The recent debate in the Commons about assisted dying has prompted me to imagine my own death, an exercise I have found surprisingly comforting and empowering.

Most people with cancer say they have thought about the possibility that they may die from the disease. However, we tend to keep those thoughts to ourselves. They are rarely shared in helpful conversations about death with medical staff, carers, friends or family. Death is still a largely taboo topic and those who care for us might imagine that indulging our need to talk might only ‘feed’ our negativity and bring us down. I guess I collude with this belief. I mean, I like it when people tell me how positive I am (I don’t tell them about my moments of grief and sadness, the despair, the rage). I don’t want to disappoint them by talking about you-know-what.

Since there is so little opportunity for me to talk about death (my attempts to establish an online ‘death group’ have so far failed spectacularly) I’ve been grateful for the centre stage that death has taken in the recent debate of the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill which MPs have backed to legalise assisted dying in England and Wales by 23 votes.

Suffering 

Though I have long held a vaguely humanistic position that supports an individual’s right to choose assisted dying when facing unbearable suffering at the end of life, I’ve seldom given the matter any serious thought.

But cancer has stopped me in my tracks and has revealed just how poorly equipped I have been to contemplate my death let alone plan for the kind of death I want. A debate in the Commons has somehow given me permission to imagine it. The idea that we might have agency over our own end is strangely empowering. And imagining my demise – set out below – has brought me the most surprising comfort. Tears have rolled down my cheeks as I have written this: they contain relief as well as sadness. This ‘exercise’ has also reinforced my conviction that as far as possible, we should all be granted a calm, supported and pain-free end of our own design and choosing. If you can bear to imagine your own end, I urge you to do so. You might find access to feelings that will pique your love of life.

My deadline 

I have a fuzzy vision of my final moments. I will be in my own home – I can’t imagine being anywhere else. In preparation for the next stage of my journey (assuming there is a next stage, I’m keeping an open mind) I need to be firmly anchored in the space I know and love the best.

I have made my will. My unequivocal do-not-resuscitate wishes are in place (filed in a folder entitled ‘Death Plan’). I have chosen the music for my funeral (I’ve been putting together lists for my personal Desert Island Discs, since I was a kid). I have in mind a brief and simple ceremony followed by cremation in a willow coffin: all expenses will be spared. My ashes will be scattered beneath a crab apple tree I have been meaning to plant in our garden for many months. A bunfight will follow at our home, the stage for many a family celebration, this one included. The fridge will be stocked with beers. A special champagne we have saved for this moment will be popped. A sad little toast will follow. I have hired a local caterer because, in my experience, funerals increase the appetite for life and good food.

I have long said my goodbyes. Nothing has been left unspoken. I occasionally nurse a regret, something I feel as a tense knot in my stomach. But I know that my chief task now is letting go, of people, places, triumphs, joys and regrets. All of it. With what little energy I have, I attempt to tense the whole of my body, and then relax it, enacting the feeling of letting go as best I can. And it feels good.

I have written my ‘legacy letters’. These are love letters to those I leave behind.  And rather than passing on wisdom to the next generation (the original objective of these letters in Jewish tradition) I have tried to articulate all that I have appreciated and felt grateful for in the people I love. I imagine those letters being filed away in jewellery boxes, safes, bottom drawers and occasionally, my greatest wish, consulted as a source of unconditional love especially during tough times, dilemmas and milestones. I want these letters to arm them somehow.

I will be confined to our bed in the master bedroom, a small stack of books at hand (though my interest in reading will have waned). A radio will be perched on a bedside cupboard, tuned in to BBC Radio 4 as it has been for most of my adult life. A scrapbook of family photos and the artwork of my grandchildren will be open at a favourite page. In the face of this final unknown, I will find the greatest comfort and joy in all that is most ordinary and familiar.

We have long broken the rule about our dog Ziggy not being allowed in our bedroom. He is perfectly attuned to my declining state. He keeps a steady vigil in a way that is both comforting and heartbreaking. He has borne witness to the great love that I share with my husband, and, for this reason, he will provide the most visceral source of comfort when I’ve gone. He is the warm, mammalian connection between us.

Should I leave my bed (and I imagine this will be difficult as I’ll be hooked up to a large cannister of oxygen), I’ll be able to look out of the window for a bird’s eye view of our garden and a tantalising glimpse into our neighbours’ gardens. I notice how each time I take in this scene, I am engaged in a quite conscious leave-taking. I drink in the details, as if to memorise them for future reference.

From time to time, I will struggle to breathe, or I’ll feel great pain, but I will be comforted by a nurse who administers morphine. And then I will sleep, the thrum of traffic and birdsong in my ears. I might be conscious of hushed exchanges between the nurse and my husband. I welcome sleep. Dying is exhausting. But my letting go is almost complete and with the steady, expert management of my pain attended to, I can drift into unconsciousness without effort.

The nurse will get some notice that my end is imminent and the bedside vigil of my husband and dog will know the end is nigh. I have no appetite for a gathering of loved ones to witness my last gasps: I know that the small part of me that might be aware would be intimidated by performative expectations. My vanity has also determined that the lasting image of me should involve me dancing in the kitchen not croaking on a deathbed.

I want this end to be as quiet and as unadorned as the snuffing out of a candle.

There she was, gone.