Dublin, Ireland

I signed the consent form for a surgery my mother begged me not to choose

Dear Delyara, My mother had bowel obstruction while already living with advanced dementia. Doctors said surgery offered a chance of survival but recovery would be difficult. Mum had once told me, years before dementia, that she did not want major operations when she could no longer understand what was happening. In the hospital, she was frightened and repeatedly said, “Take me home.” I signed consent as her legal decision-maker because the surgeon said without intervention she was likely to die quickly and painfully. She survived. Recovery has been terrible. She pulls at tubes, cries for her mother, does not understand why her abdomen hurts. Everyone tells me I chose from imperfect options and that comfort without surgery would also have involved suffering. I sit beside her bed and hear only the old sentence: Do not let them do big things to me when I’m gone in the head. Those were her words. I thought loving her meant saving her. Now I am frightened I saved her from the death she had already given me permission to allow.