Assisted-suicide debate: Stanley Kmiecic planned his death at 92

Stanley Kmiecic had lived a long and full life when, at 92, he told his family he was ready to die in the late spring of 2011.

- WATCH | Steve Fischer's report on Kmiecic's last days

With no option of assisted-suicide in Canada, the method he chose was starvation, his daughter Eva Kmiecic told CBC News.

"It took him nine weeks to pass away," she said. "We saw our dad — this very attractive, strong, very proud man — descend into a living corpse."

His final decision to die started with a visit to the Queensway-Carleton Hospital in Ottawa for some routine tests, she said

Stanley had always had a low heart rate, but when his body temperature was also recorded as low, he was admitted as a patient. Eva said he felt indignant when a nurse assisted him in the washroom.

He removed the IV from his arm, left the hospital and vowed never to return, she said.

"He was 92 and strong and his heart was strong. There was really not a lot wrong with him and he just knew at some point there would be a lot wrong with him," she said.

"He wasn't enjoying food. He was getting slower and less active and I think he just thought, 'This is it. This is the time for me.' So he decided, clearly, he would stop eating and drinking as his way of choosing death."

Stanley told his family that the whole process — weaning himself off solid food, adopting a completely liquid diet and eventually subsiding only off trace amounts of water — would take five weeks. He was wrong.

As the Supreme Court of Canada debates a case involving assisted suicide this week, Eva is hoping for a change in the laws.

‘He wanted to be able to die in his own bed’

Stanley was born in Poland, joined the underground army as a teen during World War II, and survived being shot and imprisoned in a concentration camp.

He started a new life in Canada in 1947, after getting a permit to work for Canadian Pacific Railway. He married another Polish immigrant, had a family and lived a long, happy life, his daughter said.

But as he neared 80, he began talking about his death.

"He had been very clear with me that he didn't want to die in an institution. He didn't want to die hospitalized. He wanted to be able to die in his own bed. And he wanted it to be relatively pain free. Big requests," she recalled.

She researched DIGNITAS, an accompanied-suicide facility in Switzerland

"He was really keen. He really was thinking this would be a great way to go," she said.

"He liked the idea of having a glass of beer and a good meal, and that would be it. He wouldn't be in pain. He wouldn't suffer. He would be at a point in his life where he knew he had lived a good life and everything would be in order and he could just go."

But he had not travelled internationally in decades. In the end, when he decided to exercise the option to choose his own death, getting a passport became a drawn-out burden, Eva said.

The alternative he chose was to die in his own bed.

"I didn't fight him on it. You can't really fight my dad — or couldn't really fight my dad — he was pretty stubborn," Eva said. "I think more than anything, I just loved my dad and respected his decisions. He had lived a good life. He had done well for us. And I needed to do well for him."

‘His whole body was collapsing’

There was some family resistance to Stanley's plan at first, Eva said.

"I think, for the whole family, it was a discomfort taking about my parents' passing," she said. "My mom was very unhappy in having a conversation even about it. I think worried about what it would mean for my dad's soul."

But as the years passed, her staunchly Catholic mom grew more comfortable with the idea, Eva said.

"Dying is part of living. To chose the way you die and to be comfortable with that, and not be hospitalized, I think she got more comfortable with it," she said.

Stanley started weaning himself off solid food in the late spring of 2011.

"The weight started to come off him. He was still feisty. He was in great spirits. We would sit around the table together and he would talk more about his life. I encouraged him," she recalled.

But by the fourth week, when he was increasingly limiting himself to consuming water, he spent more and more time in bed, she said. His weight had dropped from 180 pounds to less than 130 pounds, she said.

"His whole body was collapsing," she said. Yet her father, "a proud man," insisted on doing his own toiletry, she said.

Stanley reluctantly accepted oxygen by the fifth week, though he snuck the tubes out of his nose when he was left alone, Eva said. By week seven, he was emaciated and hollowed-faced, but talking still, she recalled.

"I contemplated what I could do, both legally and illegally," she said. "Your options are, take a pillow and suffocate him?"

'I just don't think humans should be put through that indignation'

Stanley died on July 18, 2011. Eva’s mother died a year later of a failing bowel.

Both deaths confirmed her belief that the law needed to be changed — especially as she, herself, was diagnosed with cancer.

"So lots of thoughts about mortality and dignity — and two real experiences with my parents," she said.

Eva is now in remission after extensive chemotherapy treatment. But if the cancer were to come back, she would want a different death than her parents.

"I just don't think humans should be put through that indignation and pain and suffering and not have the ability to have a more peaceful solution," she said. "Allow them to pass in a greater grace."