Dear Brittany Maynard

Update // Brittany chose to end her life on November 1, 2014.

Brittany,

I cannot even begin to understand how you are feeling today or how you have felt since being diagnosed. Your story is heartbreaking, and it has been on my mind since I saw a Facebook article about your decision a week ago.

I am writing for one reason: to ask you not to go through with this.

Please don't do it.

Please do not choose to end your life.

I don't know you, but I am crying at my keyboard right now. I'm weeping at the thought of you voluntarily choosing to die.

Like I said, I cannot even begin to understand how you are feeling right now, but before you click away, please consider reading this little piece of my heart that is beating just for you.

Cutting off your life means cutting off your story - a story that you did not write. You don't know how it is truly supposed to end, and if you choose to end it now, you will never know what was supposed to come next.

I know your family is on board with your decision now, but I can promise you that when you are gone, they are going to wish you hadn't made that choice. They will live the rest of their lives thinking "what if?" What if that wasn't supposed to be the end? What if that family she was trying for when she got the news of the brain cancer was actually going to happen? What if we missed out on a miracle?

Obviously I cannot say for certain that if you choose to live, you will wake up on November 2nd and be miraculously healed. I understand that there is a lot of pain in this world, and you are experiencing it right now. I know that choosing life could mean choosing more pain. I know that choosing life could mean a natural death in the near future.

I can't say for sure that your body will be healed, but you can't say for sure that it won't.

What I can say for sure is that whatever happens after you choose to live can be used to impact this world if you let it.

If you are still alive, it is for a reason. If you are still alive, there is more for you to do - more people to impact, to encourage, to love. Every second your heart is beating can be used to change the world, whether you are on the couch with your husband or in a hospital bed.

Please do not let fear make this choice. Fear is a sneaky little thing. It creeps in and makes a home in our heads and our hearts and gets so cozy that we have trouble knowing where fear ends and where we begin. It can be absolutely suffocating. I know you are afraid, but I also know there is a perfect love that can set you free from fear; a love that is trying so desperately to get through to you.

Your life is precious, and every second can be full of purpose if you allow it. Even the seconds that are not ideal, even the seconds of pain, even the seconds of sadness.

Please, Brittany, choose life. Choose to live this life you've been given with purpose. Love those around you for as long as you can, and don't let fear end your story.

Love,

Asha

//

There are many more of you in similar situations, facing similar decisions. This letter is for you too. It's for everyone. We have all been uniquely crafted by a loving God who has given us the freedom to choose. We get to choose how we are going to live, but it is not up to us to choose how we are going to die.