Good Deaths and Bad Deaths

There are many books and articles about the end of life: books about grieving, books and articles about caretaking a loved one, books about hospice, books about coping with conditions that have no cure. Since I'm not a doctor, I read books and articles written by doctors. But I found only a few books and articles about how we, the elderly, could manage to go from here, alive and healthy, to dying a graceful death at home with our family. I learned that this is not easy: there are many bumps in the road along the way. It takes a lot of planning so that we do not end up in a noisy hospital, hooked up with machinery to provide breath and nutrition in our final—often uncomfortable-days, pleading with a doctor to "do something more"; others will plead "just let me go." I hope that this book will be a guide to planning for a graceful ending.

This is not the first book about the struggle to die. But it is the first book about the whole journey, from start to finish. This is a guide to help families plan a graceful death. And make no mistake, it takes planning to avoid last days full of paperwork and machinery. There are books about grieving, books about caretaking, books about hospice, and books about coping with conditions that have no cure. These books often start too late to provide true comfort. Demographer Susan Watkins wanted to cover every step of the process. Good Deaths and Bad Deaths shows how the elderly can go from alive and healthy, to dying gracefully at home with their family.

Susan Watkins is a Sociologist and Demographer who has conducted research in the US and across the world, most recently in Malawi and Kenya. When she retired from teaching at 65 she lost the love of her life. Her gaze fell on a different horizon- How, she thought, could she have at least some control of the end of her life? How could she die gracefully, at home, with her family? What are the bumps on the road that will hinder a graceful ending?