Choosing to Die - by Theresa E Evans (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

So begins the extraordinary account of a mother and her three daughters preparing for death while coping with their own grief and impending loss.

As Theresa spends the final three months of her mother's life putting her mom's prolific flower garden to rest for winter, the garden becomes a living metaphor, mirroring the intrinsic cycles and timing of both life and death. Botany provides the lens while Theresa's years as a yoga teacher and clinical somatic educator anchor the emotional and ethical complexities that arise while helping a mother settle her affairs.

Through deeply personal journal entries, Choosing to Die is a masterclass on intentionally and mindfully supporting a loved one who chooses medical assistance in dying. This vivid firsthand experience is useful for caregivers, death doulas, and other professionals and volunteers involved in hospice care and palliative care. Most of all, Choosing to Die is a gift for anyone seeking clarity and compassion in the midst of one of life's most confounding decisions.

Review Quotes

Evans' work is about the oldest subjects in existence-life, death, love, and family-and she ably navigates these turbulent waters, both as a writer and a daughter. She maintains a simple, clean prose style... Her straightforward style allows readers an unfiltered peek at intimate, trying moments.

A heartfelt chronicle of a family's reckoning with a complicated matriarch.

As a geriatrician and certified hospice provider for over 20 years, I have seen firsthand the necessary components of "a good death".

Theresa takes us on a soulful journey with her family using her mother's garden as a vibrant metaphor of life. She is exploring a topic which is uncomfortable for many, but in desperate need of being addressed with openness, honesty and compassion.

Choosing to Die is a beautifully poignant story of love, loss and legacy. Theresa Evans weaves the evolution of her mother's garden alongside the family's shared preparation for her mother's medically assisted death, using the changing seasons to guide us through their shared experience. Together, they find ways to honor their mother and each other through the living legacy of her garden, shared and carried forward with love.