Facing Mortality on A Good Goodbye TV

Facing Mortality on A Good Goodbye TV

If you were given only a few months to live, what would you do? We wrap up the interviews on A Good Goodbye TV with a special guest who is facing his own mortality.

Arturo Francisco Olivas is a santero artist, a Franciscan Brother and a cancer survivor who has outlived the initial prognosis he was given for terminal lung cancer.

On September 16, 2011, he was hospitalized after numerous visits to his primary care physician for what seemed to be an extended bout of pneumonia. After tests confirmed that he had lung cancer, he was given eight to 12 months to live.

Medical treatments of steroids, radiation, and a targeted chemotherapy regimen with a new drug designed for his type of lung cancer began immediately. Only 10% of the people who receive this new chemotherapy treatment respond well to the drug, and he is in that minority. When this interview was recorded in March 2013, Fr. Arturo had been living with the cancer for 18 months.

Among the topics discussed:

Preparing for death by living fully and deeplyHow his faith as a Franciscan informs his spiritualityWhat he is doing to prepare for his final arrangementsThe positive aspects of skull imagery and Dia de los MuertosTalking with children about death as a part of lifeMaking artwork and saying goodbye

This longer interview has been edited into two separate programs which start airing on July 2 for the first part and July 9 for the second part.

A Good Goodbye: Funeral Planning for Those Who Don’t Plan to Die is currently airing on Albuquerque’s Comcast cable system on the uPUBLIC.tv Channels 26 and 27. Each episode is scheduled as follows:

On Channel 26, the time slots are Tuesdays at 4:00 p.m. and Wednesdays at 1:00 p.m. On Channel 27, the program airs Thursdays at 5:00 p.m. and Sundays at 9:00 a.m.Episodes will also appear on both channels in additional unscheduled repeats.

A Good Goodbye TV is an educational and entertaining 12-episode series of 30-minute programs with expert interviews on “everything you need to know before you go.”

Host Gail Rubin brings a light touch to a serious subject. Like her award-winning book, A Good Goodbye: Funeral Planning for Those Who Don’t Plan to Die, the television program covers information most people don’t know about until faced with a death in the family.

The first 12 programs will become a set of DVDs with three interviews per disc. A Good Goodbye TV interviews will be grouped by content:

DVD 1  Over My Dead Body: Essentials of Funeral Planning – Preneed funeral planning, cremation, cemetery Q&ADVD 2  Trending Topics: Pets, Funeral Parties and Going Green – Pet loss grief and disposition choices, life celebrations and celebrants, green burial and eco-friendly funeralsDVD 3  Death and Taxes: A Primer on Finances and Funerals – estate planning, financial planning, cost managementDVD 4  Good Grief! Save Money, Live and Die Better – Medicaid and more, advance directives, grief counseling

SPECIAL OFFER: Place your advance order for the four-DVD set and get a free copy of the book A Good Goodbye! Episodes are currently being finalized. Place your pre-production order today for only $39.97 plus shipping. A book will be sent right away to those who place advance orders. CLICK HERE to order.

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Medicine and Mortality

Today, two items regarding end-of-life and having a conversation about one’s own mortality. Medical directives are imperative to ensure living and dying the way you want. The following chat and op-ed give you lots of food for thought.

For more than a year now, Los Angeles Times columnist Steve Lopez has been writing and talking about how we die. On Thursday, he hosted a Google+ Hangout with Dr. Judy Epstein, clinical director of the Compassion & Choices organization’s End-of-Life Consultation Program, and Kathryn Tucker, director of legal affairs for Compassion & Choices, which advocates for patients’ rights on end-of-life issues. Here’s the video of the chat:

Here’s an op-ed column that appeared in today’s Albuquerque Journal. It was written by Dr. Aroop Mangalik, Professor Emeritus of Medicine at UNM School of Medicine. The paper titled it “Take Control of Life, Death.”

If you want to be comfortable, happy and be with your family and friends when you are facing a serious illness or are likely to die in the near future, you need to take control.

In recent decades, there has been what some have called “medicalization of death.” There have been many advances in medicine and a lot of people are living healthier, longer lives.

But ultimately, we all have to die.

Medicalization of death has occurred, to a significant degree, because we – society, patients and doctors – have not taken into account the fact that there are limits to life and that medical interventions can only do so much.

Understanding this reality is a major step that must be taken to get the best outcome for the patient.

How does one understand this? How do we take control of the situation?

The knowledge you need to get will necessarily come from your medical provider. The best decisions are made by having the facts – available treatment options and the likely outcomes.

