancer. He bravely endured painful and invasive treatments ranging from chemotherapy and immunotherapy to surgery. The last CT scans that were taken of John, just eight months after his initial diagnosis, showed the cancer had resumed its progress in his abdomen and metastasized to lymph nodes in his chest and lungs. We were headed to the deepest dive on the roller coaster ride.
John decided to end any further treatments and to proceed with palliative/hospice care. The hospice care was excellent; John was at home where he wanted to be. It was frightening to see how much opioid medication John needed to control his pain. By mid-September 2022, eating became extremely painful for him and he no longer wished to eat or drink. We held each other and cried together; he told me he was done. Voluntarily stopping eating or drinking was John’s only option. He knew this would be harder on me than on him, but I supported and respected his decision fully, and his final eight days were a steady decline.
The 11 months of my husband’s end-of-life journey were a spiraling downward roller coaster ride. Each step of his treatment was painful and debilitating. It was not what he wanted. He wanted, when he had made the decision to stop treatment, to chart his own end-of-life journey and plan for care that honored his personal dignity.
I am committed to work toward a future where terminally ill Pennsylvanians have access to a wide range of quality end-of-life care options, including medical aid in dying if they choose. I do not want my children and grandchildren — or anyone’s loved ones — to experience or witness unnecessary suffering at the end of life.
There are currently 14 U.S. jurisdictions where qualifying patients can access medical aid in dying. I do not want to have to move to another state to have this legal right. No resident of the commonwealth should have to endure what my husband did.
Please contact your state senators and representatives to request their support for HB1109/SB570; bills that would authorize medical aid in dying for terminally ill Pennsylvanians. Contact Sen. Lisa Baker, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee; Sen. Amanda Cappelletti, minority chair; Rep. Tim Briggs, chair of the House Judiciary Committee; and Rep. Rob W. Kauffman, minority chair, to request that they call for a committee vote to move this legislation to their chamber’s floor for a vote. Inform them all that you are among the 74% of Pennsylvania voters who expect that medical aid in dying legislation be passed this session.