Do you know what a living will is and more importantly do you have one? As I mentioned in my last entry I made mine as soon as I heard the cancer diagnosis. I had discussed it before with my husband and my mother when it was in the news about that woman in Florida. At the age I was (only 35) I had not ever written that or my will. Now I know that is not being a good mom because I should have done that as soon as we had children but the idea of contemplating dying and who would take care of my kids was a little more than I was ready to deal with.
I am in favor of everyone having a living will and medical power of attorney. Because a lot of people are not really sure what either is I am going to break it down for you.
Basically a living will is a legal document that you complete stating what medical treatment you do or do not want to have should you not be able to tell the doctors yourself. You take the decisions out of your loved ones hands. With the stress that your loved ones would be going through in your medical crisis this helps by removing one decision from their control.
With a living will you make two people your health care agents. These agents should be someone you trust and you need to discuss your wishes with them; they should always be given a copy of the living will for their records. Don’t worry if you make these people mad they cannot have you put down early. With the living will at least two doctors must say that you are not going to recover before the living will can be executed. The living will lets you decide if you want to be kept alive on breathing machines, feeding tubes and other life sustaining measures or if you would rather be kept comfortable with no artificial assistance to keep you alive.
The living will is a powerful tool that allows you to decide how you wish to leave this world should be ill. A living will does not need to be written by an attorney you can actually generate your own for free. You may need to have it notarized and you will need two witnesses that are not your health care agents, or your physicians. If you want to create your living will click here.