Ask your provider about the nature of the illness and what is expected without any treatment.

The next steps will be to get a clear picture of what treatments are available. You should be able to get some idea of how likely it is that the treatments will improve the outcome for you.

This includes information on previous success and failures with available options. At least try to find out if the treatment is “very likely,” “likely,” or “not likely” to help.

Equally, important, you need to know what will be the side-effects of treatment. Will the treatments be harsh or mild, will they last for a short time or will they be persistent.

The cost in dollars is also something that must be considered. In this day of uncertainty we cannot ignore that factor. Many families face bankruptcy because of “long shot” medical treatments.

Once you have the information, you need to decide. It should be your decision based on the best information and input you can get.

If you feel that the treatments available to you are not going to help you achieve your goals, you can refuse those treatments. No one can force you to have a treatment you do not want.

If you choose the path of not taking the treatment, the focus changes from controlling the disease to making your life as comfortable as possible.

The medical team will work with you to control your symptoms. They will help you with pain control, nausea, vomiting, shortness of breath or difficulties in performing day-to-day activities. They will work with you to get the best out of life for whatever time you are alive.

There are many types of experts who are trained to help you. They have overlapping roles and expertise and they work together.

They are referred to as Palliative Care Specialists, Hospice Teams or Symptom Management experts. They all have the goals of making your life better and focus on you.

They also help you and your family so that you die comfortably and with dignity with your family and friends around you.

In certain circumstances, despite their efforts, living may feel like a burden. There are other options that can be utilized.

This is the option of you willfully ending your life at the time you choose. This option has been given a number of names. Physician-assisted death (and) assisted suicide being two common ones.

The option is currently available in Oregon and Washington State. In New Mexico, we are waiting for the courts to decide if such an action would be legal.

In summary, when faced with a serious illness, you should take control of your life and decide what is best for you.

This column is written on Dr. Aroop Mangalik’s personal capacity and is not reflective of the UNM Health Sciences Center.

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When Mortality Smacks You In The Face

When Mortality Smacks You In The Face

Josh Slocum, Executive Director of the Funeral Consumers Alliance (FCA), spends his entire day on a soapbox telling people why funeral planning, advance directives and discussing your choices are important. You’d think he of all people would have his affairs in order.

Imagine his surprise in December 2010 when a heart attack struck him at the age of 36. Mortality rudely slapped his face and he was not prepared.

Given his lifestyle, a heart attack was not a complete surprise. Slocum was a heavy smoker and overweight by at least 60 pounds. The fact that he smoked endeared him to Lisa Carlson, the previous FCA executive director who also smoked.

The FCA produces Before I Go, You Should Know. This handy booklet is a planning kit illustrated with drawings by Edward Gorey. It’s a place to record your wishes regarding funeral or memorial services, facts useful for an obituary or death certificate, and the location of vital papers for handling your estate.

In the introduction to Before I Go, You Should Know, it says, “You have a duty to be sure that these things are understood, especially in a world where friends and family live some distance from you. Get it all in order and then be sure to tell others where you put it…. And don’t forget to take it when traveling.”

Slocum shared his story at the recent FCA Biennial meeting in Tucson and gave his okay to tell it here – as long as the humor is included.

He was at home in Vermont when he felt crushing chest pains. Carlson, who Slocum jokingly calls “the Queen o’ Death,” rushed him to the hospital emergency room. As soon as the EKG was read, medical personnel came running. “I knew it was bad when all those doctors came in,” he said.

He was having an acute heart attack, an experience he described as “a living nightmare.” He was promptly taken into the heart cath lab, where the doctors placed a stent that opened the clogged artery.

In recovery after the procedure, while he was swimming in a medication-induced haze, Carlson came in for a bedside visit.

She asked, “Where’s your Before I Go You Should Know kit?” Slocum admitted he didn’t know.  “You asshole,” said Carlson.

He also didn’t have advance directives on file. “It took me being smacked in the face with my mortality, even though I do this for a living,” said Slocum.

He has since quit smoking and lost 40 pounds. And he also found his Before I Go, You Should Know kit. Does he carry it with him everywhere he goes? I’ll ask him that question when we both speak on a panel discussion at the Ohio Cemetery Association’s annual meeting in August.

Meanwhile, we can all learn a lesson from Josh Slocum’s experience. Don’t wait until you are smacked upside the head with your own mortality to get your affairs in order.

Wicker basket casket for green burial on display at the FCA Biennial Meeting provided by Final Footprint™ (www.FinalFootprint.com).

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