Mum with MND dies after starving herself to 'protect her children'
A mum with motor neurone disease has died after she made the heartbreaking decision to starve herself to death to 'protect her children' from witnessing her die suddenly from choking.
Emma Bray, 42, previously spoke of her intention to move into a hospice and stop eating and drinking voluntarily.
The mum-of-two from Barnstaple, North Devon, was devastated she could not hug her children or dry their tears due to the progression of her condition, but wanted to fight for the law to change on assisted dying to help others in similar situations, the Mirror reports.
On Monday, July 14, she shared a final message on her @stupid_mnd Instagram page, along with a picture of her lying in her bed in the hospice. She wrote: 'If you are reading this then I've finished my final spin round the sun.
'I've lived a very good life, surrounded by love, music and laughter and I want this to continue in my memory. Rather than shed a tear (or whilst you do) please plant a tree or call a friend, do a random act of kindness or take time to watch a sunset.
'For moments of doubt please ask 'what would Emma do?' and run with that probably inappropriate answer. Hug everyone a little tighter and love openly.
'Please surround those who were closest to me with love, time and patience. And to quote Frank Turner - Remember you get to dance another day but now you have to dance for one more of us. Love you, bye.'
Just days before, she had gone to see Alanis Morrissette in concert with friends, ticking an item off her "bucket list". She said at the time: 'After 29 years of true love I wasn't going to let a little inconvenient terminal illness let me miss this.'
At the end of May this year, the former charity worker, who had supported hundreds of domestic abuse victims and homeless people, revealed she wanted to protect her "amazing" children, aged 15 and 14, from witnessing her potentially "brutal" death.
She said: 'I've had four different health professionals tell me I've got the worst disease possible.'
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Emma did not want her children to watch her suddenly choke to death, instead wanting a "calm and peaceful death", and had also planned her funeral and written her eulogy. She added: 'My last bit of parenting I can do is to limit the suffering and trauma they have to witness.
'I made a promise to myself that I wanted to wait to see my daughter finish high school and my son grow up a little so I can picture the man he will become.'
She chose to die using the practice of voluntarily stopping eating and drinking (VSED). According to Compassion in Dying, this involves an adult 'with mental capacity to decide to do so and in the absence of control or coercion', decides to hasten their death by completely restricting all food and fluids. They say dying as a result of VSED can typically take between 10 and 14 days.
Emma had also travelled to London to show her support for the Assisted Dying Bill. She wanted other families in a similar position to avoid having to make decisions between two "painful and potentially horrific" ways to die.
She said: 'This bill will have offered me protectio n for those I love who have already spent two years living with anticipatory grief and watching me suffer.
'Imagine seeing your children crying and upset and not be able to hug them or curl up in bed and wipe their tears away. This is hands down the thing I hate the most about motor neurone disease. It's taken my children's mum from them little by little.'
Speaking to the Mirror using her eye gazing machine, she continued: 'I now feel I am at the stage where my quality of life is very affected, I can no longer use any of my limbs. My talking is severely affected and I struggle to eat and it's getting harder to breathe. I am only really comfortable in bed and social visits are exhausting.
'I have carers multiple times a day, can't be left alone overnight and can no longer do any basic tasks. I can't scratch an itch, push up my glasses, move a bed sheet if I am too hot or cold. I feel like I am losing the essence of me, I am still so loved but I can't be myself and I see that grief on everyone's faces.
'This whole journey has been brutal but I have still been able to be a parent and I now realise I can't be a bit of the parent I need and want to be. Watching your children grieve you and not be able to hug them is the most painful feeling ever. This disease takes from everyone and it will take the children's mother from them bit by bit.'
Emma told us: 'VSED is not an easy death but with the current law in England this is the only way I can have control over my death.
'I want to protect my children from seeing me choke and struggle to breathe. I don't want to die but I am going to and have come to terms with my impending death and I know I want to die surrounded by loved ones, music and laughter not in an emergency way after further decline.'
'...My end of life wish is to be at the hospice surrounded by my friends and family. I want to have music playing, to hear people laugh and watch them playing card games over me.'
Honouring her children, Emma said: 'My children are amazing and have spent so much of their childhood witnessing me decline.
'They watched me crawl around the floor for a year before diagnosis, they help me with everything as I have no working limbs, they live in an environment where there is a constant flow of carers coming into our home.
'They are obviously struggling. They struggle watching me fade, they are already grieving for the mum I once was. How they are still attending school and laughing astounds me and is a credit to what amazing people they are.
'They have a village of people around them but I know they desperately miss me. They are living in limbo land, they know they will have to move house to live with their dad but they don't know when and that uncertainty is hard for them.
'I can see their pain and grief on a daily basis and I would do anything to take that away from them. They are desperate for a hug from me and that hasn't happened in years…
'There is never a good time to lose your mum but all my maternal instincts want to make that horrible reality as easy for them as I can.
'I urge MPs to realise that this bill will not end my life, motor neurone disease is doing that but they can help me and others with less than six months to live to die with peace. '
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