Brown, an organizational consultant dealing primarily with change, tells the story of her father, Stanley Ball, a farmer and agricultural agent who, diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, obtained the aid of Dr. Jack Kevorkian in an assisted suicide that took place on February 4, 1993. She points out that Michigan law prevented her and her brother from talking with friends before her father's passing, and she wonders why discussion of assisted suicide is so often mean-spirited and harsh. She avers that assisted suicide always appears different to those personally involved in it and that every situation is unique and all of those involved must work through its various aspects. Moreover, she does not intend her father's death to be taken as a model. Rather, she counsels caring, listening, and being open, nonjudgmental, and willing to accept change in oneself and others as elementary in dealing with the assisted-suicide decision.
William Beatty