My Mother’s Choices

In this deeply personal narrative, Dr. Hannah Kirsch, a neurointensivist and palliative care researcher, recounts her experience as both a physician and daughter during her mother’s terminal illness. The article explores the ethical and emotional complexities of facilitating her mother’s decision to use medical aid in dying (MAID) under California law. Kirsch reflects on the tension between her professional commitment to patient autonomy and her personal grief as she prepares the lethal medication, revealing the unspoken toll on caregivers. Through vivid anecdotes from managing her mother’s declining independence to the visceral act of mixing the fatal dose she exposes the paradox of control in relinquishing it. The piece culminates in a raw questioning of whether the right to choose justifies the trauma inflicted on those who enable it, leaving Kirsch torn between her roles as physician and grieving daughter.

In this deeply personal narrative, Dr. Hannah Kirsch, a neurointensivist and palliative care researcher, recounts her experience as both a physician and daughter during her mother’s terminal illness. The article explores the ethical and emotional complexities of facilitating her mother’s decision to use medical aid in dying (MAID) under California law. Kirsch reflects on the tension between her professional commitment to patient autonomy and her personal grief as she prepares the lethal medication, revealing the unspoken toll on caregivers. Through vivid anecdotes from managing her mother’s declining independence to the visceral act of mixing the fatal dose she exposes the paradox of control in relinquishing it. The piece culminates in a raw questioning of whether the right to choose justifies the trauma inflicted on those who enable it, leaving Kirsch torn between her roles as physician and grieving daughter.