By Dave Andrusko Last Christmas season, Kim Vaillancourt of Tonawanda, New York, felt like she was coming down flu-like symptoms. She could be forgiven if, out of an “abundance of caution,” she went to the doctor. She and her husband, Phil, had two biological children of their own, ages 11 and 12. On December 23, …
Continue reading "Mom with brain cancer forgoes radiation to give her unborn baby a better chance"By Dave Andrusko I visit Lauren Hill’s Facebook page less often than I should. I have three adult daughters of my own and if they were to face a terminal illness, no father could wish for greater courage than Lauren has displayed or that his own family could nurture one of them the way Lauren’s …
Continue reading "Lauren Hill, the young woman who ought to be the face of the battle over assisted suicide"Fighting against the gravitational pull of nihilism By Wesley J. Smith The herd media always present assisted suicide as compassionate and caring. To the contrary, it is ultimately abandoning and promotes invidious discrimination against the sick and disabled, seen broadly as unworthy of protecting from suicide. Over the years, people struggling with devastating illnesses and disabilities …
Continue reading "Suicide Advocacy Hurts the Sick"By Dave Andrusko I was in line at the grocery store, looked to my left, and there, on the cover of People Magazine, was Dan Diaz, the husband of Brittany Maynard, who took her own life November 1, 2014. Maynard, suffering with a terminal brain cancer, immediately became the “face of the right to …
Continue reading "What will be the Legacies of Brittany Maynard and Lauren Hill?"By Dave Andrusko The family of Lauren Hill, the courageous freshman at Mt. St. Joseph college, announced last night that Lauren has entered hospice care. Lauren, battling inoperable brain cancer, has been a profile in courage as she refused to allow her disease to stop her from achieving a life-time goal: playing in a …
Continue reading "Lauren Hill enters hospice, continues to fight inoperable brain cancer with courage and dignity"By Dave Andrusko I am convinced that anyone who read our stories about Brittany Maynard would come away knowing two things. We were deeply respectful of what she was going through and the enormous impact her terminal brain disease had on this young woman and her family. But just as our hearts were filled …
Continue reading "Two women facing terminal brain disease, two profoundly different legacies"